Regarding France’s intervention in the Sahel since 2013, Emmanuel Macron said that African leaders had “forgotten to say thank you”. A statement which did not fail to provoke a reaction, particularly in Chad and Senegal.
During the annual Conference of Ambassadors, Monday January 6, 2025 at the Elysée, Emmanuel Macron estimated that France was “right” to intervene in Africa “against terrorism since 2013”, although African leaders “forgot to say thank you”, he added. According to the President of the Republic, “none of them would be with a sovereign country today if the French army had not been deployed in this region (…) It doesn’t matter, it will come with time”, he quipped ironically.
“French leaders must learn to respect the African people”
Comments that sparked an outcry on the African continent. The Chadian Minister of Foreign Affairs Abderaman Koulamallah regretted this “contemptuous attitude towards Africa and Africans” of the French head of state and displayed his “deep concern” after Emmanuel Macron’s declaration, in a press release. Although he insisted that Chad had “no problem with France”, “French leaders must” however “learn to respect the African people”, he said.
The head of Chadian diplomacy was keen to recall the “determining role” of Africa and Chad in the liberation of France during the two world wars, affirming that “France” had “never truly recognized” it. in the same way as “the sacrifices made by African soldiers”. “In 60 years of presence (…) the French contribution has often been limited to its own strategic interests, without any real lasting impact for the development of the Chadian people,” regrets Abderaman Koulamallah. As a reminder, the military agreements between France and Chad were broken in November 2024.
The Chadian leader is not the only one to have been noticeably irritated by Emmanuel Macron’s comments at the start of 2025. The Prime Minister of SenegalOusmane Sonko disputed the fact that the announced withdrawal of French soldiers from his country would have led to negotiations between Paris and Dakar. While France would have proposed to the African countries concerned a departure of hundreds of French soldiers with a view to a reorganization in these territories, and the responsibility for them to announce this news, Ousmane Sonko qualified this assertion on social networks of “totally wrong”.
“We are not the auxiliaries of putschists”, asserts Macron
“France is not in decline in Africa, it is simply lucid, it is reorganizing itself. We chose to move in Africa (…) because we had to move,” declared Emmanuel Macron. Before clarifying his thoughts: “We left because there were coups d’état (…) France no longer had a place there because we are not the auxiliaries of putschists”. According to the Head of State, “the dialogue with Africa cannot be hostage to a bona fide, contemporary Pan-Africanism, which uses in some way a post-colonial discourse”, he declared. .
While France was engaged militarily for more than ten years in the Sahel with operations Serval then Barkhane, it withdrew its troops from four former colonies – Mali, Niger, the Central African Republic and Burkina Faso – after their rapprochement with Russia . In December 2024, the departure of French soldiers was also announced by Chad and Senegal in the name of “reorganization”. Countries that should be imitated by Côte d’Ivoire. In fact, Ivorian leaders have already announced that the Port-Bouet military base will be returned to the country.