Emmanuel Macron in Guinea-Bissau. This is both a first for the current tenant of the Elysée and a French head of state. Unlike its previous stages, Cameroon and Benin, this visit to this small Portuguese-speaking West African state is more symbolic. However, it is part of a diplomatic vision which consists for Emmanuel Macron in turning to more unusual partners of France on the African continent. This was the case for Ghana and Nigeria, two English-speaking countries with no particular historical link with Paris, where he went respectively in 2017 and 2018 during his first term.
Here is what you need to know about Guinea-Bissau, where President Emmanuel Macron’s first African tour since his re-election ends on July 28.
A state plagued by chronic instability
A coastal country in West Africa, of which Senegal and Guinea are neighbors and which is home to the sumptuous Bijagos archipelago, Guinea-Bissau is a small nation of around two million inhabitants. She obtained its independence in 1974 from Portugal after a long war of liberation, led by the African Party for the Independence of Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde (PAIGC) founded by Amilcar Cabral who was assassinated in 1973.
Since then, the country has struggled to find political stability and its army is the main culprit. Guinea-Bissau has experienced four putschs, the last of which dates from April 2012: the government of Prime Minister Carlos Gomes Junior was then overthrown between the two rounds of a presidential election in which he was the favourite. Not to mention the myriad of coup attempts, including one last February against the current President Umaro Sissoco Embalo who left 11 dead.
In 2014, Guinea-Bissau nevertheless embarked on a return to constitutional order, which did not protect it from turbulence. Tensions persisted after the election of the president Umaro Sissoco Embalo in December 2019. Last Maythe latter dissolved Parliament by invoking “persistent differences (…) that cannot be resolved” with an institution which, according to him, has become “a space for political guerrilla warfare and conspiracy”. Legislative elections should be held next December. The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) deployed a force in June to support the stabilization of Guinea-Bissau after the attempted coup in February. The sub-regional organization took the same approach after the 2012 putsch.
Since the early 2000s, Guinea-Bissau has been considered by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime as a narco-state, the only one listed on the continent. This country, one of the poorest in the world, is one of the hubs of drug trafficking in West Africa in which several army officers have been implicated. Between 2019 and 2022, 2.7 tons of cocaine were seized in Guinea-Bissau. In addition to political unrest, there are social tensions: civil servants and teachers are regularly on strike.
A regime in search of allies
ECOWAS, mediator in the various crises experienced by the country, has become a powerful ally for Guinea-Bissau. It was she who settled in 2020 the post-election dispute which had led the country to end up with two presidents. The sub-regional organization had finally recognized the victory of the candidate Umaro Sissoco Embalo. To establish his legitimacy, President Embalo has always been on the lookout for new partners, the support of his Senegalese neighbor having already been won over to him.
According to the Bissau-Guinean lawyer Fodé Mané interviewed by the German international radio Deutsche Welle (link in Portuguese)Umaro Sissoco Embalo thus benefits “of the weight that Senegal has and the importance it has for France”. The Bissau-Guinean president, continues Fodé Mané, “can take advantage of the good relations it has with Senegal to bring in a chief of EFrench state on the territory of Guinea-Bissau, which had never happened before”.
The lawyer also believes that Emmanuel Macron’s visit is only “a propaganda tool for the current regime” often criticized for its handling of human rights. Questions that will be addressed by the French president with his Bissau-Guinean counterpart. However, Fodé Mané regrets that the French President does not meet the opposition and civil society. “You cannot have a vision of the human rights situation based on that of the government”, argues the lawyer.
A new African interlocutor for Paris
In the months to come, Guinea-Bissau will play an important role on the international scene since it holds the presidency of ECOWAS. For Fodé Mané, France’s interest in Guinea-Bissau is not, however, linked to this sub-regional agenda. “At the reception of Umaro Sissoco Embalo in Paris (in October 2021)it was announced that as soon as the French head of state travels to the African continent, he will stay in Guinea-Bissau”, confided the lawyer to Deutsche Welle.
According to him, “loss of speed” of France in Africa alone can justify Paris turning to Bissau, whose regime it supported after the coup attempt. And this a few months after the official visit of President Embalo to Paris. Emmanuel Macron had then affirmed that this displacement was the sign “renewal of the relationship” between the two countries.
The French Head of State also hailed “courageous and determined efforts” led by his counterpart “in the fight against corruption and the fight against trafficking, in particular drug trafficking, which has destabilized the country and the region for too long”. As for President Embalo, who spoke in French, he wanted the support of Paris in the creation of jobs and the training of young people as well as in the fight against corruption in his country.