French Hone Hypocrisy In Africa

Tom Fenton: France Looks The Other Way For Its Former Colonies

(CBS)  Tom Fenton covered the major news events in Europe, the Middle East, Russia and Africa during his 34-year career as a CBS News correspondent. He writes about world affairs from his Listening Post in London and other locations around the world.

---

Why is it that a democratic Western country that prides itself on being a model of civilization and a champion of liberty can support dictators and oppression in what we used to call backward countries? No, I am not talking about the foreign policy of the United States. I am speaking of France, which has long used a double standard in dealing with its former African colonies.

The latest events in Togo are a reminder that four decades after the winds of independence swept through Africa, the French government still pulls the strings in French-speaking Africa.

The world may not have paid much notice to the sudden death of Gnassingbe Eyadema, the longtime dictator of Togo. But France certainly did. President Jacques Chirac of France paid warm tribute to him as "a friend of France and a personal friend of mine." Being a "friend of France" covers a multitude of sins.

President General Eyadema — a former sergeant in the French Foreign Legion — ruled Togo with an iron hand ever since he seized power 34 years ago. That was Africa's first military coup, and established a trend that was quickly copied elsewhere on the black continent.

Eyadema was shrewd enough to recognize the French "sphere of influence" in Africa, and France was cynical enough to overlook his excesses. French advisors ran the country, and made sure he stayed in power. In recent years, as most foreign aid donors began to get squeamish about giving money to a dictator, Eyadema went through the motions of holding elections, but they were shams. The General President — who styled himself as "the Guide" — brutally eliminated any opposition.

But France continued to bankroll him with $100 million in aid each year, little of which went to the people. Togo is a sliver of a country, squeezed between Ghana and Benin, and has few natural resources other than the handouts from the French government. Its GDP per head was $243 last year, less than when Eyadema took power.

What did the French government get in return? It got Togo's vote in the U.N. General Assembly and its unstinting support for French foreign policy. Whether that was worth the money only the French can judge, but presumably they thought it was.

Only, now that Eyadema is dead and one of his sons, Faure Gnassingbe, has seized power, Togo has suddenly become an embarrassment for the French government. The problem is partly the way that his son seized power — rewriting the Constitution on the spot (it took 45 minutes) and shutting out the speaker of the parliament, who should have become the interim president. What may have bothered the French even more is that they may have been caught short by the son's power play. Perhaps Faure was not their man, and they preferred another candidate.

For whatever reason, the French government is now calling for "respect" for the Togo constitution and free and transparent elections for a new president. The Greeks may have invented the word "hypocrisy" but the French developed it to a fine art.