The Colonial Pact: On France's Grip Over Former African Colonies
This post examines the economic structures binding former French colonies to France, tracing their origins to post-independence agreements and detailing the mechanisms—currency controls, resource rights, military oversight—that perpetuate French dominance. The writer argues that African leaders who resist these terms face removal or assassination, and that genuine independence remains blocked without deliberate challenge to the arrangement.
Fifty or more years have passed for most African colonies since they gained their independence from European imperialist. Many African countries continue to suffer the effect of colonization but former french colonies seem to be having a harder time with their independence. Meanwhile physical oppression went away with the so called independence, economic oppression continues to exist today under the umbrella of the colonial tax which France forced its African colonies to agree to in exchange for their independence.
When Guinea demanded independence from French colonial rule in 1958, France reacted with anger, ordering all french citizens to leave the country together with all their property. They had orders to destroy whatever could not be taken with them. Schools, hospitals, public administration buildings, cars, books, medicine, and technical equipment were burnt down or destroyed. Even animals and food crops were not spared - all poisoned and destroyed. It was a message to all french colonies of the consequences of rejecting France and asking for independence.
Sylvanus Olympio, the first president of the Republic of Togo, instead of signing the colonisation continuation pact with France, instead agreed to pay an annual debt to France for the so called benefits of French colonisation. This prevented the French from destroying the country before leaving. This model was later adopted with all other french colonies who with the example of Guinea in their minds, preferred to live today and fight tomorrow. For all the colonies, France was the one to decide how much was owed and the amounts were so big that they were almost impossible to pay.
To ensure that the Africans will pay their ‘debt,’ France came up with a colonial pact that basically handed over the management of the economies of the said countries to France. Under the colonial pact:-
- Former colonies had to deposit at least 65% of their foreign exchange reserves in The French Central Bank and pay an equivalent of 20% of their monetary reserves as oversight fees. The countries cannot at will withdraw money from their accounts without approval by the French government and the countries cannot. - All natural resources found in the former colonies were to be exploited only by France. Another country could be awarded rights to exploitation only if France was not interested. - France gets priority in the issuing of all public contracts. - France gets the exclusive rights to supply military equipment and train the military officers of the former colonies. The colonies are also obliged to side with France in any situation of war. - France has the legal right to intervene militarily in the former countries and to permanently station troops in those countries (So let’s be aware that France can take enter the Anglophone regions today without needed any permission.) - The former colonies are obliged to have French as the official language of the country and its education system - The former colonies have to send its financial reports annually to France - At the worst of them all, the former colonies are required to use the colonial currency FCFA even after France itself adopted the Euro.
Every African leader that has tried to ignore, circumvent or refute the colonial has either been assassinated or forced out of power by means of a coup. Between 1963 and 2013, there were 67 coups in 26 African countries. 16 of those countries are Francophone, and the coups always happened after a policy change.
This depicts the situation every president or leader of a former French colony has to deal with. Without the required military force and support to force France to annul the colonial pact, we cannot anytime achieve our economic independence whose lack of is the principal cause of out social welfare issues. This longstanding problem needs more that political tact to solve. it is going to take more creativity than technocracy.
The longstanding question is “When does the colonial pact expire?” - 2035 maybe?
- Tino Foy
The piece speaks to a moment of renewed scrutiny of Franco-African relations, particularly as Cameroonian and other African publics questioned the legitimacy and durability of colonial-era economic ties. It reflects broader conversations about sovereignty and structural inequality in the post-Cold War African political landscape.
In 2018, when this was written, France's economic grip on its former colonies was not widely understood in mainstream discourse outside specialist circles. The post makes the mechanisms explicit and legible, connecting economic dependency to political instability—a connection that has only sharpened as African movements for monetary and fiscal independence have grown more vocal. It remains essential reading for anyone seeking to understand why African development is constrained by forces beyond national borders.