French Intervention in Africa – creating “stability” to maintain exploitative economic relations precludes the possibility of political development
On the fifth of December last year, the UN Security council voted unanimously to authorise France, CAR’s former colonial ruler, to intervene to restore order and protect civilians after eight months of warfare between rebel forces, militias and government forces. However, this is not the first time France has intervened in a former colony to restore order. Why has military action been necessary?
All the way back in 2008, France sent troops to intervene in Chad to defend its political ally, Chad’s corrupt and nefarious government, against rebel militias. President of Chad, Idriss Deby, has been president and ally of France since 1990, when he took over the capital with his own rebel militia (supported by the French). Chad is a source of raw materials for the French economy, and French private and government investors own a substantial portion of Chad’s industrial and financial institutions. Chad is also the seventh poorest country in the world, with 80% of its population living below the poverty line of $2 a day.
In 2009, the French government intervened militarily in the Ivory Coast after disputed elections led to civil war in the country. France made the largest contribution of international troops sent in to bring an end to the fighting and oust President Gbagbo, but it was not the first time the Ivory Coast had seen French soldiers. In 2004, the same President Gbagbo that was the target of the 2009 UN mission had bombed French peacekeepers in the same country, killing nine soldiers. This lead to a negative reaction among the French public to military interventions in Africa, made worse when it emerged French troops were also implicated gunning down peaceful protestors in the Ivory Coast in the same year. The 2009 intervention successfully secured peace and stability, and a French victory in the former colony which had also seen French PR defeat. By conditioning the acceptance of foreign intervention among the French population through the emphasis on its short-term success, and by overcoming its own mini ‘Vietnam syndrome’, France was able to continue its foreign interventions on the African continent unhindered by public hesitancy.
The emphasis on the military victory crowded out any discussion about why the Ivory Coast had descended into civil war twice within the same decade despite French intervention. It seems that all too often sustained humanitarian progress is not the outcome after French intervention in Africa.
In Mali in 2013, the frequently oppressed Taureg minority in Malian Azawad staged a revolt against a corrupt government that considered them second-class citizens. The revolt was hijacked by Islamist groups, which led France to intervene to reinstate the questionable Malian government (which began to extra-judicially execute Taureg citizens soon after) and suppress the Taureg movement. An election was held among the southern citizens soon after, which did nothing to ameliorate the substantial woes facing most Malians, which is predominantly the crushing misery of serious poverty. The question of Taureg independence, and oppression of minorities, was left unaddressed, to boil over again at another date no doubt. Stability was achieved, but long-term developmental prospects and conflict prevention remain nil.
France is concerned with stability in former colonial nations because it maintains strategic political relations and profitable trade with them. The continent accounts for 5% of France’s exports and 240,000 of its expat nationals. Though France has attempted to diversify its sources of raw materials, Africa remains an important supplier of oil and metals. This is especially true of C.A.R., Mali, Chad and the Ivory Coast, for whom France is their primary trade partner. They are also all members of the African Financial Community, which links the value of their common currency to the French franc, and the Bank of Central African States, which is backed by the French treasury. There is nothing wrong with economic relations (despite their quasi-exploitative nature). However, when economic ties surpass humanitarian causes as the reasoning behind intervention, we can predict with certainty that the effort needed to create sustainable long-term political stability for the benefit of all Africans is not going to be introduced.
The problem with foreign intervention is that western discussions about foreign military intervention preclude the possibility that humanitarian issues aren’t the major issues concerning western governments. The history of French interventions in instability-ridden African nations doesn’t show a humanitarian mission bent on the fixing of fundamental political issues, but short-term military missions designed to protect nefarious economic allies despite their brutal operations, and to provide enough stability to allow profitable trade in natural resources to continue. It’s not about fixing systemic political issues at the heart of formerly colonial African states, but about maintaining the exploitative economic bond, and control over the region. Genuine economic empowerment of African nations, under the auspices of real self-determination, is generally not compatible with European geopolitical agendas. Sad, but true.
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IMMIGRATION – THE REAL DEAL
A two part article on the deliberately misleading coverage and scapegoating of immigrants in the media
Last summer, rush hour commuters at Kensal Green station on their way to work were struck by a scene that looked like it could have come straight out of the dystopian film ‘Children of Men’. Standing right in front of the escalators were several burly UK border agents taking aside and questioning non-white commuters, asking for proof that they are not illegal immigrants. A local resident asks about what is happening, and the agents promptly threaten him with arrest for ‘obstruction’ and tell him to ‘crack on’, despite his perfectly legitimate question.
The operation was later admitted to have been called into effect not based on any particular information that illegal immigrants would be accessing that particular tube station on that particular day, but was part of a wider campaign against illegal immigrants in the Kensal Rise area (which included the infamous racist vans). The idea, according to the Home Office was to show “presence” and make it clear that “something was being done” about “the immigration issue”. The results of the endeavour were kept secret as it would “reveal operational intelligence” (read: “because it didn’t work”).
