Cristina Gallach, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs: "We must put African issues on the Spanish political agenda"

By 2019, several African economies had emerged as the fastest growing in the world, but the coronavirus pandemic slowed development and has reversed the region's progress. In March the UN Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) noted the fall in African economic growth from 3.2 per cent to 1.8 per cent for this year..

Although some of the consequences of the pandemic are already being reflected in the African countries, the long-term consequences have yet to be seen and that is why the report presented by the Fundación Alternativas: "Africa 2020 Report" has attempted not to focus on the direct consequences of the COVID-19, although it has a significant presence in the chapters.

Seeking to go beyond the way in which Spain reports on Africa and avoiding focusing the debate on the continent on this 'North-South' dichotomy has been the main objective set by the foundation when producing the yearbook.

"We must put African issues on the Spanish political agenda," said the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Cristina Gallach, who urged civil society to join the various initiatives to promote prosperity on the African continent. Gallach explained that "the Alternatives report is very important, it is rich and varied. From the ministry we are working to deepen our relationship with Africa as a whole and with the different countries bilaterally, contributing and accompanying the socio-economic development of a continent that we have our eye on from the south of Spain".

With regard to the impact of the COVID-19 on the continent, the Secretary stressed that it will "affect" the economic and social situation in Africa, and therefore "it will be essential to design a foreign policy to accompany the pandemic". For the post-COVID stage, Gallach announced a "strategy" for development cooperation, "agreed" with civil society and NGOs, taking into account the large Spanish presence in Africa.

Along with Gallach, the Foundation's Executive Vice-president, Diego López Garrido, presented the report, highlighting the role of Africa as a political subject with its own personality where the ecological transition and the digital revolution are fundamental". 

José Segura Clavell, Director of Casa África and Pedro Martínez-Avial, Director of Casa Árabe, also participated in the presentation of the yearbook.

Directed by Elsa Aimé González, coordinator of the Sub-Saharan Africa Panel, and Itxaso Domínguez de Olazábal, coordinator of the Middle East and North Africa Panel, of Fundación Alternativas, the report brings together experts from the continent in different fields: political, economic, social and cultural. Divided into eleven chapters, the report sets out the general lines of North Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa through a set of multidisciplinary texts that attempt to look at regional and international interconnections, and "see how the continent is progressing beyond the generalised vision", said Itxaso Domínguez during the presentation of the report to the media.

Relations between the Maghreb and Africa, feminist activism in Africa, climate change and conflict in sub-Saharan Africa and EU-Africa economic relations are some of the titles which make up the yearbook which has sought to bring issues into public debate which do not have so much room for discussion..

For example, the monograph dedicated to "Artivism", by researcher Sebastián Ruiz Cabrera, doctor and professor of international relations, entitled: "Political resistances in Africa through art. A way of expressing current social activism", focuses on how social protests have changed in recent years, through new initiatives that have been successful, such as the one that brought about the end of the civil war in Liberia in 2003 known as the "Sex Strike" or how in countries such as Tanzania, Kenya or Sudan they use music, poetry or murals to get around the repressive measures of governments and show their discontent.

Or the one by Irene Fernández-Molina and Erica Picco on the forgotten conflicts in Western Sahara and the Central African Republic. "Although these are two very different conflicts, they have points in common", points out Fernández Molina, who points out that the forgetting of these conflicts by the international community is not so much in the interventions, as in both there have been and are missions of the United Nations and other organisations, but in "the conversion of the crisis into a routine", which causes an entrenchment that makes their resolution difficult.

It remains to be seen what new challenges the pandemic will bring to the African continent, which, as the authors of the report point out, has not meant the creation of new negative trends, but rather is serving to intensify those already present such as the vulnerability of citizens and the increase in authoritarian practices.