South Africa and its neighbors were at the center of a struggle for influence this week when top Russian and US officials visited, offering a rare moment of influence for governments on a continent more accustomed to being battered by events than courted.
With a war in Europe pitting invading Russian forces against a Western-armed Ukrainian army, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen were looking for support. broader international.
For southern African countries, which hold strong ideological and historical sympathies for Russia but have far more significant trade balances with the European Union and the United States, that rivalry presents an opportunity.
“They have the opportunity to play one side against the other to obtain concessions; for more aid, more trade,” said Steven Gruzd of the South African Institute of International Affairs. “That is precisely what we are seeing right now.”
The war in Ukraine has intensified the longstanding competition between the great powers for access to Africa’s abundant natural resources and the diplomatic prize of its 54 UN votes.
But Africa’s voting patterns at the United Nations show a continent divided over which side to support in the Ukraine war.
Landlocked between South Africa and Mozambique and with a gross domestic product of less than $5 billion, the small kingdom of Eswatini rarely attracts the attention of world powers. No Russian diplomat is based there.
However, Lavrov made a stopover after visiting South Africa, which his counterpart Thulisile Dladla described as a “profound honour”. The two parties signed a visa waiver agreement.
Eswatini depends on US aid, but its absolute monarchy has faced US criticism on human rights.
‘Multipolar’
For South Africa, the continent’s economic powerhouse and diplomatic heavyweight, it was an opportunity to mock a Western alliance it sees as too bossy and hegemonic.
Hosting Lavrov in Pretoria, his counterpart Naledi Pandor defended the planned joint military exercises with Russia and China as a “natural course of relations” between “friends”, and suggested that South Africa no longer believed that Russia should withdraw from Ukraine unless to reach a peace agreement. it is agreed.
South Africa, along with Russia and China, is pushing for a “multipolar” world in which geopolitical power is less concentrated in the United States. For that reason, he is an enthusiastic exponent of a proposed political and trade alliance between himself, Brazil, Russia, India, China (BRICS), for which he will hold a summit later this year.
“A more inclusive multipolar world. This is the vision of the BRICS family and what we all subscribe to,” Anil Sooklal, the South African official in charge of BRICS, told Reuters.
But South Africa’s exports to Russia were $587 million in 2020, while its exports to the United States in the same year were $10.2 billion, data from the Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC) shows.
“South Africa takes the BRICS very seriously, but the reality is that the BRICS have (offered) very little,” said Tom Lodge, professor of peace and conflict studies at the University of Limerick. “It hasn’t delivered the kind of benefits that South Africa was hoping to get.”
China, an ally of Russia, a major trading partner, has been more interested in staples like wine and wool than the high-tech value-added products South Africa wants to sell, Lodge said, adding that “the United States offers better business opportunities.”
Yet despite South Africa’s refusal to vote against Russia at the UN and its rejection of NATO’s position on Ukraine, Yellen met with South African officials and on Thursday will visit mining sites that stand to lose jobs due to the transition to green energy that the United States is a part of. a major funder.
‘Too important’
While Angola’s aging political class still remembers Russia’s support for its then Marxist Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) in its 27-year civil war against Washington-backed rebels, there has been a marked shift to the West since that President João Lourenço took office in 2017.
“Angola is one of the few African countries that condemns Russia’s actions, apparently under pressure from the EU,” said South African political risk analyst Marisa Lourenco, noting “a sharp turn toward the United States and away from Russia.”
Angola is also seeking to deepen ties with Germany, France and its former colonial ruler Portugal, he said. Lourenço even suggested in an interview with Voice of America in December that he would like to ditch Russian military assistance in favor of the US military equipment program.
That did not stop Lavrov from paying a courtesy visit to Luanda on Wednesday, where he offered to double university scholarships for Angolan students to 300 next year in an exercise of Russian soft power. Russia’s Alrosa, the world’s biggest diamond producer, has a 41% stake in a huge mine in Angola.
“Russians want to say out loud that they are not isolated and that they are welcome everywhere,” said Irina Filatova, emeritus professor of humanities at the University of KwaZulu-Natal.
“(That) won’t win (South Africa) over the US or the British, but it doesn’t mean they will stop trading,” he said. “It’s too important.”
