Nairobi – France came to Nairobi last week with a message it has been trying to land for years: that it wants to be Africa’s partner, not its patron. At the Africa Forward summit in May, Emmanuel Macron made that case again. Not everyone was convinced.
On the second floor of the Kenyatta International Convention Centre, far from the cameras and presidential motorcades, the cafe stayed unusually busy long after lunch had ended. Young founders sat next to diplomats. Investors leaned across small tables, writing numbers on napkins. Translators moved easily between French and English. Every few minutes, another handshake began with the same question: “So what can France offer Africa now?”
It was the question that ran beneath almost everything at the two-day gathering, co-hosted by France and Kenya. Whether it produced a satisfactory answer is less certain.
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A relationship under pressure
For years, France’s standing in Africa has been eroding. Military interventions, persistent post-colonial economic arrangements and a series of diplomatic ruptures, most visibly in the Sahel, have left many Africans deeply sceptical of French intentions.
Macron arrived in Nairobi having spent recent years acknowledging those grievances publicly. At the summit he returned to familiar language, emphasising investment over aid and what he called co-development over dependency.
African leaders were listening, but carefully. Sovereignty and equal partnership dominated their contributions from the floor. France appeared more willing than before to accept that framing, though whether rhetoric translates into structural change remains the central open question.
“Africa needs partners who can move quickly,” said economist and former UN official Vera Songwe during one panel. “France still has institutional relationships here that can help unlock financing, technology transfer, and industrial development faster than starting from zero.”
Where France still has ground
The summit focused heavily on sectors where France holds genuine expertise: renewable energy, urban transport, agriculture, healthcare and digital infrastructure. French engineering firms showcased solar-grid systems designed for rural communities. African startup founders pitched artificial intelligence solutions to French venture capital funds.
French companies have spent decades building ports, rail systems, roads and telecommunications networks across Francophone West and Central Africa. Critics argue those relationships have historically favoured Paris over local economies. Yet even many sceptics separate political grievance from technical capacity.
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“African governments may criticise France politically, but they still know French companies can handle large-scale projects,” said Kenyan political analyst Mark Bii at the summit.
Education may ultimately be France’s most durable asset on the continent. Tens of thousands of African students study there each year, building professional and cultural ties that shape business and diplomacy across generations. At the summit’s youth forum, French universities announced expanded scholarship programmes in engineering, climate science and artificial intelligence.
One beneficiary made the case directly. A Cameroonian robotics student who had studied in Lyon described the access it had given him to laboratories, networks and research opportunities unavailable at home, and said he intended to bring those skills back to Africa.
Negotiating, not receiving
Not everyone arrived in Nairobi ready to be persuaded. Fatou Ndiaye, a 28-year-old Senegalese entrepreneur whose agritech company helps smallholder farmers use satellite data to predict crop disease, had spent years watching European governments make promises that rarely reached actual African businesses.
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“Usually, these summits are for politicians,” she said. “People speak beautifully, then everyone flies home.”
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By the close of the summit, something had shifted her view slightly.
“France is finally starting to understand that African countries don’t want charity anymore,” she said. “We want partnerships that actually build industries.”
Her final assessment carried the weight of the two days. “This was the first summit where I felt Africans were negotiating,” she said. “Not receiving instructions. Negotiating.”
The business cards and abandoned coffee cups left on cafe tables when the convoys pulled away suggested that, whatever its limitations, the summit had at least started a different kind of conversation. Whether it produces a different kind of outcome remains to be seen.