Turns out the only thing illegal about the entire scene was that the border agents failed to inform the people they took aside that actually under law you are not compelled to consent to the questioning at all.
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The man who stopped to take this cracking photo of the burly cop types in the background questioning people from ethnic minorities was told he was “loitering on private property”, and that he was giving officers “reason to suspect he was involved in terrorism”. Classic.
If you live in the UK, and read the national papers, you would become accustomed to being bombarded with coverage about immigration that is overwhelmingly slanted, misrepresentative, and sometimes just completely wrong. A wholesome look at how the issue of immigration is actually treated, and dissection of some government claims, can tell us a lot. Why on earth are such heavy-handed tactics used by the UK border agency? Are illegal immigrants, or immigrants in general, really such a serious problem? Is there any problem with immigration at all?
Newspapers frequently give the impression that immigration contributes to serious issues like unemployment and the fiscal deficit. Of course, this is a complete fiction.
The simple facts are that despite routine headlines about immigration cost per UK household, or arguing that migrants are 20% more likely to claim work benefits than Britons, immigration gives an enormous boost to the UK economy.
Immigrants are 20% more likely to claim work benefits than Britons simply because immigrants are proportionately over-represented in the work force, more of them are employed than native Britons. Only 6.6% of UK immigrants last year were unemployed within 6 months of receiving their National Insurance number. That’s an employment rate, among immigrant populations, of 93.3%. Immigration is thought by economic think tanks to be responsible for over £6 billion worth of economic growth over the last few years.
Immigrants actually have a positive effect on the dependency ratio, which is the proportion between those of not working age (classed as dependents) and those of working age in the population, meaning most migrants are actually of working age. Immigrants are actually far less likely to claim benefits on the whole than UK citizens, being 9% of the population yet only comprising 6.4% of claimants. All in all, immigrants contribute 34% more in taxes than they receive in benefits. It seems that most immigrants to the UK are of working age, are actively looking for or have already found jobs, and are fully intent on making a contribution to the economy.
A major claim of the year, made by Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt as part of the government agenda to eliminate the fiscal deficit, was that Health Tourism (the idea that foreign nationals come to the UK to take advantage of its world class health system) costs the NHS over £2 billion a year. However, it was found out that the NHS only has records for between £30 and £70 million pounds worth of such activities (a negligible amount in a budget amounting to £110 billion). Surprisingly, to this date no one really has any clue where Jeremy Hunt got that figure from.
Another well-repeated broad claim made by the UK’s national dailies is that immigrants even contribute to the housing crisis because they represent an overwhelming burden on council housing allocation. Headlines like “Somali asylum seeker given £2m house” and “Former asylum seeker gets £1.8m house” do nothing to correct this erroneous atmosphere. The truth is they are underrepresented in council housing, only 5% of council house tenants are foreign nationals, while the proportionate immigrant population stands at 9%.
An EU report on the migration situation in Europe last year purported that there was “little evidence” that EU citizens come to Britain to collect state benefits, and that “benefit tourism” was largely a myth. The report goes on to say, the “vast majority of immigrants move to find (or take up) employment” and that the “budgetary impact of claims by non-active EU migrants on national welfare budgets is very low”.
Regardless of the truth and facts, we have a situation in the media where newspapers can regularly place headlines such as the now infamous Sun headline “600,000 benefit tourists” in Britain, and retract them in small print in the next issue, meekly admitting that there was actually “no evidence” behind the headline. As far as the government and media are concerned, immigration is a serious issue that contributes to problems such as unemployment, the fiscal deficit, crime, the housing crisis, and just about anything you can think of.
According to a comprehensive Ipsos Mori poll, public concern about immigration has risen substantially since the late 90’s, with newspaper readership a strong predicator. In 2002, a full quarter of all the articles in the Daily Mail and the Daily Express were on the subject of asylum (overkill much?). The myths surrounding immigration prevalent in our media have strongly influenced the public discourse in the UK.
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This graph indicates a separate survey to the Ipsos Mori poll, this one interestingly shows immigration concern by newspaper readership. Of course, there is a problem of causality – are Mail readers more concerned about immigration because they read the Mail or do they read the Mail because they are more concerned about immigration? The graph shows that coverage of the issue in papers and people’s perceptions are clearly related.
The issue of immigration is encased in serious misconceptions, and the level of concern for the issue ends up crowding out actual problems from the public discourse. As long as the public are concerned with one particular bogeyman, and as long as they tacitly concede to having their fears constructed for them, they will never be able to deduce the real cause of their woes. People aren’t able to comprehend that depreciating quality of healthcare might be due to cuts to its funding, and slow privatisation of its components, when they are outraged by mythical health tourists. They will never be able to raise the serious issue of unemployment in the context of the economy reeling from the failure of austerity, instead of within the context of immigrants stealing jobs. Despite the economic truth, that immigrants serve the national economy to the tune of billions, it appears they serve the nation better as scapegoats for its many serious problems.
