Cape Verdean President José María Neves said this Friday that the economic crisis will bring about “profound changes” in relations between the European and African continents, acknowledging that “grievances” and remnants of the Cold War still exist.
“Europe will treat Africa with the complexity that exists on the African continent, there is still a lot of discontent and aspects of the Cold War, these elements must be taken into account in the debate about relations between Africa and Europe,” José María Neves said during the presidential dialogue with his Portuguese colleague Marcelo Rebelo de Souza, closing the Eurafrika Forum, which took place on Thursday and Friday in Carcavelos, on the outskirts of Lisbon.
“The issue is not only the financial package, the European Union can allocate 150 billion euros for the Global Gateway, China can allocate 3 billion euros, Russia the same amount, but now there is an issue that one of the presidents emphasized when he said that his country did not vote for condemning the UN resolution, but he was there in Brussels,” at a meeting that brought several African heads of state to a summit with the European Union in June.
Speaking about the experience of participating in this meeting, José María Neves said that the presence of this head of state, who voted against the UN condemnation of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, made sense, and added that “the EU’s responses must take into account the complexity that exists on the African continent” , and conclude that “the Brussels summit and the visits of some heads of state and government to Africa are already showing some interest in making important strategic changes in the relationship.”
For his part, the President of the Portuguese Republic, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, said that “Africans must see a firm commitment from the European side”, whether in strategic, military, economic, financial or food terms.
“Portugal, with successive governments and under different circumstances, has been resilient. The European Union has been solid at certain times. At the moment he has excuses because he is overwhelmed with problems,” he said.
According to the head of the Portuguese state, “it is necessary to more firmly fulfill the obligations assumed by Europe, the European countries in relation to Africa”, because “Europe must first of all be consistent.”
“There can be no important countries in Europe that either ignore Africa this Friday or promise to be present, show up once and then ask Portugal to stay to replace us. We don’t care because it’s our calling, but it would be nice if they stayed. too,” he criticized.
When asked “how to treat China within the current framework”, Marcelo said that “maybe it’s better to leave China alone for now.”
“Knowing that it exists, knowing what it represents in terms of economic penetration, but perhaps not add up to the problem. The challenge for democracies is already very big, perhaps not adding up all the problems at the same time,” he warned.
Author: Lusa
Source: CM Jornal
