Afro-Arab Relations in Retrospect
How we got to today’s situation
Extracted from ‘The Arabs and Africa’ edited by Khair El-Din Haseb; published in 1984 by Croom Helm, London, for the Centre for Arab Unity Studies, Beirut, Lebanon Being the proceedings of a seminar co-sponsored by the Arab Thought Forum, held in Amman, Jordan 24-29 April 1983
The July 23 Revolution and Africa
Part VII
Mohamed Fayek
The historical links between Egypt and the rest of the African continent go back thousands of years. Pharaonic Egypt had strong relations with both the heart and the periphery of the continent. In modern times, Khedive Ismail established an Egyptian empire that extended as far south as Equatorial Africa, and as far east as the shores of the Red Sea down to Somalia. Al-Azhar always enjoyed great prestige in the eyes of African Muslims.
But despite these links Egypt never developed a nationalist orientation toward Africa until its Revolution on 23 July 1952. No sense of belonging to the African continent existed, neither at the mass nor official levels. Nor was there any connection between the Egyptian nationalist movement, embodied in Egypt’s political parties, on the one hand, and the African nationalist movements, on the other, at the time.
If there was an orientation toward Sudan, it was not because both countries were African but because Sudan has always been viewed as an inseparable part of the Arab nation, the unity of the Nile valley being complementary to Arab unity.
Egypt’s lack of an African orientation can be attributed to two reasons. Firstly, a misconception imposed by imperialism whereby Africa was portrayed as being divided into ‘two Africas’: the Arab-Muslim one, north of the Sahara, and sub-Saharan black Africa. This was further manifested in the pattern of communication and trade routes established by the imperialist powers. While such routes were established between the colonies and the capitals and ports of the imperialist states, the African Sahara was meant to be a barrier between the Arab North and the African South, with no similar lines of communication to contribute to their interaction and integration. Even the international community, including the United Nations and its specialized agencies, took this division for granted when dealing with African states and regions. This, in turn, reinforced the influence of that misconception. The Sahara has, throughout history, been a corridor linking the North with the South, both in trade relations and in cultural influence.
Secondly, the African movement itself, which was initiated by black Americans in reaction to discrimination against them, adopted the theme of the black man’s dignity and freedom and his returning to his roots – while the black Americans had neither knowledge nor concrete links with the African continent, other than the colour of their skin. Hence the birth of what is called ‘Africanism’ based on their African descent – but only with black Africa in mind. African unity was to them as much a way of reviving the ancient African empires of Ghana, Songhi, Mali and others, as it was the unity of black Africa. With this, Africanism, before reaching the African continent itself, took a separate path from Arab Africa. Egypt, therefore, as well as the rest of North Africa, had no connection with this particular African movement.
It was the July Revolution in Egypt which unveiled Egypt’s African face, and its true affiliation to the continent. Nasser designated the areas of Egypt’s foreign policy as comprising three circles: the Arab, African and Islamic. In his book, Philosophy of the Revolution, he stated:
… We cannot under any condition, even if we wanted to, stand aloof from the terrible and terrifying battle now raging in the heart of the continent – between five million white and 200 million Africans
… Surely the people of Africa will continue to look at us – we who are the guardians of the continent’s northern gate – we who constitute the connection link between the continent and the outside world.
We certainly cannot, under any conditions, relinquish our responsibility to help spread the light of knowledge and civilization to the very depth of the virgin jungles of the continent … Africa is now the scene of a strange and stirring turmoil … We cannot … stand as mere onlookers, deluding ourselves into believing, that we are in no way concerned …
The Reasons for the July Revolution’s Interest in Africa
The leadership of the July Revolution could without difficulty envision the African dimension of Egypt’s identity, when it embarked upon drawing up a new scheme to mobilize Egypt’s human and material resources. Such a dimension is naturally inherent to Egypt’s geographical location, and its need to take advantage of what may be termed the ‘genius of the place’ in accordance with its traditional interests.
From the experience of the July Revolution’s fierce struggle against imperialism, which started with military operations against the British occupation in the Suez Canal area, the revolutionary leadership realized that Egypt’s independence would never be achieved so long as imperialism had a strong grip on Africa. The first step was to terminate the British occupation of Sudan, even at the price of conceding the claim to the unity of Egypt and Sudan, raised earlier by King Farouk to assert his power over both parts of the Nile valley – and even though such a claim resulted from the consensus of the Egyptian people and was thus adopted by the nationalist parties and movements before the revolution. The revolutionary leadership’s view, in this regard, was that the unity of the Nile valley was viable only if the Sudanese were given the right to self-determination. The Revolution realized that true and genuine unity is that which represents the will of the Sudanese people, rather than that based only on historical rights or those of conquest, hence its full support for self-determination. If a unified state, created by the free will of the Sudanese, was established, its frontiers would extend to the heart of the African continent and thus border several neighbouring African countries still under colonial rule (British, French or Belgian). Such a state would certainly be a serious threat to imperialist interests on the African continent. Since the basic mission of the July Revolution was to fight imperialism in all its forms, Africa was one of the strongholds of imperialism which the Revolution had to confront.
