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European Union And Challenges Of Africa’s Development: A Critical Appraisal, 1999-2010
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The structure of Euro-Africa relationship was traced
as far back as 1949 when the first meetings of the council of Europe,
(when European countries were still primarily concerned with their
post-war reconstruction) were held (Okigbo, 1967). He concentrated his
study on Europe’s relations with Africa as a whole. He was to wind up
his study with a call for the establishment of an Africa common market.
Okigbo’s works is interesting because of it’s indepth discussion on the
existing relationship between Africa and European community. His
observation that the way out of this continued exploitation of African
countries by the EEC lies in her formation of a common front to confront
the Europeans is worth considering by African leaders. The major
problem that has continued to plague Africa’s development efforts is the
lack of intra-African economic relations and total dependence of
African states on Europe for economic survival.
Ake (1978) looked at
the issue of Africa’s underdevelopment vis-à -vis Europe’s development.
His works are of immense benefit to this study because of the background
information they provide on European community and Africa, the
exploitative relationship, which they exposed in the Europe-African
relations still continues under the present dispensation. If there is
any change, it is that instead of the exploitation being done by
individual European countries, it is now under the collective strategy
of the European Economic Community.
Afolabi (1986), in his own
contributions on the Nigeria-European relations, traces the historical
origins of Nigeria and European Economic Community in which he asserts
that the economic interactions between Nigeria and EEC were conducted
via the approval of the United Kingdom the erstwhile imperial power,
since Britain had not made up her mind to join the EEC. He looked into
the existing pattern of economic and relations of the continent of
Africa and the community member states. He is of the view that Nigeria
and other African countries stand to gain from their cooperation with EU
through the Lome Convention in the area of trade, industry and finance.
He pointed out that the imbalance in the trade relations between
Nigeria and Europe community member states is attributable to Nigeria’s
industrial underdevelopment. He called for Nigeria’s stronger tie with
the European community especially then that the integration of Europe
seemed eminent. In his words. “..Our approach should whilst not
undermining the benefits, lay greater emphasis on our relations with the
community as an essential element of Nigeria’s foreign policyâ€.
(Afolabi, 1986:54).
He advocated for a stronger tie between Nigeria
and the European Economic Community as a strategy for Nigeria’s
development but he failed to clear the issue of whether actually, the
economic relations between Nigeria and the Community has been truly
beneficial to Nigeria, and why Nigeria has not been able to overcome her
industrial underdevelopment which he reasoned was responsible for the
existing imbalance between the two. The lack of industrial development
of Nigeria rather than being responsible for the imbalance is a
by-product of such relations with the community. It is the manifestation
of the exploitation of Nigeria by the community in their economic
relations, which leaves her more underdeveloped. However, the work is
relevant for the insight it provides on the nature of the
African-European community relations with special reference to Nigeria.
Also, his recognition of the imbalance that exists in the trade
relations between the two continents is in order.
Asobie (1983) also
examined Nigeria-European community relationship. Apart from explaining
Nigeria’s ambivalence in its attitude to the EEC at earlier stage and
why such rejection of association was later reversed, it sought to know
how the operation of Lome Convention negated Nigeria’s national
interest. The reversal of earlier decision represented a gradual
surrender to external pressure as well as the working out of dynamics of
Nigeria’s political economy.
He observed that the association is
detrimental to Nigeria’s economic interest because Nigeria’s decision to
associate with the EEC is informed more by political rather than
economic reasons. But he doubts the political and diplomatic imperative
of associating with the EEC as Nigeria’s leadership role in the third
world will be damaged due to the fact that such an association brings
about decisive tendencies among the third world countries. According to
him, such association will only help in disintegrating any solidarity
movement amongst them through consolidating Africa’s vertical
integration with Europe.
