Former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo issued a stark warning on Thursday about a “new scramble for Africa,” accusing external powers of fuelling instability across the continent while posing as peace partners.
Speaking at the third Mashariki Cooperation Conference in Diani, the 89-year-old statesman and veteran mediator said Africa risks becoming a theatre of great-power competition, repeating the mistakes of the Cold War. He specifically named China’s Belt and Road Initiative for deepening debt dependency, and Russia’s Wagner Group and its successors for deploying proxy forces in Mali, the Central African Republic, Libya, and Sudan without demanding governance improvements in return.
“The hypocrisy is breathtaking,” Obasanjo told an audience of intelligence and security chiefs from across Africa. “Such partners are not building Africa’s future. They are extracting Africa’s present.”
Obasanjo, who led Nigeria from 1976–1979 and again from 1999–2007, also denounced what he called a “coup epidemic” across the Sahel. Since 2020, successful takeovers have occurred in Mali (twice), Guinea, Sudan, Burkina Faso (twice), Niger, and Gabon.
“I repeat what history has taught me without ambiguity: military governments have never delivered sustained development or genuine security in Africa,” he said. “I say this as a former soldier who twice handed power to civilians — first in 1979 and again in 1999. The handover of power is not a weakness. It is the highest expression of a soldier’s patriotism.”
Obasanjo, who was also a victim of a military government, urged the continent’s intelligence chiefs to expose the financing and arming of proxy forces by external actors, calling it “one of the greatest obstacles to durable peace in Africa.”
The Mashariki Cooperation Conference, now in its third edition, brings together intelligence and security services from across the continent to address emerging geopolitical dynamics and Africa’s security architecture.
The Masharaki Cooperation Conference 111 is geared towards critically examining the evolving geopolitical dynamics shaping Africa’s security environment and exploring innovative approaches to strengthening the continent’s security architecture.
Specific objectives include discussing the emerging geopolitical shifts and their implications for Africa’s security landscape, evaluating the strengths, gaps, and prospects of Africa’s security architecture and promoting regional cooperation, intelligence sharing, and strategic partnerships to enhance collective security across the continent.
The 2026 Conference is the third year. It examined the current structure and effectiveness of Africa’s security architecture, assessed Africa’s strategic preparedness and responses to current geopolitical realities, and explored how Africa can leverage rapid technological advancements to support governance and security structures.
The intelligence chiefs also assessed Africa’s counterterrorism measures in the dynamic and changing terrorism theatre and examined Africa’s strategic responses to global resource competition and climate change.
The organisers said the MCC offers an opportunity to mainstream African perspectives into global security dialogues at a time of rapid change, with profound implications for Africa’s security and prosperity. It also provides an opportunity for closer intra-African collaboration and enhanced engagement with global partners, benefiting the continent.
