African Countries Forced by France to Pay Colonial Tax
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African Countries Forced by France to Pay Colonial Tax
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Re: African Countries Forced by France to Pay Colonial Tax
#2> We often accuse African leaders of corruption and serving western nations interests instead, but there is a clear explanation for that behavior. They behave so because they are afraid the be killed or victim of a coup. They want a powerful nation to back them in case of aggression or trouble. But, contrary to a friendly nation protection, the western protection is often offered in exchange of these leaders renouncing to serve their own people or nations’ interests.
The same arrangement prevails between the defenders democracy and smaller countries that can't defend themselves against Big Brothers.
Why do you think Uncle Sam chose to invade Iraq when the House of Saud is the real evil in the ME?
Re: African Countries Forced by France to Pay Colonial Tax
#3This is really Horrible.
Probably, why 80% of the 10 countries with the lowest literacy rates in the WORLD among adults are in francophone Africa.
Namely: Benin (40%), Burkina Faso (26%), Chad (34%), Côte d’Ivoire (49%), Guinea (29%), Mali (23%), Niger (29%), and Senegal (42%).
Re: African Countries Forced by France to Pay Colonial Tax
#4My first post on HN :)
I'm not sure the situation is a simple as the author implies.
It is true that when the French left Guinea in 1958 they took everything with them. Eventually Guinea turned to communist Russia with even greater consequences.
The author claims "Right for France to pre-deploy troops and intervene military in the country to defend its interests". This is not true as it's a defence agreement against external aggression, not internal civil war. For example they did not intervene for any side during the 2002-2004 civil war in the Ivory Coast.
The usage of Franc CFA is actually beneficial to those using the currency as it's value is pegged to the Euro, hence helping to control inflation.
I do not dispute the facts that Africans countries ought to be more autonomous (after all that's what independence is), but this stems more from a failure from Africans politicians than anyone else.
Re: African Countries Forced by France to Pay Colonial Tax
#5My first post on HN :) I'm not sure the situation is a simple as the author implies. It is true that when the French left Guinea in 1958 they took everything with them. Eventually Guinea turned to communist Russia with even greater consequences. The author claims "Right for France to pre-deploy troops and intervene military in the country to defend its interests". This is not true as it's a defence agreement against…
>"For example they did not intervene for any side during the 2002-2004 civil war in the Ivory Coast."
That's no true. France supported Alassane Ouatarra, the current president who lost the election, but was backed by France which troops fired on people on the street and also bombarded with helicopters the presidential palace to force the elected president Laurent Gbagbo to give power to Alassance Ouattara supported by France.
Links are all over the net to prove that.
The fact and history behind the CFA is much more dark, than presented.
I agree with you, Africans should fight the French to become more autonomous.
Re: African Countries Forced by France to Pay Colonial Tax
#6This is really Horrible. Probably, why 80% of the 10 countries with the lowest literacy rates in the WORLD among adults are in francophone Africa. Namely: Benin (40%), Burkina Faso (26%), Chad (34%), Côte d’Ivoire (49%), Guinea (29%), Mali (23%), Niger (29%), and Senegal (42%).
That sounds simplified. Mali, Chad and Niger are inland desert countries whose enormous total land area consists mostly of Sahara. They would still be desperately poor even if their official language were English, Dutch or Danish instead of French.
Conversely we could look at African countries that haven't had to suffer meddling from a colonial parent, and they don't seem to be much better off. Liberia has been independent for a long time. The Democratic Republic of Congo doesn't suffer from Belgian military interventions. Neither is a paradise.
Re: African Countries Forced by France to Pay Colonial Tax
#7Another foreigner discovers the wonders of Francafrique, but he gets the mechanism wrong.
Although trying to study the place from third party sources is like watching Rashomon, this is pretty much how it works: - "friendly" dictator is installed and maintained so long as he cooperates. - aid packages are sent over (in cash, by plane) and loans made with friendly zero interest - money flies straight back via Geneva to finance French parties (e.g. RPR and Chirac, but also Mitterrand whose network was a subset of Pasqua's, ironically; who knows who is in charge these days) - country is maintained in poverty by any means practical (rigged election equipment with magical 90%+ wins, flying in 1,000 soldiers into Congo from Chad, shipping weapons by the crate...) so as to lower the cost of keeping it under control. This includes financing both sides of a war (as in Angola), and the "black governors" as some call them deliberately installing the rule of corruption from top to bottom (see Mobutu for the best example). The loans and missing aid definitely help keep the finances problematic, especially when they cause future resource production to be promised away for years as collateral.
