- Presidents from five small nations praise Trump’s diplomacy
- Immigration and security shape new U.S. outreach strategy
ABUJA, NIGERIA – U.S. President Donald Trump met with leaders from five African countries in Washington on Wednesday brandishing his trade-over-aid policy, though the meeting was about more than trade.
African leaders at the meeting included the presidents of Gabon, Guinea-Bissau, Senegal, Liberia, and Mauritania. These relatively small countries, mostly found on the western side of the continent, are seemingly of less strategic value compared to the bigger countries. They were beholden to Trump, who seized the opportunity to enthuse about Africa.
“There’s great economic potential in Africa, unlike a few other places,” Trump declared at the press conference following the meeting. “There’s tremendous wealth there.”
Yet with immigration, how to stem the flow of people to the U.S., and security loomed large over the meeting. Trump conceded that a major sticking point was “the high number of people overstaying their visas.” Mauritania, Senegal, Guinea Bissau and Liberia also occupy a part of West Africa that has been a launchpad for immigrant boat journeys trying to reach either Europe or the Mexico-U.S. border.
The five countries also offer the U.S. the opportunity to build new friends in a region where it had suffered strategic setbacks in recent years with pro-Russian regimes seizing power in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger. Part of the consequences was Niger’s decision to shut the U.S. military base from where it monitored and launched drone attacks against jihadist groups active in the Sahara Desert.
Security and strategy
That is a need that the Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Ghazouani probably had in mind when he highlighted his country’s unique position. “Mauritania is a great country in the sense of its strategic position,” he said in his remarks. “It is on the Atlantic Coast which makes it a neighbour to the US. It unites North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa.”
On the deals side, the country offered investment opportunities in critical minerals such as manganese, uranium, iron ore and rare earths. And all the other countries offered a mix of investment opportunities in critical minerals and political collaboration with Trump, who got praised for his peace-making efforts in Africa and elsewhere.
It was a tone set by the U.S. President himself when he talked about the peace agreement he brokered between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda.
“They’ve been fighting for 30 years, 7 million dead, and they think their number is actually quite a bit higher than that,” Trump said. “The countries were very happy that we were able to solve that problem. I think over the next couple of weeks the leaders of both countries will come to sign the final agreement.”
“The meeting allowed Trump to project unquestioned power over the presidents of small African countries,” said Gbara Awanen, an Abuja-based West Africa analyst. “But they merely represent the low-hanging fruits of African diplomacy; the main challenge is in dealing with the more important countries.”
