Quartz: Macron is making another big play for Africa, this time for its startups

Unlike Britain, the other major colonizer of Africa, France’s post-colonial ties have remained firm, through major upheaval and economic change. In recent years those ties have started to fray around the edges, with the increasingly tense debate around the CFA, the two common currencies of West and Central Africa, which are still guaranteed by the French treasury and pegged to the euro.

Enter president Emmanuel Macron. At 39, he became the youngest-ever president of the French republic, he’s widely credited with revitalizing France and elements of French self-belief. As the first president born after the majority of Francophone Africa gained independence, he’s made clear time and again he believes African countries can find their own way without paternalistic European leadership, though he’s also had missteps in getting that point across. [...]

His stated interested in Africa was clear to see at Vivatech, this year where he toured the packed exhibition hall in Paris and made a point of visiting the Africa stands with Rwandan president Paul Kagame, taking selfies with African entrepreneurs.

On the main stage Macron said the French development agency (AFD) will be backing a new $76 million (€65 million) digital project that will offer funding for African startups. “African startups have energy but the big providers of development aid and financiers have not adapted to that. We ourselves are too slow, too hesitant,” he said, speaking on stage switching between French and English.

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America Magazine: Making sense of the tension and contradictions in Kenya and Rwanda's elections

When the incumbent President Uhuru Kenyatta and his party (the Jubilee Party of Kenya) won the election with 54 percent of the vote, the leader of the opposition National Super Alliance, Raila Odinga, cried foul, claiming electronic “voter theft.” Protests followed and turned violent in Odinga-supporting areas. Mr. Odinga has decided to take the results to the Kenyan Supreme Court, despite the local and international observers’ conclusion that the election was basically free and fair.

In contrast, the elections in Rwanda on Aug. 4 passed almost without incident. The incumbent, Paul Kagame, was re-elected for a third seven-year term with a somewhat astonishing 98.8 percent against two other candidates. There was no electoral violence, no public disputing of the outcome and no overt signs of electoral fraud. Apart, that is, from one candidate for presidency, Diana Rwigara, having nude photos of herself leaked onto the internet, probably to discredit her. [...]

While many see the result as a sign of repression, supporters of Kagame see it as a sign that his no-nonsense approach to rebuilding a country that was devastated by the mid-1990s genocide has grassroots support. There may be truth in that: Under Kagame’s authoritarian rule, the country’s economy has boomed. Described as one of the fastest growing economies in the world, Rwanda has had a GDP growth rate of around 8 percent, has reduced poverty levels, invested in infrastructure and technology, and is rated by the World Bank as the second best country to do business in in Africa (56th in the world). It is also rated by Transparency International as the third least corrupt country on the continent, ranking 50th out of 176 countries worldwide in 2016. [...]

However this should offer no consolation to the deeply fragile, though perhaps more democratic, Kenya. The political chaos that marks Kenyan elections and the corruption of the country’s political process does no one any good, least of all the economy. Kenyans need to take the positive aspects of Kagame’s success—anticorruption measures and economic growth—to heart. If they do, it is likely that it will afford Kenya a more certain and long-term stability and prosperity.

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