After Mali closed the door in May 2022, Niger and Burkina Faso announced on Saturday their withdrawal from the G5 Sahel. An additional setback for this organization, founded in 2014, whose anti-jihadist force has never managed to assert itself effectively on the ground.
From five it became four, and now there are only two. The G5 Sahel, an organization made up of Mauritania, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger and Chad, lost two new members on Saturday December 2nd.
After Bamako, whose interim government announced its withdrawal in May 2022, Burkina Faso and Niger, also led by soldiers, also announced their withdrawal from this organization, which also includes a joint force to combat terrorism.
The departure is a new example of the “sovereignist” turn claimed by the three countries, which signed a mutual defense pact, the Alliance of Sahel States (AES), in September, cementing the partnership between their militaries. It also marks a new stage in the break with former Western partners, and in particular France, which had been committed to the G5 Sahel from the start.
A regional force to replace Barkhane
Established on December 19, 2014, the G5 Sahel is a cooperation framework between five countries in the Sahel-Sahara region that addresses development and security issues. This organization was founded following Operation Serval, the French military intervention in Mali in January 2013, to stop the advance of jihadist groups towards Bamako. The operation then evolved into Operation Barkhane, dedicated to the fight against terrorism throughout the Sahel.
In 2017, the G5 Sahel acquired a joint five-nation military force, largely funded by international partners, particularly the European Union. This consists of five battalions of 750 men each – one battalion per country – and must initially support the forces of Barkhane and the UN mission in Mali that are already stationed on site in order to eventually replace them.
“The perspective at the time was to strengthen and coordinate the region’s armies so that they themselves would lead the anti-jihadist struggle,” explains Thierry Vircoulon, associate researcher at the Center for Sub-Saharan Africa at the French Institute for Relations. International (IFRI). ). “This project required strong trust between partners, which never really materialized.”
Mistrust between members
The start of the joint G5 Sahel force immediately began under bad auspices. Just three days after its creation was formalized – during a meeting between French President Emmanuel Macron and his Sahel counterparts in Mauritania – the headquarters of the joint force based in Mali was destroyed in a terrorist attack that claimed several lives. Their general commander, the Malian Didier Dako, was then deposed in favor of the Mauritanian Hanane Ould-Sidi. The troop moves from Sévaré to Bamako.
On the ground, cooperation between contingents sometimes leads to tensions, both military and political. “Although all states are united in the same force, not all states have the same priorities in the fight against terrorism,” recalls Niagale Bagayoko, a security policy specialist in Sub-Saharan Africa and President of the African Security Sector Network (ASSN). “Chad, for example, is more concerned about Boko Haram attacks on its border with Nigeria than the further advance of groups linked to al-Qaeda and the Islamic State.”
Another obstacle is the fear of some states that foreign military personnel may interfere in their internal affairs. “The contingents’ freedom of action led to difficult discussions that slowed down work on site,” the expert continued. “The force’s operations were mostly limited to border surveillance and, with the exception of Barkhane, were unable to carry out truly large-scale anti-terror operations.”
Tensions with Western partners
Adding to these operational difficulties are tensions between the G5 Sahel countries and foreign partners. Several of its members believe that the donation commitments are being implemented slowly and criticize the “lack of solidarity” from the international community.
Some, like former Nigerian President Mahamadou Issoufou, criticize the sparse announcements and emphasize the need to “ensure sustainable funding” to make the force “sustainable and autonomous.”
Almost two years after its founding, according to the UN, less than half of the 418 million euros promised by the international community has been paid out. On the ground, the security situation continues to deteriorate despite the presence of Barkhane troops, particularly in the so-called “Three Borders Region” between Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso.
In this context, the deterioration of relations between France and Mali due to the double coup – in August 2020 and then in May 2021 – will represent a turning point for the G5 Sahel joint force.
On May 15, 2022, Mali slammed the organization’s door to protest the refusal of “certain G5 Sahel states” to assume the organization’s rotating presidency, which should have gone to them. In a press release, she castigates the “maneuvers of a supra-regional state” – implicitly France – that is “desperately aiming to isolate Mali.”
In the same vein, Burkina and Niger, in their press release of December 1st announcing their withdrawal from the organization, stated that the G5 Sahel must not “serve foreign interests to the detriment of those of the peoples of the Sahel.”
Inevitable separation
For Niagale Bagayoko, the successive exits of Mali, then Burkina Faso and Niger from the G5 Sahel were predictable and only confirmed “the brain death of the organization”.
“The G5 Sahel countries have proven to be ineffective. Their joint force was never truly operational in the fight against terrorism. After the withdrawal of Mali and the signing of the alliance of the Sahel states with Burkina and Niger, the withdrawal of these two countries from the organization is not surprising. It is part of the strategy initiated by Mali to question all international intervention frameworks with regard to security and development.”
Since the withdrawal of French forces from Barkhane in mid-November, UN peacekeepers, Malian forces and their Russian Wagner militia auxiliaries have managed to recapture the town of Kidal, which was controlled by Tuareg-majority armed groups for ten years. Signatory of the Algiers Agreement. A victory that caused great enthusiasm throughout the country.
“With the recapture of Kidal, the Malian army has achieved a goal considered paramount by public opinion and Malian elites, namely the recapture of the country’s territorial integrity,” explains Niagale Bagayoko. “The question is whether the Malian authorities have the means to sustain this victory in the long term, even though the conflict between Bamako and the political-military groups in the north has been going on for decades. Finally on the front of the anti-jihadists.” Fight, the latest attacks by the Jnim [lié à al-Qaïda, NDLR] in the Timbuktu region and by the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara in the Menaka region indicate that the battle against these groups is far from won.”
On Sunday, terrorist groups carried out five terrorist attacks in the Malian towns of Ménaka, but also Labbezanga, Tessalit and Dioura, killing several dozen people. A week earlier in Burkina, several hundred jihadists launched a large-scale attack on the military base in Djibo, which was repelled by the army after deadly clashes.
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