Экономическое возвращение России в Африку

1.1 Background to the Study
During the years of 2000s there was a resurgence of the interests of Russia in the continent of Africa. According to Pajon (2017) the renewal arose within Russia framework of new foreign policy, that started to develop during late 1990s and recently consolidated. After encountering a wonderful age in the periods of USSR, mostly in 1960s, the relationships between Africa and Russia considerably decline with the fall of USSR. Whereas Russia has not at one time withdrawn from Africa, its engagement in the continent regressed at the preliminary years. The early 1990s happened to be years that Russia made efforts of developing relationships with the West while withdrawing from the continent of Africa (Ramani, 2016).
According to Mehmet (2018) failure to accomplish the momentum desired in its relationships with the West, Russia started to develop a bigger scale, multi-dimensional policy incorporating the former geography of Soviet and Middle East originally, and Latin America, Africa and China after that (Oldberg, 2017). The process, that grew a fresh momentum in the course of the era of President Vladimir Putin in 2000s, has radically developed with the increase in prices of oil and the impact of a cooperative global structure. The agenda and priorities of the geopolitics of Russia have grown towards developing a contemporary geo-economical understanding because of its developing economy, foreign investments and trade in this fresh period (Mehmet, 2018).
According to Korybko (2016) the political involvement of Russia in Africa diminishes as compared to how it has invested in the continent of Asia. From his first tenure in governance, Vladimir Putin has visited nations in Asia towards developing bilateral relationships. Africa happened to just be of only negligible significance to him. In the priorities hierarchy of Russia, the High North and Arctic are amongst the tactical interests of Kremlin, partly as a result of natural resources that can be extracted there and the presence of the military of Russia in the region Murmansk. Africa, in the meantime, conquers a second tier, as a result of its restrained economic projections and the outstanding impact of the past European colonial forces (Klomegah, 2016).
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There was hope for Russia to look for such alliances in the continent, despite that Africa is now an item of stiff competition between the past colonial forces and emerging nations, counting Russian alliances like Israel, Turkey, Brazil, China and India. The authorities of Russia are as well searching for fresh economic and financial resources which cannot be reached by the American and the European Sanctions. Therefore, after a sudden disconnection in early 1990s, Russia seemed to re-experience Africa’s attractions. The Soviet Union had heavily invested both economically and politically (De Waal, 2015).
1.1.1 Russian African Economic Relation from 2000 to 2020
The perception of Russia concerning Africa had started to transform with regard to the context of fresh state priorities and values in the 21st Century (Abbink, 2016). Russia begun establishing close relationships with the nation of Angola, a past ally. Deputy Foreign Minister V. Sredin stated, the relationships between Angola and Russia were advancing to the strategic alliance stage (Polikanov and Deich, 2014). Since 2001 to 2005, the interest of Russia on Africa started to grow, and the relationships of Africa and Russia gained a favorable dynamism. During 2001, the heads of nations of Nigeria, Egypt, Guinea, Gabon and Algeria and Ethiopia’s Prime Minister toured Moscow. During the meeting with Gabon head of state, O. Bongo, in 2001, Putin stated, Russia wished to start friendly relationships with every nation across the globe, and the continent of Africa was equally equivalent as any other area (Russian Presidential Press, 2001).
Russia took part in the Action Plan of Africa, that was acknowledged by G-8 nations in 2002 Kananaskis Summit that took place in Canada. The Business Council of Russia to Africa was established in 2002, having to engage sixty businessmen who happened to be active in tourism, finance and gas industries of the continent. Planned in 2006, the business forum for South Africa and Russia was conducted as amongst the Expo-Russia organizers. Despite that it did not have serious attendance till 2008, the council tends to be rebuilding itself. The ambassador of Russia to Ethiopia was indorsed to AU commission in 2005. Relationships were propelled with SADC, whereby South Africa pursues a core role and also the ECOWAS, whereby Nigeria serves a core role. It was easy to observe Russia rising interest on Africa amongst Russian economic and political circles in 2006 and 2007 (Pittelli & Pirio, 2015). Putin toured South Africa, Morocco, Algeria and Egypt in 2006. These tours happened to be their first to experience, since Putin was recorded as the 1st leader from Russia who visited the Sub Saharan Africa.
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The tours by Putin to the continent, counting Morocco and South Africa, were actually a clear message for the world that indeed Russia is to come back in Africa where it earlier on had geopolitical interests. Russia happens to be doing that in a significantly fresh way. In representative terms, since Morocco and South Africa were situating on the opposite far edges of Africa, Putin sent a message that indeed the whole of the region was of significance to Russia (Shedrin, 2016). South Africa became significant country for piloting for expansion of Russia in Africa as well as its relationships with Africa, the business spheres of Russia chose the nation as a basis for expansion in Africa.