It's important to note that Francafrique has been internationalised; FX Verschave, who despite being almost a communist has been very good at keeping track of the whole thing thinks the French networks have become subsets of the US ones. Cuba, Russia were also big players on the chessboard. As for the targets the saying is the louder they complain about the West, the closer they are. Omar Bongo was hand-chosen by De Gaulle (cf Foccart's memoirs) and trained and educated in France. He was the most reliable and famous, so close to the French government he arbitrated disputes between ministers.
You basically hear two sides of the story: - "communists are trying to take over the place and we must stop them and forget human rights for a while whilst we do so" (CIA, Rhodesians, South Africans back in the days) - "the Western capitalist powers will do anything to conquer their colonies and keep them in control, but we're the democratic choice" (Madagascar, Ghana, Zimbabwe and the aforementioned left wing countries). Some of the claims are pretty bold, for example aforementioned Verschave claims the left wing Mitterrand made Le Pen's political career happen (from 0.4 to 10% of the vote) in exchange for maintaining a nice vivier of far-right youth that could be relied on for African "holidays" and the occasional false flag car burning in Algerian-French banlieues.
I don't think either side is right of course but you can glimpse crumbs of truth from each side, and occasionally pockets of data emerge as the various powers take the fight to the press and public temporarily, or some Don Quixote decides to try her hand at windmills like Eva Joly against Elf (cf "Poisoned Wells" which is a nice taster to the place). I look forward to reading the declassified intelligence documents in 70 years or whatever it is. Mercenary accounts can be pretty entertaining too - I'll close with Simon Mann's quote about the French DGSE and military intelligence, "whatever you do, we can do dirtier".
Re: African Countries Forced by France to Pay Colonial Tax
#8That articles looks bogus. For instance:
It’s such an evil system even denounced by the European Union, but France is not ready to move from that colonial system which puts about 500 billions dollars from Africa to its treasury year in year out.
According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budget_of_France, that's pretty much equivalent to the budget of the French government. If that number were true, France finances ought to be in better shape.
Re: African Countries Forced by France to Pay Colonial Tax
#9That articles looks bogus. For instance: It’s such an evil system even denounced by the European Union, but France is not ready to move from that colonial system which puts about 500 billions dollars from Africa to its treasury year in year out. According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budget_of_France , that's pretty much equivalent to the budget of the French government. If that number were true, France finances o…
The money does not appear on official counts, it mostly sits in offshore accounts and structures. Cf the Clearstream affair.
Re: African Countries Forced by France to Pay Colonial Tax
#10My first post on HN :) I'm not sure the situation is a simple as the author implies. It is true that when the French left Guinea in 1958 they took everything with them. Eventually Guinea turned to communist Russia with even greater consequences. The author claims "Right for France to pre-deploy troops and intervene military in the country to defend its interests". This is not true as it's a defence agreement against…
>"For example they did not intervene for any side during the 2002-2004 civil war in the Ivory Coast." That's no true. France supported Alassane Ouatarra, the current president who lost the election, but was backed by France which troops fired on people on the street and also bombarded with helicopters the presidential palace to force the elected president Laurent Gbagbo to give power to Alassance Ouattara supported b…
You are mixing the facts.
I stated the 2002-2004 war. The election were held in 2010.
During the civil war[1] 2002-2007 The country was divided in two with the French military separating both side, the French were authorized to act by UN resolution 1528 (very important!)
The elections were held in October 2010, the counting took months and the Electoral commission declared Alassane Ouatarra the winner in December 2010. Laurent Gbagbo refused to stand down, claiming he won. Thus the 2nd civil war began[2]. The stand off continued until April 2011 when the rebel took control of the country including Abidjan and with the help of the French removed Gbagbo.
[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Ivorian_Civil_War [2]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Ivorian_Civil_War