Mali’s military junta led by Col Assimi Goita has cancelled all the eleven post- independent agreements the country alongside 13 other French-speaking countries signed with France.
There have been speculations that spate of coup d’etat in Francophone countries, which started in Mali and moved speedily to Burkina Faso, Guinea, Sudan, Chad and Niger, is not unconnected to the stringency of the eleven agreements.
The Ghana Report reported: What interests us today among these eleven agreements is the tenth (n⁰ 10) which says that the 14 countries of the CFA zone through the agreement, are not authorized to have a military alliance with other countries and are also not authorized to buy military equipment in another European country without the authorization of France,
that is why Mali has been blocked until today. But the situation has been unblocked, Mali can now freely cooperate with all the planet’s countries without asking France for permission.
Mali has boldly redefined her situation, establishing herself as a sovereign state.
If such agreements are not redefined or suspended, the assumption that France has over the years unduly interfered in the democratic process of these colonies for exploitation will further plunge Africa into military rulership.
The report stated further : “That is why we do not stop denouncing this colonization which has now been practiced since 1960, by interposed persons, that is to say by leaders of their choices whom they support and whom they protect by imposing dictatorship on them in front of their own peoples.”
If truly, military intervention in politics is informed by moves to break from the shackles of dominance and bad governance, there may be a zoom.
The agreements are listed below:
1. The colonial debt to repay the benefits of colonization
2. The automatic confiscation of national financial reserves
3. The right of first refusal on any raw or natural resource discovered in the country
4 . Priority to French interest and companies in public procurement and public tenders.
5. Exclusive right to provide military equipment and train military officers of the colonies.
6. The right for France to deploy troops and intervene militarily in the country to defend it’s interests
7. The obligation to make French the official language the country and the language for education
8. There is obligation to use the CFA franc (franc of the French colonies in Africa)
9. The obligation to send to France, an annual balance sheet and a report on the state of reserves. No report, no money.
10. Renounce any military alliance with other countries, unless authorized by France.
11. The obligation to ally with France in the event of war or a global crisis.
