Sounding the Alarm - Africa in the Age of Trump

Growing up, we were taught that history is a series of events shaped by the will of nations and their people. But for much of Africa, history too often happens to us. We react, we absorb, we adjust, but rarely do we shape the tide. Now, as Donald Trump, today, marks 100 days in office on his second term (1), Africa again stands at the mercy of global forces it neither initiated nor fully understands.

Let’s be clear: Africa has never quite cracked the code of development. While Southeast Asian countries — South Korea, Vietnam, Malaysia — bet on export-led growth (2), African leaders clung to import substitution (3). This wasn’t just a policy flaw; it was a mindset. As Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the head of the World Trade Organization, rightly noted a few days ago, Africa’s default reaction to global competition has often been to ban things (4). Instead of making our own industries competitive, we close our markets, enrich a few monopolists, and punish the masses with high prices and inferior goods.

Nigeria under President Buhari was a case study in this self-inflicted economic strangulation from 2015 to 2023 (5). Despite our articles (6), Nigeria banned everything from rice to used cars in a futile attempt to stimulate local production. The result? Inflation, scarcity, and a select few enriching themselves while the masses suffered. Yet Nigeria is not alone. In Ethiopia, protectionist policies were sold as patriotic economics (7). In Zimbabwe, isolation was mistaken for sovereignty (8 ). Across the continent, security woes, weak institutions, and inconsistent investment policies have left agriculture and manufacturing in shambles (9). All these terrible policies were supported by intellectuals people thought knew what they were talking about (10). They supported African governments to shut doors and then wonder why wealth doesn’t walk in (11).

While the irony was glaring to some of us, our governments and their supporters did not see it: While we banned tomatoes and toothpicks, we never built the roads, secured the farmlands, or stabilized the power grid needed for local production to thrive. That’s not import substitution; it’s economic sabotage. Even when African governments claim to invest, it is often in white elephants or consumption-heavy ventures, not in structural reforms. Meanwhile, insecurity — from jihadist violence in the Sahel to armed banditry in Nigeria — continues to decimate productivity.

Even when America extended a hand through initiatives like the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) in 2000 (12), we squandered it. This is an agreement that provides duty-free and quota-free access to the US market for certain goods, aiming to foster economic development and enhance US-Africa trade relations. For non-oil exports, for instance, utilization rates was below 40% for 15 countries, including major exporters like Nigeria and Angola (13). Ironically, it was often Chinese companies that took advantage of AGOA by setting up African-based operations to bypass tariffs (14)(15). The program expires this year, and given Trump’s record, it is unlikely to be renewed.

Trump is not known for subtlety, and Africa is barely on his radar, unless it’s for derision or transactional deals (16)(17). Under a second Trump term, we may see the full unraveling of America’s presence on the continent. There are credible reports that U.S. embassies and trade missions in Africa could be shuttered en masse (18). If Trump pulls out of 75 embassies for example, a future leader may only bring back 40. That’s how permanent some of these changes may be.

And this is no abstraction. When Trump imposed tariffs on China during his first term, Biden didn’t roll them back; he doubled down (19). In the same way, once Trump implements any policy that has detrimental effects on the continent, even a future moderate U.S. president may lack the will or political capital to restore it.

Ignorant populists scoff at aid dependency. There is much debate about the sustainability of foreign aid. But sudden withdrawal, without viable local systems in place, is like yanking life support without warning. USAID’s decapitation by Trump has triggered similar pullbacks by the UK, the Netherlands, and other traditional donors (20). With European governments now redirecting funds to defense, Africa’s aid cushion is thinning fast (21)(22).

Aid funds infrastructure development, education, and acts as a cushion for many things we take for granted.

Consider health: PEPFAR, the U.S. program that has saved millions from HIV/AIDS (23), also played a critical role in Nigeria’s 2014 Ebola containment success, despite Lagos receiving disproportionate praise (24). This isn’t just about aid; it’s about the foundation of human capital in Africa. Without aid, many do not know that vaccine funding for diseases like tuberculosis plummets. A single year of missed measles or polio vaccinations could echo into decades of disease outbreaks.

Malaria? Nigeria still accounts for a third of global deaths (25), yet could not afford mass rollout of the new malaria vaccine in its 2025 federal budget (26). How do we survive this vacuum? Africa is being left to its own devices, without the devices.

In this vacuum, China is expected to expand its influence, but cautiously. Even Beijing is reducing its investments in Africa (27). No more blank cheques. The generosity of the Belt and Road years is gone. But in a Trump-era world, China may offer less and demand more.

If Africa has anything that interests Trump, it is our minerals. Rare earths, cobalt, lithium, these are now central to global supply chains, especially with China restricting exports. The U.S. will likely offer security support in exchange for exclusive mineral deals, much like the reported DR Congo–U.S. arrangement driven by fears of Rwanda-backed militias (28).

Nigeria’s north, for instance, already receives substantial U.S. counterterrorism support. (29) The question is: what will the U.S. demand in return? Increased military aid tied to the expulsion of Chinese firms? Resource concessions? Some have hailed US’ handsoff approach in our democracy as the needed catalyst to Africa’s long-awaited awakening. But what will happen is a reversion to resource dependency. And this time under military and geopolitical duress.

Perhaps most frightening is the growing apathy. As Sudan descends into chaos and the Democratic Republic of Congo loses a sixth of its population, the world shrugs (30). Under Biden, the U.S. spent $128 billion on Ukraine in its war (31), but these crises in Africa barely made headlines. Under Trump, the neglect could become policy.

