From: Tsegai Emmanuel (emmanuelt40@gmail.com)
Date: Mon Feb 16 2009 - 08:32:38 EST
*The Obama Administration and Sub-Saharan Africa* Stratfor Today
»<http://www.stratfor.com/analysis>February 16, 2009 | 1203 GMT
[image: display graphic for Obama and Africa]
*Editor's Note:This is the fourth piece in a series that explores how key
countries in various regions have interacted with the United States in the
past, and how their relationships with Washington will likely be defined
during the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama.*
The United States historically has devoted only sparing attention to African
affairs, and that is not likely to change much under the Obama
administration. Popular hopes abound in Africa that U.S. President Barack
Obama — whose paternal ancestry is Kenyan — will prioritize Africa in his
foreign policy. However, whatever Obama's personal interest in the continent
might be, his government will have little time to devote to Africa because
it must focus on a number of more pressing concerns — including Afghanistan,
Iraq, Iran, Russia and the global economic crisis — that impinge more
directly on core U.S. interests.
African countries, rather, will be determining how their relationships to
the United States will be defined under the Obama administration. Three
Sub-Saharan African countries in particular — Ethiopia, Nigeria and South
Africa — were regional anchors for Washington's Africa policy under the Bush
administration, but must now re-evaluate Washington's intentions. Meanwhile,
a fourth country, Angola — while not an ally of the United States by any
stretch of the imagination — is aiming to become a power broker in Africa on
par with Nigeria and South Africa. Each of these four will play a key role
in shaping the Obama administration's options in the region.
South Africa
South Africa has two advantages not shared by most other states on the
continent. First, it is at the tip of a peninsula and so only has security
concerns to its north; this frees up resources to address other needs.
Second, it boasts a climate largely free of the risk of tropical maladies,
and a topography that allows for easy agricultural and industrial
development, which combine to support long-term economic calculations. These
two advantages make South Africa the Sub-Saharan state with the best chances
of successfully pursuing development. The country's robust reserves of
various precious metals and diamonds only improve its economic outlook.
South Africa wants to return to its "natural" position as the dominant
influence in the southern African region, and it sees an opportunity to do
so with the new U.S. administration. The Obama government is looking to
South Africa to resolve the power-sharing crisis in neighboring Zimbabwe.
While South Africa was also supported by the Bush administration in this
role, Obama's approach differs from that of his predecessor in that the new
administration is not calling for regime change in Harare — an approach that
failed in 2008. South Africa now has the opportunity to secure its political
and commercial interests in Zimbabwe by directly shaping the country's
transition to a post-Mugabe regime. South Africa will then use its gains in
Zimbabwe as a springboard not only to secure Washington's support but also
to reassert its influence throughout southern Africa.
Nigeria
Nigeria is a country with artificial boundaries, drawn by British colonial
authorities; its territory comprises everything from desert in the North to
tropical swamp in the South. In such an unnatural political entity,
maintaining central control over 140 million people and 250 tribes has
required Nigerian governments to rule with a heavy hand.
Moreover, Nigerian rulers have shown little hesitation to use deadly force
or coercion in order to safeguard control over Nigeria's one critical
resource: oil. Nigeria's key natural asset — found in swampy,
difficult-to-occupy terrain in the southern reaches of the country —
finances not only the country's regional influence but also its very
survival. Abuja is trying to manage tensions in the volatile and oil-rich
Niger Delta region, balancing the country's interests with those of the
region's dominant Ijaw tribe in order to protect production facilities from
militant attacks.
Abuja is also seeking to maintain its influence as a dominant power in West
Africa. Its deployment of troops for peacekeeping forces, its banking and
commercial interests and its ability to provide oil to neighboring countries
are tools Nigeria uses to maintain its sphere of influence.
U.S. and Nigerian interests in the Gulf of Guinea and West Africa largely
overlap. Above all, Washington wants two things from Nigeria: oil and a
partner in guaranteeing regional security.
Nigeria is the fifth-largest foreign supplier of crude to the United States,
and both countries want a stake in nascent energy-producing states
Equatorial Guinea and Sao Tome & Principe. Both also want to prevent a
return to regionalized conflict in West African states including Sierra
Leone and Liberia. Abuja does not, however, want Washington poking its head
too far into internal Nigerian politics, calling for improved governance or
pushing to reduce corruption.