Ogunremi (1989) discussed the Euro-African
economic relations in general. He did not confine his discussion only to
that of European community. He noted that the economics and essentially
trade are the central issue, which the relationship between Africa and
Europe revolves around. This assertion is in line with Hopkins’ (1986)
idea that “trade first brought Europeans to Africa in the fifteenth
century and trade has remained the basis of their relations with the
continent from then onwardsâ€. But this trade with Europe, he pointed
out, has always been disadvantageous to Africa since the earliest trade
contact. Hopkins noted that this because the items of trade have always
been determined by the Europeans to suit their industrial development
interests. For instance, he argues that when industrial revolution
occurred in Europe, they felt that trading in slave was no more
profitable and therefore initiated the trade in industrial raw materials
to feed their industries. He sees this trade relation as being
responsible for Africa’s underdevelopment.
It is a lamentable but
certain fact that Africa has hitherto been sacrificed to our West Indian
colonies. She has been confined to a trade, which seems to preclude all
advancement in civilization (Ogunremi, 1989:56).
He posited that the
future relationship between the two continents my depend largely on
Europe’s attitude to Africa and so suggested that Europe should use her
technological advancement to the advantage of Africa and that the two
continents begin to see each other as partners in progress. Finally, he
called on African states to integrate and deal with Europe as a body not
separately.
Arghiri (1972) in his study, made a scholarly exposition
of the unequal exchange and transaction between the North and the
South. He delved into the issue of international trade transaction
between countries of the South specializing in primary commodities and
those of the North whose chief exports are manufactured goods. The study
portrayed two views. There are those who hold the view that there was a
long-term deterioration in the terms of trade of the developing
countries, and those of the opposite view, who believe that there was no
such deterioration in terms of trade and that actually, there was an
improvement in terms of trade of the developing countries.
Arghiri
supported the view of deterioration but differed as to the causes and
mechanism of the deterioration, which for him, are joined in the unequal
exchange that takes place between the advanced industrialized countries
and the developing countries. He used statistical figures and
quantification of empirical data to substantiate his view that the
imperialism exploits of the underdeveloped countries are primarily
through the instrumentalities of trade rather than through investments
and repatriation of profits.
On the problems of underdevelopment and
instability in Africa using Nigeria as a case study, Klausen (1999)
argued that uncontrolled population growth in African continent is the
cause of her backwardness. According to him, “The unprecedented high
rate of population growth has a considerable effect on the development
of Nigeria†(Klausen, 1999:14). Klausen saw the Western European nations
through the EU as rendering developmental services to the Nigeria
state. He contended that the serious economic problems of Nigeria have
prompted the western industrialized countries to take special measures.
Nigeria has better access to its markets than other African countries.
He argued that the only hindrance Nigeria has in competing effectively
in the international trade is her over-reliance on oil and agricultural
product instead of manufactured goods.
Most literatures such as Nweke
(1986); Obiukwu (1987); have also tended to analyze Nigeria’s foreign
policy and diplomatic relations in terms of the internal and domestic
variables that influence it. However, this tendency is very myopic since
domestic factors alone do not shape the external behavior of states in
international politics. This is because no state operates in the
international political scene in isolation of other states. It is a
world of inter-dependence and inter-connectedness.
Gambari (1980) saw
Nigeria’s foreign policy more as a consequence of the domestic politics
than any other factor. He discussed Nigeria’s foreign policy in the
first republic and saw the defect in her foreign policy as a result of
the conflicts between the various political parties of that period and
argued that Nigeria was always sitting on the fence on most issues and
that her African posture on independence is a manifestation of the
internal contradictions of Nigerian politics. Gambari’s study focused on
foreign policy positions of the various political parties in Nigeria’s
first republic rather than on analysis of the foreign policy of Nigerian
government. Gambari endorsed the principle of “concentric circleâ€, in
Nigeria’s foreign policy objectives, when he was Minister for Eternal
Affairs. The principle emphasized Nigerian, African and World interests
in that order.
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ABSRACT - [ Total Page(s): 1 ]This study examined the European Union, EU and challenges of African development. Specifically, the study ascertained if the increasing rate of EU-African relations has increased the volume of trade between EU and Africa and secondly, ascertained if the increasing rate of EU-African relations has increased the volume of foreign direct investment from EU states to Africa. The study interrogated the following research questions. First, has the increasing rate of EU-African relations increased the ... Continue reading---