Russia Foreign Ministry went on to offer political-diplomatic aid to firms by the Russia operational in Africa. Based on the figures of year 2007, the investment of Russia in Africa’s Sub-Saharan region was $1.5 billion. The volume of trade by Russia with those nations increased by a twenty percent, exceeding $1.3 billion. In 2007, 4,500 students of Africa went for education within the state of Russia, and a 50 % were financed by the state of Russia from the national budget (Korybko, 2016). 800 fellowships funded by the state were set aside for students of Africa in the budget of years 2007-2008. Aid was situated to fight malaria and AIDS in Africa. Financial and Humanitarian assistance was given to DRC Congo, Kenya, Guinea, Sudan, Mali and Somalia as well as other Countries (Mungai, 2016).
In the security sector, Russia has helped in the stabilization of the situation in Central African Republic where a Russian Security Company, the Wagner Group is active. In 2014, Russia was able to beat both UK and US in supplying arms to Nigeria to fight Boko Haram. Russia has signed military arrangements with almost two dozen countries in Africa. However, its actual presence on the ground is small compared to those of France or the US (Öztürk, 2016).
On 23rd and 24th October 2019, Russia had its Russia- Africa Economic Forum in Sochi. The Summit was co-chaired by the Russian President Vladimir Putin and Egyptian President and African Union Chairman Abdel-Fattah el-Sisi. According to the Russian Presidential Press, (2019), all 54 African states sent a representative to the meeting, including 43 heads of state or
investments. Russia-Africa bilateral trade, which doubled in the last five years stands today at about US$20 billion. This is miniscule compared to other partners like China, US, Europe, India
government, according to Kremlin advisor.
For Russia, the Summit was more than just trade and
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and Japan, only 3.7% of Russian exports end up in Africa with 2.7% going to North Africa (Sergunin, 2019).
African goods account for only 1.1% of Russian imports (Korybko, 2016). Putin announced at the Summit that trade would be doubled in the next four or five years. Trade in mineral resources particularly manganese and chromium will be very important for Russia. However, the partnerships in other sectors are set to boom particularly in areas of Russian strength. These will be in sale of arms, security, oil and gas sectors, Nuclear energy, mining and diamond industry. The Summit came up with a final Declaration of 47 paras dealing with the mechanisms of Partnership, Political Cooperation, Security Cooperation, Trade and Economic Cooperation, Scientific, Technical, Humanitarian and Information Cooperation and Cooperation in Environmental Protection (Öztürk, 2016).
All these developments pointed to Russia acknowledgement of Africa growing role in the contemporary world as well as Russia desire to participate in the resolution of international problems on the continent in order to create a multi-polar world system (Emelyanov, 2017). according to Kazibwe, (2018), Russia has been coming back to Africa slowly, but changing conditions invalidated past methods of engagement.
1.2 Statement of the Problem
Russia return to Africa raises one main question. What motivates the economic return of Russia to Africa? The study also seeks to answer other three questions. First, is it solely the result of a windfall effect or is it, rather, the product of a well thought-through strategy, like Russia’s pivot to Asia, that started in Vladimir Putin’s first term? Secondly, how has Russia’s economic return manifested itself: in diplomacy, the military sphere, natural resources or the economy? Lastly, how does Russia’s Africa economic policy work alongside those of other powers that were already active on the African continent? This paper thesis attempt to start answering these questions. First, it is beyond doubt that Russia’s economic return to Africa is much more modest than recent media coverage would have one believe. Second, the tools used by Russia uses point to indirect action and influence executed by certain private and state actors. Third, Russia’s prospects in Africa probably rest on two pillars, military-technical cooperation and the exploitation of natural resources.
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1.3 Research Justification
The research will give a discussion on how the relationships between Africa and Russia have grown since the USSR collapsed in 1991, as well it will aim at answering the reason for changes within the relations. When USSR shrunk, there were institutional and political changes in Russia that resulted to the continent no longer to be believed as an area of priority. To consider the relations of modern day between Africa and Russia, the research will assess multilateral and bilateral involvements between Africa and Russia through certain examples with attempts of narrowing the study’s focus.
The examples are going to give a deeper profundity of relationships amid Moscow and Africa, and give an insight on the overall attributes of multilateral and bilateral engagements of Russia with the continent. First, they are going to do a documentation of the engagement process, do an analysis and generalize on them. The Bilateral involvements between Africa and Russia are going to be assessed through a cooperation study in the sector of energy, military and mining amongst others.
1.4 Research Methodology
The research aims at examining, through literature analysis and review, of how the multilateral and bilateral economic relationships between Africa and Russia have advanced from when the Cold War ended. The study is to depend on the secondary sources; internet sources, articles from the newspaper, journals, books that are published counting the official and state documents; and unofficial discussions with well-known scholars of Russia. Primarily, the study is going to be an exploratory research which will aim at describing the manner in which contemporary and historical events amongst Africa and Russia have happened and waits on Africa with the transformed relationships with Russia.
Secondary data is to undergo serious analysis as well as interpretation for purposes of examining the documents accuracy and relevance for this study’s purposes. Analysis of qualitative data is to be conducted by use of content analysis for purposes of reducing the broad information variety to quite a limited combination of features constituting a variable.