African Union's dependence on donor funding is a legacy of rampant colonial plunder

Daily Maverick

2 days ago

Mo Ibrahim, the prominent Sudanese-British billionaire, ignited a potent debate at his annual governance weekend in Marrakesh, Morocco, an unofficial gathering of African luminaries.
Ibrahim criticised the African Union's (AU's) 70% dependence on external financing during his conversation with the former AU commission chairperson Moussa Faki Mahamat: 'You call them colonisers, but when they give us money, they're partners… This is a farce; either you're serious, or you forget it.'
He was ostensibly championing African sovereignty. However, this perspective, while nominally highlighting a crucial contradiction, suffers from a fundamental conceptual flaw in its assessment of such financial assistance.
These contributions, regardless of their framing as development partnerships, are not benevolent donations from the West; they are, in essence, a protracted form of restitution for centuries of systemic exploitation.
The historical timeline of Africa's subjugation dates back to 1415, with Portugal's occupation of Ceuta, Morocco, initiating a predatory colonial expansion that culminated in the infamous 'Scramble for Africa' in the 19th century. The Berlin Conference of 1884-1885 formalised the partition of the continent among European powers, heedless of existing cultural, ethnic, or social boundaries.
This exploitation, which extended well into the latter half of the 20th century, left indelible scars and profound economic dislocations that continue to plague the continent.
Slave trade
The transatlantic slave trade, a particularly brutal manifestation of Western colonialism from the 15th to 19th centuries, forcibly transported more than 12.5 million Africans to the Americas between 1501 and 1866.
This inhumane trade was not merely economic exploitation; it was underpinned by an intellectual scaffolding designed to rationalise the subjugation of black people as inherently inferior, solidifying the notion of white racial supremacy.
This deliberate construction of racial hierarchy created a cohesive ideological framework that justified domination and exclusion based on race, becoming an integral part of the modern global system, permeating international relations, economics, politics and culture, with repercussions still felt today.
These were not isolated historical events but systematic processes that birthed modern racism as an ideology and institutional practice. The colonial project relied on these conceptions not only to legitimise human trafficking, but also to solidify a global structure in which Africa occupied a subordinate position.
The scale of this historical plunder is staggering. One conservative estimate suggests that the British Empire alone had extracted more than £35-trillion (in current terms) from its various colonies across the world, alongside an abundance of cheap or completely unpaid labour and vast quantities of commodities such as rubber, sugar and oil.
Continuing extractive dynamic
The outflow of wealth from Africa persists even after the end of direct colonial rule. A modern study revealed that between 1970 and 2010, $814-billion (in 2010 US dollars) flowed out of sub-Saharan Africa through capital flight, illicit financial flows, resource mispricing, and debt servicing. This figure significantly surpasses both official development aid and foreign direct investment to the region, underscoring a continuing extractive dynamic.
Beyond direct financial losses, colonialism inflicted immense opportunity costs, impeding Africa's natural development. While Europe's net foreign assets reached 70% of its GDP by 1914, Africa suffered a lost annual growth rate of 0.9% to 1.3% during the colonial era.
This is in addition to the destruction of indigenous economic systems, land ownership structures, impeding industrial development, enforcing monoculture economies, fragmentation of trade zones by creating artificial political and economic boundaries, and the suppression of independent scientific, economic and intellectual advancement.
Furthermore, the pattern of European colonial exploitation versus developmental investment was not uniform. Britain, the largest colonial power, allocated a mere 16.9% of its capital exports to all its colonies (excluding Canada, Australia and New Zealand), which is less than the 20.5% directed to the United States alone.
Any claim about a beneficial contribution of colonial powers in the development of their African colonies is, at best, a fallacy.
Even anthropometric studies indicate a decline in the height of African people by at least 1.1cm during colonisation, signalling worsened health and nutrition due to land grabbing, forced labour and disease, reflecting a decline in the biological standard of living with long-term economic implications.
Furthermore, European colonialism arrested the natural evolution of African social and political systems. African societies were denied the gradual development necessary for the maturity of stable governing institutions and the internal construction of political and social legitimacy.
Colonial powers deliberately dismantled traditional structures and local governance systems, replacing them with authoritarian, externally imposed authorities serving colonial interests.
Political instability
This severed the organic interaction between society and the state, a vital foundation for long-term political stability. The direct consequences are evident in the recurrent civil wars, coups and political instability that have plagued African nations throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, leaving a legacy of autocratic institutions dominated by military or ethnic elites.