This disengagement creates fertile ground for insurgencies. With aid drying up, no jobs, and weakened institutions, Africa could become a patchwork of fragile states, each vulnerable to warlordism or corporate extraction.

This, at a point, when Russia, a rising opportunist in Africa’s geopolitical casino, is licking its lips (32). Following coups in Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger, Moscow has positioned itself as the great anti-Western ally (33). The three countries have left ECOWAS, the regional alliance (34), and created Alliance of Sahel States for themselves, buoyed by populist rhetoric and Russian backing (35). The youngest of these military leaders, Burkina Faso’s Ibrahim Traoré, is hailed as a revolutionary by many, though his only visible credential is anti-French defiance (36). Rumors even suggest a Russian general visited Nigeria with proposals to replicate their influence model there (37). That’s not diplomacy; it’s colonization by other means.

The road ahead is dangerous. Insurgency will rise. Refugees will multiply. With the withdrawal of Western interest, Africa’s crises will become invisible to the world. The ongoing tragedy in Sudan and the unchecked violence in DR Congo foreshadow what’s to come. No one will care. Not even to help the innocent.

Even more dangerous is the likely political instability. Many African governments, fragile and often illegitimate, will buckle under the pressure. And while some hope this will eventually force a systemic reset, the cost may be too high. What is the price of transformation when millions must first perish to make it happen?

Trump’s second coming is not Africa’s primary problem, but it accelerates many of the continent’s existing cracks. Whether it’s the end of trade support, the loss of aid, or the rise of militarized resource dependency, the road ahead is grim unless African leaders, and citizens, finally take the continent’s future into their own hands and use tried-and-tested methods that other countries have used to transform their countries.

The alarm has been sounded.

REFERENCES

1. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2025/apr/29/trump-100-days-president
2. https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/economics/four-asian-tigers/
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Import_substitution_industrialization
4. https://web.facebook.com/olive.tree.982/videos/517574394620042/
5. https://therenaissance.com.ng/buharis-presidency-the-sob-of-a-battered-nation-by-victor-amadi/
6. https://proshare.co/articles/legacy/news/47884
7. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/235283803_Trade_protectionism_Reasons_and_outcomes
8. https://www.commonwealthroundtable.co.uk/commonwealth/africa/zimbabwe/opinion-zimbabwes-continued-isolation/
9. https://www.idos-research.de/uploads/media/Studies_48.pdf
10. https://web.facebook.com/obi.triceemeka/posts/pfbid0sfJiLbKc5QVpFZcoF6CwsMSZjzaZq81TwgpZP3sHshYWA632vFbhS6iD3SUDX9Q9l
11. https://mises.org/mises-wire/problem-africas-protectionism
12. https://ustr.gov/issue-areas/trade-development/preference-programs/african-growth-and-opportunity-act-agoa
13. https://www.ecofinagency.com/public-management/2404-44446-agoa-has-had-a-positive-but-limited-impact-on-exports-report
14. https://www.thefreelibrary.com/TRADE+-+Does+AGOA+unfairly+benefit+Chinese+firms%3F-a0487066918
15. https://agoa.info/news/article/14976-does-agoa-unfairly-benefit-chinese-firms.html
16. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-attacks-protections-for-immigrants-from-shithole-countries-in-oval-office-meeting/2018/01/11/bfc0725c-f711-11e7-91af-31ac729add94_story.html
17. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-trump-administrations-africa-policy/
18. https://www.theafricareport.com/381872/donald-trump-plans-to-shut-dozens-of-us-embassies-including-8-in-africa/
19. http://aol.com/news/biden-once-slammed-trumps-china-213141788.html
20. http://onestoptrendingnews.com/americas-european-allies-are-trying-to-pry-millions-of-their-unspent-money-back-from-usaid/
21. https://www.iss.europa.eu/publications/briefs/funding-weapons-together-or-not-how-pay-european-defence22. https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2025/03/04/eu-pitches-plan-to-free-up-800-billion-for-defense-spending/
23. https://www.hiv.gov/federal-response/pepfar-global-aids/pepfar
24. https://ng.usembassy.gov/commemoration-of-pepfars-17th-anniversary-in-nigeria/
25. http://gavi.org/vaccineswork/hope-despair-nigerias-malaria-frontline
26. https://drpcngr.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/Understanding-the-Nigeria-2025-Proposed-Health-Budget-.pdf
27. https://www.weforum.org/stories/2024/06/why-strong-regional-value-chains-will-be-vital-to-the-next-chapter-of-china-and-africas-economic-relationship/
28. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/3/17/amid-conflict-why-does-the-drc-want-a-minerals-deal-with-trump
29. https://www.state.gov/u-s-security-cooperation-with-nigeria/
30. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/sudan-and-congo-savaged-as-world-shrugs/
31. https://www.cfr.org/article/how-much-us-aid-going-ukraine
32. https://ecfr.eu/article/the-sweating-bear-why-russias-influence-in-africa-is-under-threat/
33. https://guardian.ng/opinion/implications-of-russias-geopolitical-strategies-in-the-sahel/
34. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5yvd91j72eo
35. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alliance_of_Sahel_States
36. https://issafrica.org/iss-today/in-burkina-faso-traore-s-legacy-could-extend-beyond-popularity-and-promises
37. https://web.facebook.com/john.ogunlela/posts/pfbid0WM3g7vSdFdUoE1jr3diCFThUSaPU3ZF8HX7sUDrHsRHWk4sMRAcPt9yjHUthLsDal