It must be recognized that President Emmanuel Macron is among the French leaders, the one who is most worked to normalize his country’s relationships with Africa. This is evidenced by his choice to recognize and assume France’s responsibility in the violence of which Cameroon was the theater before and after its independence.
Certainly, some will see a constraint dictated by the context and the current issues. But, beyond that, the problem of the French leader lies in an inconsistency which means that his actions, sometimes imprints of an apparent nobility, often contradicts others, which pass it up for a neocolonialist. It must also be admitted that he faces hostility linked to faults from which his country has been guilty before him, faults that some do not hesitate to instrumentalize for sometimes uncomfortable purposes.
As in the case of genocide in Rwanda, Emmanuel Macron certainly does not go so far as to apologize, even less considering repairs, even symbolic. But it is already necessary to salute its decision to recognize and assume France’s responsibility in the violence that punctuated Cameroon between 1945 and 1971.
Macron, executioner of his own initiatives
Following the conclusions of the report of a mixed commission of historians who had been given to him seven months ago, the French president thus endorsed with sense heavy. By the mail he sent to his Cameroonian counterpart on July 30, but made public only yesterday Tuesday [12 août]Emmanuel Macron admits that his country used weapons to deny some Cameroonians the right to aspire to get out of the colonial yoke. He also recognizes in a certain way that independence acquired in 1960 by Cameroon was only a facade, France remaining alongside the new authorities which were favorable to him to massacre opponents.
Recognizing such responsibility constitutes a considerable effort, which it would be dishonest to ignore.
Only, on the part of the same president Macron, we remember behaviors and words that contradict this approach. In particular, his declarations marked by threats following the coup of July 2023 having overthrown Mohamed Bazoum in Niger. Nor has you forgotten the Pau summit during which, urgently summoning the leaders of the countries of the past G5 Sahel, he had administered an admonition worthy of a former canton chief. So many attitudes that make Macron the executioner of his own initiatives.
France, “the evil to fight”
But above all, we live in an era when France can no longer dream of undisputed influence in Africa. And Macron is not the only responsible. In a context where the continent, and particularly its youth, aspires to more sovereignty, France, dragging a heavy passive, embodies for many the harm to fight.
The geostrategic rivalries reinforce this perception, certain actors exploit this passive to advance their own pawns, while other African leaders use it to consolidate a legitimacy which they could never have acquired differently. Often, they thus hide their own shortcomings behind a virulent discourse against France.
Thus, Macron’s Mea Culpa on violence and massacres in Cameroon marks a milestone that could help appease tensions between France and Africa. But the gesture may not be enough. Because, between the two banks of the Mediterranean, real or instrumental disputes are too numerous to disappear with a simple recognition, as important as it is.