In contrast, Europe itself was not immune to internal strife and political fragmentation during its own political development. The continent endured centuries of religious conflicts and devastating wars, such as the Thirty Years' War in the 17th century and the two world wars in the 20th century, before forging formulas for political and social consensus, including constitutional democracy and the rule of law.
The crucial distinction, however, lies in Europe's ability to undergo these transformations from within its own societal and political fabric, accumulating historical experiences organically.
Africa, conversely, was deprived of this process by colonial subjugation imposed through force and domination, rather than internal interaction or social and political negotiation.
This distortion warped the paths of state-building, leading to the reproduction of oppressive structures post-independence, often under national guises but with fundamentally colonial tools.
Although development aid is typically not classified as reparations, for the purpose of Mo Ibrahim's argument, let us regard it as such.
Astronomical figures
In 1999, the African World Reparations and Repatriation Truth Commission called for the West to pay $777-trillion, a figure equivalent to approximately $1.34-quadrillion in 2023.
More recently, the Brattle Group, an international consultancy firm, quantified the cost of the transatlantic chattel slavery at $100-trillion to $131-trillion. Taking the most conservative estimate of $100-trillion as the cost of colonialism in Africa, the scale of redress required is astronomical.
If external partners were to pay the entire AU annual budget of $650-million, it would take approximately 153,000 years to compensate for the colonial plundering.
Even if we assume that all developmental and humanitarian aid to Africa, currently estimated at a maximum of $3.5-billion annually (disregarding the political and economic conditionalities that often ensure donors gain $2.15 for every $1 disbursed in aid) constitutes reparations, Europe would still need more than 28,500 years of sustained payments to compensate for the $100-trillion in colonial losses, assuming no inflation or interest.
It's possible — only just possible — that the clamour kicked up by Ibrahim springs from the AU's move to designate 2025 the 'Year of Justice for Africans and People of African Descent Through Reparations'.
No one genuinely expects Europe, or any former colonial power, to cough up reparations that could ever truly right the wrongs of colonialism's devastation. Those wounds run too deep, carved by centuries of fire, bullets, and blood — no sum could balance that ledger.
Yet, the claims stand, unyielding, timeless and just.
However, the mere whisper of reparations seems enough to rattle European investors, and Europe-based investors especially, as the global economy stumbles. Their reflex? To polish the meagre scraps of aid they toss our way, dressing them up as some grand atonement for a past they'd rather we forget.
Ibrahim's comments were made in dialogue during his good governance event with the departing chairperson of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki Mahamat, whose tenure from March 2017 to February 2025 was marked by significant controversy.
While Ibrahim is keen to criticise the AU's sources of funding, he overlooked the widespread characterisation of his guest as a ' disaster ' for the organisation. AU staff accused Faki of corruption, cronyism and leadership failures, alleging a mafia-style cartel that operates with impunity within the AU.
The greater problem for the AU, and the source of its ineffectiveness, lies not solely in its funding sources but fundamentally in the calibre of leadership exemplified by politicians like Faki.
Profoundly problematic
Perhaps Ibrahim was correct in one regard: his derision of the slogan 'African solutions for African problems'. This slogan is, indeed, profoundly problematic.
Africa does not suffer from 'African problems' with a specific racial nationality or phenotypic characteristic. Rather, it confronts political, economic and social challenges within the context of an ongoing geopolitical exploitation — another reality that the 'wise men' convening in Marrakesh often conveniently avoid acknowledging, lest it affect their direct economic interests and investments.
The Emirati role in the Sudanese conflict serves as a prominent case in point. Former colonisers, those whom Ibrahim disdains calling such, played a significant role in creating these problems.
These problems require solutions commensurate with their nature: political, economic and social solutions made by policies tailored to address them.
Crafting these solutions demands not merely financial resources but also the genuine exchange of expertise and true investment in developing Africa's human capital to forge them.
There is no foreseeable future where European nations can simply be just 'partners' free from the shadow of their colonial history. African nations need to continue reminding Europe of its ongoing benefits of this historical exploitation.
This historical reality may come as something of a disappointment to Ibrahim, but historical amnesia is a luxury only the beneficiaries can afford.
The tangible and enduring impact of colonialism on our lived present is a stark reality, not merely an abstraction to be dismissed with Ibrahim's sarcasm.
The past is not merely prologue; it is an active force shaping the present and demanding a more nuanced and historically informed understanding of Africa's path forward. DM