France does not want to do business with Africa. France wants to do business with a version of Africa that exists only in the air-conditioned corridors of Nairobi hotels and the gilded halls of the Élysée.
The recent summit in Kenya is being hailed as a demarcation point. A shift. A new era of partnership. It is none of those things. It is the latest iteration of a decades-old performance. If you are an investor watching these handshakes and thinking the risk profile of Francophone or East African markets just shifted, you are being sold a narrative that local founders and hard-nosed private equity players stopped believing years ago. If you enjoyed this article, you should check out: this related article.
The "lazy consensus" suggests that high-level diplomatic summits bridge the gap between European capital and African opportunity. In reality, these events act as a filter that blocks real innovation while subsidizing state-backed behemoths.
The Sovereignty Trap
Diplomats love the word partnership because it costs nothing. When French officials talk about wanting to do business, they are usually talking about massive infrastructure projects—rail, energy, and water—that require heavy sovereign guarantees. For another perspective on this event, refer to the recent coverage from Forbes.
This isn't "doing business." It is debt-loading.
When a French multinational enters a market backed by a bilateral agreement signed at a summit, they aren't competing. They are capturing. They seek predictable, state-guaranteed returns that insulate them from the actual economic realities of the ground. This creates a distorted market where local startups and mid-sized enterprises cannot compete for talent or resources because the "big brothers" have sucked the oxygen out of the room.
Real business happens in the trenches. It happens when a logistics firm in Mombasa solves the last-mile problem without a government subsidy. It happens when fintech builders in Dakar bypass the creaky banking infrastructure that French colonial-era banks have controlled for a century. Summits don't accelerate this. They ignore it.
The Myth of the Level Playing Field
The competitor narrative suggests that France is finally ready to compete with China and the US on merit. This ignores the structural baggage of the CFA franc and the institutional inertia of the French Treasury.
You cannot claim to want a fresh start while maintaining a monetary system that anchors eight West African nations to the Euro. This isn't a conspiracy theory; it is a liquidity constraint. Investors from outside the "Franc Zone" often find the rigidities of these markets stifling. By showing up to a summit in Kenya—a non-CFA country—France is attempting to signal a pivot. But you don't pivot with a press release. You pivot by dismantling the preferential treatment given to the CAC 40 giants.
I have watched companies burn through millions of dollars trying to "partner" with state entities following these summits. They spend two years in meetings, six months on a feasibility study, and another year waiting for a signature that never comes because the political winds shifted.
The smart money isn't at the summit. The smart money is in the informal markets, the peer-to-peer lending networks, and the decentralised energy grids that don't need a ribbon-cutting ceremony.
Why "Risk" is the Wrong Metric
The most common question at these summits is: "How do we mitigate risk in Africa?"
The question itself is the problem. It assumes that "Africa" is a monolith and that risk is something to be avoided rather than priced. French firms have historically been risk-averse, seeking "stability" above all else. In emerging markets, stability is often just another word for stagnation.
If you wait for a country to look like a European social democracy before you invest, you’ve already lost. The high returns in African markets come from navigating the chaos, not from waiting for a French bureaucrat to tell you the coast is clear.
The Real Friction Points
- Regulatory Arbitrage: Big summits produce "Framework Agreements." These frameworks are often outdated by the time the ink dries. Real operators move faster than the law.
- Currency Volatility: A summit can't fix the fact that the Naira or the Shilling can swing 20% in a month. Only sophisticated hedging and local-currency revenue models work. France’s "business" model is still too focused on repatriating Euros.
- The Talent Drain: While Macron talks about "brain circulation," the reality is a visa regime that makes it nearly impossible for African engineers to work freely across borders. You can’t build a partnership if one side isn't allowed to visit the other’s headquarters without a six-month interrogation.
Stop Asking for a Seat at the Table
The most dangerous thing an African founder or policymaker can do is believe that they need France’s permission to grow. The "demarcation point" isn't a summit in Kenya. The demarcation point happened ten years ago when mobile money penetration bypassed traditional banking. It happened when solar home systems made the national grid irrelevant in rural areas.
France isn't "offering" business. France is desperately trying to remain relevant in a continent that has increasingly viable options in Ankara, Beijing, Dubai, and New Delhi.
If you are an executive reading the reports from Nairobi and thinking about expanding, ignore the quotes from the ministers. Look at the port data. Look at the fiber optic subsea cable ownership. Look at who is actually building the data centers.
The Brutal Reality of "Win-Win"
The phrase "win-win" is the death knell of a real deal. It’s what people say when they want to obscure who is actually getting the short end of the stick.
True business is about trade-offs. It’s about aggressive competition. It’s about someone losing market share because someone else did it better, cheaper, and faster. Summits are designed to prevent that kind of creative destruction. They are designed to protect the incumbents.
If you want to do business on the continent, stay away from the diplomatic circuit. Go to the tech hubs in Yaba. Spend a week in the industrial zones of Ethiopia. Talk to the traders in Ariaria Market.
The people at the summit are talking about the "Africa of the future." The people in the streets are already living in it, and they don't have time to wait for France to catch up.
The next time you see a headline about a "landmark agreement" between a European power and an African nation, check the stock price of the three largest engineering firms in that European country. That’s who the deal is for. Everyone else is just an extra in the movie.
Stop looking for a demarcation point in a ballroom. The real shift is happening where the cameras aren't allowed.
Get out of the hotel.
