By Sheriff Bojang Jr
Africa-Press – Botswana. Washington’s reduced footprint in Africa under Donald Trump has opened wider space for Beijing, Moscow and Delhi in Africa, forcing the continent to decide whether it can seize agency or remain contested ground. Donald Trump’s return to the White House has not only shaken Washington but also accelerated a global realignment in which Africa is central but not in control. His ‘America First’ doctrine, sharpened by tariff wars and disdain for multilateralism, has reduced the continent to a transactional afterthought. Aid flows are being pared back, trade programmes hollowed out, visa restrictions tightened and the fragile scaffolding of US-Africa relations dismantled.
As in his first presidency, Trump has shown little appetite for continental initiatives. “Trump’s ‘America First’ is really ‘Africa Last’,” says Texas-based global affairs analyst Curtis Smith. “His transactional approach reduces diplomacy to short-term deals, which is dangerous for any African state negotiating alone,” he tells The Africa Report. Hug it out The unintended consequence of Washington’s tariff wars has been to push Beijing, Moscow and Delhi into closer alignment. What were once parallel competitions now resemble a Eurasian embrace. In Beijing recently, President Xi Jinping hosted Russia’s Vladimir Putin and India’s Narendra Modi in scenes that signalled a shifting axis.
Their embrace projected an alternative order, one in which Africa’s markets, minerals and diplomatic support are central prizes. China provides capital and infrastructure, Russia offers energy and hard security, and India brings markets and technology. Tariffs designed to punish have instead nudged rivals into functional coordination. Africa is no bystander in this shift but a pivotal arena, supplying cobalt, lithium, farmland and oil while wielding 54 decisive votes in multilateral forums. “ Trump’s ‘America First’ is really ‘Africa Last’ Analysts see both opportunity and peril. Multipolarity gives Africa more partners to court, but fewer degrees of freedom if Eurasian interests converge too tightly. The real question is whether the continent can seize agency in this contest or remain the prize of others. “Africa has long been the chessboard rather than the chess player. But that is beginning to shift,” says Smith. “By signalling that Washington is no longer reliable, Trump has accelerated Africa’s search for alternatives – BRICS, India, Türkiye, the Gulf and, most importantly, each other.”
Olajumoke Ayandele, a visiting assistant professor at New York University’s Centre for Global Affairs, adds that the shifting order is part of a broader postcolonial turn. “African states are increasingly rejecting the role of being subordinated to external interests or acting as subcontractors for policies shaped elsewhere.” Beijing builds, Moscow arms, Delhi invests China has spent two decades entrenching itself across Africa. Its contractors dominate skylines from Nairobi to Lagos, its banks have financed billions in ports, roads and power plants, and its control of Congolese cobalt and Zimbabwean lithium underpins the global energy transition. Beijing also projects itself as a political ally, backing African positions on climate finance and trade at the UN.
Russia’s model is narrower but sharper. In Mali, Burkina Faso and the Central African Republic, mercenaries trade guns and regime survival for mining concessions. Russian arms now account for nearly half of Africa’s major weapons imports. Cheap oil, gas and grain sweeten the deals, giving Moscow leverage despite limited economic depth. “ Russia is aggressive and takes more risks, fomenting instability to regain footholds. China prefers stability Yet the two powers operate on different logics. “China’s and Russia’s models in Africa do not neatly align,” says Liam Karr, the Africa team lead for the Critical Threats Project at the American Enterprise Institute. “Russia is aggressive and takes more risks, fomenting instability to regain footholds. China prefers stability, so it can protect and expand its already dominant economic position and gradually enter the defence space.”
