Marcelo Rebelo de Souza: “Africa is not a priority for Europe”

The President of the Republic, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, said this Wednesday that the African continent is not a priority for Europe and expressed regret that this has happened.

Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, speaking at the closing ceremony of the Euro-African Forum, which runs from Tuesday to end this Wednesday in Carcavelos, on the outskirts of Lisbon, believed that Europe is aging and Africa’s population is growing, “but with poverty and conditions that, apparently not known, not perceived and not understood by many Europeans.

“Let’s be frank: of course we can talk through the many millions for Africa and we can even say that most of them are in line with the goals set by 2063 by the African Union, but Africa is not a priority for Europe,” he said. emphasized.

According to Marcelo Rebelo de Souza, “part of Europe does not understand Africa” ​​because “there are countries [europeus] who have never had the experience of knowing Africa as it should be.”

“Or they were, but they forgot,” the President of Portugal emphasized, meaning that the countries of Central and Eastern Europe do not have the experience of relations that he spoke about, and in the case of the Nordic countries, they had it in the 1970s , 1980s and 1990s, “but in a way that they don’t recognize that in some of them it’s not a priority for part of their public opinion,” he added.

While the southern European countries “know [África] better”, but the current times mark the “end of empires”, he believed.

Similar to what is happening in Portugal, he said, “a Eurocentric view of Africa has persisted that does not recognize that an African point of view is not a European point of view.”

Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, who spoke at the last panel of the Eurafrica forum, in the “Dialogue between Presidents”, which was also attended by the President of Ghana, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, who is on an official visit to Portugal. part stressed that the covid-19 pandemic and climate change have exacerbated this lack of knowledge.

“It is easy to talk about a single world, but making it a priority is not the same thing,” he stressed.

In addition, the war in Ukraine “made Europe more Eurocentric, forgetting about the rest of the world and the fact that the war is global in nature and involves all superpowers and emerging powers.”

Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa then referred to what he called the “problem of perception” of European public opinion, believing that “populist movements [que se transformam] organically, nationalist and xenophobic movements are growing in many countries of Europe”, the result of which is the rejection of cultural differences.

“It’s a shame and it could turn into a huge mistake if [África] is not a priority,” he added.

Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa argued for the need to seize this opportunity to support Africa, deeming it “fundamental” to be on the continent “to create conditions for education, better living conditions and the security of investment.”

“We have very little time before the end of the war and the post-war period to realize that we cannot miss this unique opportunity. We don’t have to. Europe can’t,” the head of state reiterated, noting that some European countries realize how important it is to change their policies, but lament the slowness with which they do it and the fact that it takes time to change attitudes.

Marcelo emphasized the need for “stronger political will at the European level”.

“This means that the main European states must agree to this. They agree when it comes to their investments in some of their companies in the state. But I don’t know if that’s enough. We want more. This partnership should be much bigger. This is because that is why this type of dialogue is so important,” he said, referring to the Euro-African dialogue.