President Emmanuel Macron this week hosts dozens of leaders of French-speaking countries for a summit he hopes will help boost French influence in a world beset by crises, in particular Africa.
The leaders will gather Friday and Saturday for the “Francophonie” summit, the first time the event has been held in France for 33 years. Macron is also holding bilateral talks with several top guests on Thursday.
France’s sway in Africa has been badly eroded by successive coups in Mali in 2021, Burkina Faso in 2022 and Niger in 2023 which saw Paris-friendly governments replaced by juntas who cosied up to Russia.
Meanwhile the crisis besetting Lebanon, a former French colony targeted by daily Israeli bombardment and now a ground incursion as Israel attacks the Shiite militant group Hezbollah, has again shown up France’s lack of influence in the Middle East.
Centrist Macron is hosting the showpiece event at a time when his own domestic standing has been chipped by the outcome of this summer’s legislative elections which forced him to nominate rightwinger Michel Barnier as head of a minority government in a potentially testy “cohabitation.”
One of Macron’s key guests at the summit will be Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau who is himself facing a political crisis after seeing off two no confidence votes in as many weeks.
Macron kicked off a day of bilateral talks with a meeting at the Elysee palace in Paris with Georgia’s President Salome Zurabishvili, herself a former French diplomat and dogged opponent of a new law in her country seen as anti-LGBT.
The summit will use different venues on each day, with leaders gathering on Friday at a chateau in Villers-Cotterets northeast of Paris where Macron last year inaugurated a centre for the French language. On Saturday, proceedings will move to Paris.
Louise Mushikiwabo, secretary general of the International Organisation of La Francophonie (OIF) that groups 88 member states, acknowledged that the body had a “modest” influence.
‘Space for dialogue’
The OIF is not able to “resolve the complicated crises of the world, but can make things move forward,” she told AFP in an interview.
While key African leaders such as Democratic Republic of Congo President Felix Tshisekedi will be present, those of Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger have not been invited.
One prominent guest will be Chad President Mahamat Idriss Deby, an ally of France and regular visitor to Paris, whose Sahel nation still hosts French troops even after their departure from Mali, Burkina and Niger.
Guinea has been invited despite its junta under General Mamady Doumbouya taking power in a 2021 coup. A delegation from Lebanon is coming but not its prime minister.
Macron told l’Union newspaper he sees the Francophonie as “a space for mediation”, “a space for dialogue to resolve political differences”, citing a territorial dispute between the DRC and Rwanda on which he hopes to make progress at the summit.
The OIF, whose missions are to “promote the French language”, “peace, democracy and human rights”, “support education” and “develop economic cooperation”, estimates the number of French speakers at 321 million across five continents, making it the 5th most spoken language in the world.