Prior to this, it was traditional Egyptian national security interests that counted. Ever since the dawn of history, the rulers of Egypt have been concerned to secure the sources of the Nile. Now, with the new values and spirit that governed the July Revolution, this objective could no longer be achieved by subjugation or be extending the power of Egypt, as was the case in the past; rather, it could only be done by liberating Egypt from imperialism and establishing friendship with the peoples and new governments of Sudan, Uganda, Kenya, Congo, Tanganyika, Rwanda and other areas where the Nile tributaries rise.
Later, there was a third reason for the Revolution’s African orientation. After the Revolution’s success in establishing new industries and expanding old ones, African markets became one of the best for Egypt’s products, especially given its policy of expanding trade relations with the Third World.
However, even if this African orientation was an end in itself (considering that the African dimension is an element of Egypt’s make-up, and that Africa, as mentioned above, is one of the three circles designated by Nasser as foreign policy concerns) the need to curtail Israel’s activities in Africa was one of the major reasons for the Revolutions early emphasis on Africa.
The July Revolution and African Liberation Movements
Before the July Revolution, the only way open to African liberation movements to gain independence was the constitutional-evolutionist one, namely to ask the colonial power to accord each particular colonized country more self-rule until full independence was achieved. The methods adopted to support such claims were all within the established constitutional framework, according to international agreements and human rights charters. This was how India gained its independence. African nationalist movements were influenced by this approach, especially in the British colonies and dependencies where strong connections existed with India, through local Indian communities. Furthermore, many African nationalist movements were also influenced by Ghandi, who started his political life in South Africa.
If some of these movements used violence as a tactic, such as the Mau Mau in Kenya, then they were more ‘human rights’ movements aimed at redressing the injustices inflicted on the indigenous population by the colonial power (such as uprooting them from their lands and communities) than independence movements. Violence, moreover, was a reaction to the violent methods used by the colonial power itself.
The July Revolution created a new opportunity for African liberation. Its success in bringing about the end of the British military occupation of the Suez Canal, as a result of the military resistance organized by the Revolution, the failure of the Tripartite Aggression against Egypt in 1956, and the successful nationalization of the Suez Canal all proved to the leadership that military occupation is untenable when faced with well-organised popular military resistance, however strong the military occupation may be. The British base in the Suez Canal area was the most powerful in Africa, and the most strategically significant Britain had anywhere. The failure of the 1956 aggression was the prelude to the fall of the British Empire itself, described at one time as the one on which ‘the sun never sets’.
The July Revolution provided an example of what military resistance against imperialism can achieve and generated effective assistance and aid to African liberation movements as a result of which Egypt became the strong ally of all revolutionary forces in Africa, and Cairo became an important base for African liberation movements.
Military Assistance to Liberation Movements
Egypt was the first state in the world to supply African liberation movements with weapons for use in armed resistance against imperialism and racism on the continent. Egypt also provided these movements with military training in its Sa’iyqa School (for Egyptian stormtroopers) as well as at its military academy. Egyptian intelligence services participated in operations to smuggle arms to resistance areas and in securing the safe transport of resistance fighters to Cairo for training.
Egypt bore the major responsibility in this endeavour until 1963 when the African Liberation Committee, an affiliate of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), was formed by nine member states, including Egypt, and financed by the OAU. After both Algeria and Tanzania gained their independence, they also contributed to this type of assistance. Military activities were directed against colonial forces which refused to grant occupied African regions the opportunity to develop self-rule as a prelude to complete independence, such as in the Portuguese colonies and Rhodesia after the Unilateral Declaration of Independence aimed at establishing a racist regime.
Egypt’s ability to supply these movements with military aid was enhanced by the rearming of the Egyptian armed forces following the 1955 arms deal with Czechoslovakia, which left a large stockpile of British-made weapons and ammunition – now no longer needed – available for distribution to African liberation movements. When these weapons appeared in resistance areas, no suspicions were raised about Egypt’s role in supplying them since they could have been smuggled from British colonies in Africa.
Egypt provided such aid to all liberation movements regardless of their political ideologies. Thus, in many instances, Egyptian aid was given to more than one movement in the same region. For example, in Angola before independence, Egypt’s aid went to the MPLA, which is now in power, as well as to GRAE, led by Roberto Holden and to UNITA, led by Jonas Savimbi. The size of the aid was proportionate to the particular size of each movement and its activities. It was in this way that Cairo maintained friendly relations with all nationalist forces in Africa, without preference for particular leaders, since the aim was always simply to terminate colonialism.
Political Offices of African Liberation Movements in Cairo
Cairo hosted many delegates of African nationalist organizations who visited it to establish relations with Egypt, to convey their cause to the outside world through the powerful Egyptian mass media, or to attend conferences.
At the end of 1955, the African League was established to manage the affairs of these delegates and to facilitate their contacts with the large number of African students and envoys either receiving education in Cairo or visiting it for other reasons. Another of the League’s goals was to enhance the Egyptian peoples’ awareness of Africa, so to speak, and to establish channels of communication between Egyptian intellectuals on the one hand, and African students studying in Egypt and delegates of liberation movements on the other.
Then came the idea of opening political offices for these movements, similar to those of the Algerian liberation movement in many countries throughout the world. The purpose of these offices was to establish connections between each African liberation movement in its own country, and Egypt – which was the movement’s major source of aid. Furthermore, these offices were intended to establish contacts with the outside world, whether informational, diplomatic, educational or financial. Egypt was the first country in the world to host a large number of African political offices representing the major African liberation movements.