Given the confluence of interests, the Obama administration will likely
support Abuja's backroom moves to maintain a sphere of influence through
West Africa, as well as an initiative to, in effect, buy the temporary
loyalty of the Niger Delta region's Ijaw tribe with a power-sharing
agreement.
Ethiopia
Ethiopia is highly mountainous in the center, giving way to stretches of
savannah or inhospitable desert in the northern, southern and eastern
regions. The seat of government, Addis Ababa, is surrounded by these
mountains. While this creates a substantial defensive barrier against
foreign (or domestic) attackers, it also makes it difficult for the
government to deploy troops to defend against threats on the periphery. As a
result, successive Ethiopian governments — including the minority ethnic
Tigray regime of current Prime Minister Meles Zenawi — have maintained large
standing armies and have tended to rule with strong-arm tactics, in order to
occupy peripheral regions and prevent internal and foreign threats from
mobilizing and threatening the center. The deployment of large masses of
troops to peripheral border regions has also led countries neighboring
Ethiopia to feel threatened, in case Addis Ababa should decide
extraterritorial intervention is needed to defend the center. Such fears
have led countries, including Eritrea and Somalia, to mobilize their own
fighters to disrupt Ethiopia's forward deployments.
For internal security reasons, Ethiopia needs to maintain a forward military
posture. This includes positioning troops along and across the border with
Somalia to defend against threats that could mobilize from that country. By
the same logic, Ethiopia's threshold for invading a neighboring country is
low. Ethiopian and U.S. interests aligned closely during the Bush
administration, with Washington giving Addis Ababa a blank check to
intervene in Somalia to battle an Islamist insurgency. Continued Ethiopian
operations in Somalia could, however, disrupt an ongoing political process
aimed at isolating and containing radical Somalian Islamists.
The worry from Addis Ababa is getting caught on the wrong side of the Obama
administration in Somalia. While Ethiopia will be measuring closely its
relationship with Washington as well as the Obama government's support of
diplomacy in Somalia, Addis Ababa has pulled its troops in Somalia back from
frontline positions to garrison towns along the border. The pullback allows
Addis Ababa to maintain what are essentially rapid-reaction forces inside
Somalia. At the same time, it supports the Somalian political process by
blunting the Islamists' argument that the presence of Ethiopian troops
inside Somalia was the motivation for their insurgency.
Angola
Angola is Africa's seventh-largest country, located in the southwestern part
of the continent. It is a lightly populated country, with about 12 million
people living in almost 500,000 square miles; this has meant that the reach
of the central government, based in the northwestern coastal region, has
been limited. Resources — oil and diamonds — found in parts of the country
distant from the center have attracted foreign mining interests; sparse
central government control in those areas has enabled local leaders to act
according to their own interests, which frequently have been in opposition
to those of Luanda.
This combination — an expansive geography, lacking in natural barriers
against foreign invaders, but holding resources that inspire opposition to
central control — has forced Angolan governments to rely heavily on an
extensive security apparatus to safeguard their control. When its own
capabilities have been threatened by an overwhelming combination of domestic
and foreign forces, Luanda has turned to foreign interests (such as Cuba and
Russia) to augment its security. Relations between Angola and the United
States have never developed particularly strongly, however.
During the Cold War, Washington (as well as South Africa) provided military
and economic support to the National Union for the Total Independence of
Angola (UNITA) rebel group, which was fighting for control of the country
against the ruling Soviet-allied Popular Movement for the Liberation of
Angola (MPLA) regime. After the end of the Cold War, however, U.S. support
for UNITA waned, and the group collapsed as a fighting force in 2002 after
its leader, Jonas Savimbi, was killed on the battlefield.
Since then, the MPLA has been able to consolidate its grip over the country,
and has acted as a free agent selling its mineral wealth on the global
market to the highest bidder. Angola has become a (relatively) rich state,
certainly by African standards, and has only recently dropped its pariah
status. Now, Luanda wants to assume a leadership position in Africa
commensurate with its wealth and its recent internal consolidation of power.
Although the United States does have interests in developing Angola's
natural resources, Luanda is unlikely to have a significant direct
relationship with Washington. Rather, it will be watching very closely the
Obama administration's developing relationship with South Africa. This
cooperation — beginning with resolving the crisis in Zimbabwe — could lead
to a resurgence in South Africa's power throughout the region. Luanda's fear
is that this could lead Pretoria to resume the support it provided UNITA (in
return for diamond concessions) during the Cold War — and that UNITA could
reacquire an insurgent capability and threaten the MPLA regime again.