Bola A. Akinterinwa Africa is what anyone says it is. For some people, it is a dark continent. Some argue that it is the richest continent on earth. Some see Africa as under-developed while some others believe Africa is developing. For the United Nations, Africa is one of the seven or eight regions of the world. However, African leaders rejected this UN conception of Africa as a region in 1991 with the signing of the Abuja Treaty Establishing the African Economic Community. The Treaty redefined in its Article 1(d) Africa, no more as a continent of one region but as a continent of five regions: West Africa, North Africa, Central Africa, East Africa, and Southern Africa. The cardinal objective of dividing Africa into five regions was to foster and fasttrack continental unity and integration. Apart from this, by lingua franca, there are four types of Africa: Anglophone, Francophone, Lusophone, and Arabophone, Africa. While Anglophone and Francophone Africa are English and French speaking respectively, Lusophone and Arabophone are Portuguese and Arabic speaking. Linguistic typology has been more of a centrifugal force, dividing Africa and working against a united and integrated Africa. For instance, Morocco, on the basis of being Arabophone, had to adopt the diplomacy of ‘open Chair’’ at the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) in protest against OAU’s decision to recognize and accommodate Polisario (Popular Front for the Liberation of Saguia el-Hamra and Río do Oro) which wanted an end to Moroccan occupation of its territory. Polisario wanted political independence for Western Sahara. Algeria supported the Polisario Front, especially in order to counter Morocco’s regional influence and maintain a strategic buffer on its own border. Morocco wanted and still wants to acquire the Western Sahara by manu military. The OAU is against the replacement of old Spanish colonization with Moroccan colonialism. Euro-American and Arabophone Undermining In reaction to the OAU, Morocco took the bad end of the stick and took leave of the OAU for several years (Open Chair diplomacy). It is against this background that the Euro-American and Arabophone diplomacy has been undermining Africa’s development. It is also in this context that Morocco’s renaming of its major 1,055-kilometre Tiznit-Dakhla Highway as President Donald J. Trump Highway in appreciation of Trump’s recognition of Sahara in 2020 should be understood. The highway links Morocco with the West African region. Linking the highway to Donald Trump’s name, because of US support for Morocco’s claim of sovereignty over the Western Sahara, negates the policy stand of the African Union. It undermines Africa’s policy of no more colonization and need for self-determination as wanted by the Sahrawi people of the territory. More important, it strengthens the ambiguity of Morocco’s geo-political status in Africa. True enough, Morocco is geo-politically located in the northern region of the African continent, but the region of the world to which it now seeks to belong is secure and peaceful but cannot but have the potential of division-seeking with Morocco’s membership. It is on record that Morocco aspired to be a member of the European Communities shortly before the European Communities were transformed into European Union. It is also on record that Morocco also applied to be a Member of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). Morocco applied in July 1987 to become a member of the European Economic Community. Most unfortunately, the European Council rejected Morocco’s application on the grounds that Morocco is geopolitically located in North Africa. Besides, Morocco did not qualify to be called a European State. Put differently, simply because the OAU recognized the Western Sahara, which Morocco wants to have as part of a Greater Morocco, and because of the little or no impact of Morocco’s policy of ‘open chair’ or (la politique de la chaise vide) on the OAU, Morocco sought membership of the European Communities. In 1984, Morocco suspended its membership of the OAU without truly withdrawing its original membership of the organization. It left its official seat vacant. Probably because of the ‘don’t care attitude’ of African leaders all of whom Morocco insulted, Morocco had to look for alternative organization in order to be relevant in regional and international politics. As Morocco’s quest to be a European State has failed, the next effort was to also seek to be a member of the ECOWAS which belongs geopolitically to the West Africa region of Africa. Morocco did not want to belong to the North Africa region. As the Yoruba proverbial saying has it, if moving forward becomes problematic and one cannot move forward, one must also know how to retrace his or her steps backward. In January 2017, Morocco returned to its seat, this time, in the African Union. The OAU has been transformed i
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