Time to take 'Africa' seriously

Cape Verde team, before embarking on a decent FIFA World Cup run (Image: BBC)

Putting the controversial off-the-pitch antics to one side (there are too many to list here), this summer's FIFA World Cup brought us some genuinely great, heart-warming stories. We won't forget the progress of Cape Verde, who reached the Last 32 and gave eventual finalists Argentina a sweat, forcing the South American nation to play in extra time. Cape Verde, earlier in the tournament, also held eventual World Cup winners Spain in a group match and had qualified over Uruguay who won the whole thing in 1930 and 1950. The Last 32 also saw DR Congo giving England a run for its money, having taken an early lead but then succumbing to a 2-1 defeat.

In fact, not wanting to list the other African nations, but the first knockout stage saw nine of the ten from the continent in contention (only Tunisia missed out). They can thank the expansion of the World Cup which rose from 32 competing in 2022 to 48 in this edition. Previously, only five African nations could qualify. There are talks of the World Cup in four years' time - co-hosted by Morocco - to be competed by 64 nations, which then could see even more African nations compete. We shall see about how that would work logistically, but there is hope for the previously, arguably, 'unknown' nations to take part. Millions of those who live in these countries are big on football, so it would make sense to give people there a further incentive to follow.

It has been an interesting year for the continent of Africa, which has got me thinking about it as a whole. I don't write or research about its countries, largely because the news agenda in the UK and Europe has focused on events elsewhere for so long, Africa is often overlooked. But a series of events then put African nations in the front and centre. In December, the United States launched a military operation against Islamist militants in Nigeria. Less than a month later, the African Cup of Nations football tournament ended in a total fiasco, when eventual on-the-pitch winners Senegal defeated Morocco despite walking off due to a contentious 94th minute penalty decision going against them. Morocco missed that penalty and lost after extra time. However, the result was later overturned. Senegal has launched an appeal against the decision, so your guess is as good as mine as to who will eventually collect that coveted trophy. We'll find out after October.

And fast forward to after the World Cup, where Morocco - yes, they're featuring quite a lot here - and Spain - who will be co-hosting the World Cup in 2030 with Morocco - endured a high-profile political diplomatic tussle. In one day, 60,000 people from Morocco flocked to an enclave of Spain, Ceuta, and tried to swim across the strait to mainland Spain. It was reported that almost 100 died and the vast majority had simply returned to Morocco hours later. The entire episode had caused widespread uproar, largely thanks to clickbait nonsense shared by political influencers and groups on social media who demonise before understanding why, and how, an unprecedented number of individuals decided to take part in this exercise.

Even as I write this, it is unclear as to what, or who, caused it. The Spanish leader focused his finger pointing towards trafficking groups. There was an argument that Morocco did not like that Spain agreed a rare partnership deal with Algeria (who don't get along with Morocco) and acted out. However, the Moroccan government has denied any involvement. Some also believed the United States had a hand in it due to its 'warming relationship' with Morocco and its distancing of relations with Spain, whose government has been openly critical of the US' war with Iran. Others say that it was to exploit Spain's most recent immigration policy reform, where it "announced a mass regularisation programme expected to grant legal status to around 500,000 irregular migrants."

The narrative around the events in Ceuta got me thinking even more about Africa as a nation. We, in the West, simply don't talk enough about the continent and when we do, it's generalised something silly. Africa is incredibly diverse. From the Middle East up north, to Afrikaans down south, it's all-but-forgotten in recent years. Sure, during the latter stages of the 20th Century, it was (rightly) given significant spotlights. Many of us who read into politics know about Nelson Mandela's plight in apartheid-hit South Africa, the stories of brutal dictators like Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe and Uganda's Idi Amin. We know about the famine in Ethiopia thanks to Bob Geldof and Band Aid. And we know about the genocide in Rwanda in 1994, largely thanks to the excellent, yet extremely hard-to-watch three-time Oscar nominated film, Hotel Rwanda, released almost ten years later.

But headline-grabbing dictators, and Mandela, move on, and European nations no longer hold power of many of these nations - and therefore European publics are almost non-the-wiser. British athletics fans are reminded every four years which countries also shared a UK monarch at one stage - 22 modern African countries, by the way. But do we know whether Donald Trump's attack in Nigeria was a success? Do we truly know what's happening in South Sudan, whose people are currently enduring suffering similar to what we're seeing in Palestine? Do we know why many of the people attempting to enter England by flimsy and gang-infected boats are from Somalia and Eritrea? Why is the relationship between Morocco and Algeria fragile enough for it to impact Spain? And how are countries like Libya really doing after their uprisings in the early 2010s?

These are important questions which I don't have answers to, but are also useful to understand if we are to understand the world we're living in today. I see it too often, that the continent is generalised as 'Africans' when the continent is so big. Unless you're clumsy or a racist, you don't conflate China or Japan, for instance, so why say 'African' when you could mean Egypt or Kenya, two very different nations. The media industry across the rest of the world has a responsibility to get Africa right, by providing spotlights to specific parts, and make sure they get the consistent attention in the same way we did in decades previous. Even the controversial 'Rwanda policy' that the UK government tried to introduce in 2023, where those entering via boat, would then be transported there, has been forgotten, thanks to the policy being rightly ditched. But now it's no longer there, it's a forgotten country again. Is it on the right path towards developing human right records approved by major western governments? Perhaps not, if judging by a recent 'pro-family' conference in Ghana, where Rwandan lawmakers participated and pledged stronger restrictions against their LGBT+ communities. 

Stories like this matter, if we're to understand global politics and when certain African countries and peoples are part of solutions that concern policies closer to home. We mustn't let sport and film remind us that they simply exist for five minutes and that's it. This year has taught us that the continent is closer to 'the rest of us' than we think. It's time we let them into our consciousness, in a conscious way.