Africa, the world’s richest continent in terms of strategic value and mineral and natural resources, has frequently been relegated to the back burner of U.S. foreign policy. In the January 26 article, “Trump’s Africa policy: strategy or shakedown?”
Published on the website of The Institute For Strategic Studies (ISS), it notes that “The 2025 US National Security Strategy recasts Africa from partner to price tag in a transactional, resource-driven era of great-power rivalry.”
This rivalry pits the U.S. against China in the race to acquire resources and investments on the continent. As British American historian Niall Ferguson recently observed in thetimes.com, this moment (in time) represents a “back to the future return to great-power competition, with Washington and Beijing as the primary poles.”
Africa is no stranger to such rivalries. According to ISS, the continent bears the scars of Cold War proxy conflicts and colonial competition, and again risks becoming an arena for competition over its resources, markets, and geo-strategic locations.
The 2025 US National Security Strategy also frames the world in “hemispheric blocs,” noted the article, “Africa Needs a Geopolitical Strategy and Global Engagement Policy,” written by Cedric De Coning.
“The Middle East and Africa are framed as regions that need to be managed transactionally to secure their resources for the Western hemisphere, and to counter the influence of its rivals,” he points out.
Outsiders working to take advantage of the African continent is nothing new.
Years ago, famed Black American novelist Richard Wright expressed his concern about America’s role in Africa. According to Wright’s biographer, Hazel Rowley, “He listened to the Voice of America and the Voice of Peking (China) and tried to make sense out of the world.
The African countries, one after the other, during the late 1950s and early 1960s, were proclaiming their independence. Wright worried that America would bring the Cold War to Africa, and he did not underestimate the role of Western (CIA) secret agents. The Americans have their fingers everywhere,” he proclaimed.
Today, in President Donald Trump’s emerging order, the strong set the rules and the weak absorb the consequences and for African states, with limited albeit varying degrees of power and leverage, there is cause for concern, noted ISS. During President Trump’s first term, he dismissed African nations by using insulting and foul language.
During the first year of his second term, while repeating his disdain for Africa, he slashed so-called aid, which was really a disguised soft-power diplomacy from the US Agency for International Development (USAID).
In 2025, South Africa was especially targeted. President Trump accused the South African government of unsubstantiated claims of White farmer persecution, which he referred to as “genocide,” and land seizures.
This culminated in November of 2025, when the president boycotted the G20 Summit in Johannesburg, South Africa, the first to be held on the continent.
However, several African nations are not intimidated by the U.S.’s stances and moves and have been outspoken in their criticism of recent actions it has taken in other parts of the world, particularly in Venezuela.
“Maduro’s capture has been widely denounced by African governments and the continent’s regional organizations alike. South Africa has been among the most outspoken, with its envoy to the U.N. warning that such actions left unpunished risk ‘a regression into a world preceding the United Nations.
A world that gave us two brutal world wars, and an international system prone to severe structural instability and lawlessness,’” wrote Jamie Dettmer in the article, “Africa decides keeping Trump happy isn’t that important,” published Jan. 10 on Politico.
The article explores the readiness of some African nations to “defy” the American president. This is partly because they have less to lose. Tighisti Amare is the director of the Africa Program at Chatham House and explained in the article that U.S. leverage on the continent is waning.
“With dramatic cuts in U.S. development funds to Africa already implemented by Trump, Washington’s leverage is not as strong as it once was. And the U.S. doesn’t really give much importance to Africa, unless it’s the (Democratic Republic of the Congo).
Where there are clear U.S. interests on critical minerals,” Amare told Politico. “In terms of trade volume, the EU remains the most important region for Africa, followed by China, and with the Gulf States increasingly becoming more important,” she added.
Keeping President Trump happy is not that important when you have such dealmaking as “China’s top car exporter, Chery, agreeing to buy Nissan’s vehicle-manufacturing plant in South Africa, after becoming the second-biggest motor retailer locally,” noted Bloomberg.
“The move is the latest—and most significant—marker of Chinese auto manufacturers’ growing presence in the continent’s largest economy. It comes at the cost of more established players from Japan, the U.S. and Europe, which have lost market share to cheaper imports from China and India.”
According to ISS, in President Trump’s view, facilitating peace processes in Africa may reflect bilateral quid pro quo arrangements in which peace is bartered for political access or resources—rather than institutionally anchored settlements.
“The DRC-Rwanda accords reveal the playbook that will likely be used in other conflict flashpoints. U.S. intervention may also target states needed to safeguard critical mineral value chains and maritime trade routes, particularly focused on the transatlantic,” ISS notes. However, the DRC-Rwanda accords have thus far failed, with the Trump-brokered peace agreement a dismal failure.
“There’s an element of self-preservation kicking in here because some African leaders share similarities with the Maduro government,” said Oge Onubogu, director of the Africa Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
To advance Africa’s integration into the global market amid Washington’s geopolitical headwinds, its leaders must unify around a common vision. Without unity, then in the words spoken in 1948 by former UK Prime Minister Winston Churchill, “Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”
If African nations come together, they can leverage their power and influence to gain a strategic advantage and can throw off the yoke of imperialism.
“The reality is that in geo-political terms Africa’s contribution to the world economy remains relatively limited, and this, as the NSS demonstrates, translates into weak global influence. Africa can, however, collectively generate leverage in a number of areas, if it is able to develop the capacity to act together,” wrote Mr. De Coning.
“With 54 member states Africa represents a large bloc of votes in multilateral fora. When Africa partners with others, it can become very influential.
This is why some actors seek to divide Africa, while others will try to weaken multilateralism. Africa needs a global engagement strategy that fosters African unity, builds strong relations with partners, and protects the multilateral system.”
Follow Jehron Muhammad @Africawatchfcn on X