India, meanwhile, is quietly scaling up. Already Africa’s fourth-largest trading partner, Delhi’s interests stretch from telecoms to energy and agribusiness. Vaccine diplomacy during the Covid-19 pandemic built goodwill, now being monetised. Unlike Beijing, it does not overwhelm with debt; unlike Moscow, it does not entrench with guns. Its narrative of South-South cooperation resonates, but its financial firepower remains modest. “ Africa has long been the chessboard rather than the chess player. But that is beginning to shift Together, though, these powers are edging toward alignment. Trump’s tariffs and retreat from multilateralism have given them a motive to coordinate. Africa is where their convergence plays out most visibly. Four theatres of contest: Sahel, Kenya, Nigeria, Ethiopia Africa’s future role in the Eurasian order is most visible in four pivotal arenas. In the Sahel, Russia’s hard-edged model dominates. With French troops gone and US presence under review, juntas in Mali and Burkina Faso lean on Moscow’s Africa Corps, trading gold and uranium for survival. China builds quietly in the background. The outcome is entrenchment, not stability: regimes endure, extremists spread and citizens remain trapped.
Kenya faces a different squeeze. Once Washington’s anchor in East Africa, it is burdened by Chinese railway debt while Gulf billions pour into ports and real estate. “ African states are increasingly rejecting the role of being subordinated to external interests or acting as subcontractors for policies shaped elsewhere With Trump offering little on trade, Nairobi risks drifting deeper into Asian and Gulf orbits. Its balancing act will be a bellwether for other democracies under strain. Nigeria has the scale to be a continental rule-shaper, straddling Chinese loans, Indian energy deals and Gulf finance. But insecurity, governance deficits and debt undercut its leverage. Abuja could anchor Africa’s agency – or remain another pawn in rivalries. Ethiopia, at the Horn’s crossroads, embodies multipolar risk and promise. China bankrolled infrastructure, Türkiye supplied drones, the UAE offered finance, Russia courts diplomatically and India invests in pharmaceuticals. Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed seeks regional leadership, but domestic fragility keeps Ethiopia vulnerable. Together, these theatres illustrate Africa’s dilemma, says analyst Emman Etuk: “The Sahel shows how dependency deepens. Kenya and Ethiopia highlight the challenge of balance. Nigeria hints at leadership. Each reflects the same question: agency or pawn?” Harare as a test case Nowhere are these dynamics clearer than in Zimbabwe. Shut out of Western finance, President Emmerson Mnangagwa has leaned on Beijing and Moscow. Chinese firms dominate platinum and lithium, Russian companies hold mining concessions, and Beijing recently opened its market to Zimbabwean blueberries.
India is now part of the mix. Vice President Constantino Chiwenga’s Chalo Zimbabwe investment mission to Delhi yielded $170m in deals, from Ashok Leyland trucks to Jindal power plant refurbishments. “ A continent of underemployed youth is a vulnerability. A continent of coders, engineers and scientists is a superpower Ayandele sees Zimbabwe’s strategy as a form of South-South cooperation rather than simply balancing great-power rivalry or disguising dependency. “While every country naturally pursues its own national and strategic interests, partnerships like these are reshaping how we think about development,” she tells The Africa Report. But rivalry lurks beneath, according to analysts. As the quiet fallout between President Mnangagwa and his deputy intensifies, analysts argue that what looks like diversification is really elite competition dressed up as diplomacy. Mnangagwa treats these partnerships as insurance against sanctions; Chiwenga sees them as leverage in his succession battle. Zimbabwe is not unique.
Across the continent, multipolarity often translates less into strategic agency than into survival politics. Africa’s fork in the road By 2035, one in three young people on Earth will be African. The continent’s working age population will exceed China and India combined. That demographic wave could propel Africa into pole position or destabilise it. “A continent of underemployed youth is a vulnerability,” warns Smith. “A continent of coders, engineers and scientists is a superpower.”
Sovereignty in the 21st century is no longer about saying no, warns Ayandele. “Increasingly, they are about the ability to rewrite the rules. In this sense, I do see Africa emerging as a distinct pole in the evolving world order if we play our cards right.” But to achieve that, Smith adds, Africa must act collectively, using the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) as leverage and resisting the lure of bilateral deals that undercut unity. It must guard against elite capture, where external partnerships serve regime survival rather than national strategy, and it must convert demography into productive employment, not unrest.
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