Trump presidency: What Africa, Australia must do

Given Trump’s lack of political experience, it has been hard to imagine how he will stand in an international arena with no coherent policy agenda.

WITH Trump’s America First campaign, African nations need to craft a coherent regional foreign policy approach for development and security cooperation with external actors to benefit Africans.

Meanwhile, Australia should take every step to ensure its investments and security engagement do not result in the destabilisation of African countries.

From being the most unlikely candidate for the Republican Party to becoming the president of the world’s most powerful country, Donald Trump’s presidency will have profound ramifications for global politics.

Here we have a man who, despite being the underdog in the 2016 US elections, holding views that divided the Republican Party and the American people, threatening the deportation of Mexicans, wanting to ban the entry of Muslims and asylum seekers into the US, never holding a public office and boisterously misogynistic, is now president of the world’s sole, but retreating superpower.

With this and the growing uncertainty that the world is faced with, Trump’s presidency is a global risk and one that will have significant repercussions, politically for Australia and Asia, and economically for Africa.

During the election season, US diplomats and their counterparts insisted that relations between the US and its bilateral and multilateral partners would not change. Former Australian Prime Minister John Howard emphasised the resilience of Australia’s traditional alliance with the US. Others argued that although changes in leadership may occur, “institutions remain the same”.

In Tanzania the sentiment was partly that bilateral relations with the US, irrespective of Trump’s presidency, would not change. Meanwhile some in Africa’s second largest economy, South Africa, have raised concerns saying that a Trump presidency will usher in protectionist policies in the US that will hinder trade between the two countries.

The shared concern among many has been to what extent Trump will deviate from current US foreign policy. Given Trump’s lack of political experience, it has been hard to imagine how he will stand in an international arena with no coherent policy agenda.

What will Trump’s policy towards Japan and the broader Asia-Pacific be? Will it isolate Japan and South Korea as he has suggested during his presidential campaign? Are we going to see an increase in Bush-era unilateralism from not only the US but countries such as Russia and China?

With the current deadlock in the United Nations on Syria, the ability to reach future consensus through multilateral channels is looking bleak.

However, the Trump administration’s foreign policy is increasingly becoming clearer. America First and US isolationism will be the order of the day. Such an outlook is already prompting both Australia and African countries to rethink their foreign and economic policy directions. Where will Africa turn, to herself

or Beijing? African countries need to capitalise on and consolidate their numerical advantage in global politics in a much more inward-looking fashion.

Through the African Union ( AU), African countries must develop a coherent approach to their international relations, particularly in terms of US-Africa and Sino-Africa relations.

An “African way” is needed towards development and regional integration, one which does not rely on the US as an engine for achieving economic growth.

“African values” must be articulated if the continent is to address the challenges and take advantage of the opportunities that lie ahead, particularly in ways that would result in investment benefiting Africa’s peoples.

African countries need diplomatic and development partners who can engage the continent on equal and equitable terms.

Increasingly, they are aligning themselves more closely with the “Beijing Consensus” as opposed to the Washington Consensus — which has been the bedrock of the global financial system. The Washington Consensus policies have slowed the growth of local industries in Africa and undermined intra-African trade, which currently stands at less than 12 percent.

Given Trump’s protectionism and his lack of interest in African affairs, the future of the US African Growth and Opportunity Act ( AGOA) is uncertain. Africa must be strategic on its road to industrialisation. Karamzo Saccoh is a political analyst, former staff of Amnesty International and the United Nations University. Karamzo holds a Master of International Relations from Macquarie University, Australia. — Pambazuka News. Read the full article on www. herald.co.zw