Under Donald Trump’s presidency, US engagement with Africa is shrinking along a handful of key issues such as controversial deportation deals, punitive trade tariffs and strategic grab of critical minerals across the continent. The result is a continent caught in the crosswinds created by US exhortative policies. While larger African democracies like Nigeria, Ghana and South Africa are fighting the crosswinds to protect their sovereignty, dignity and independent policies, smaller and weaker states are compelled to yield under surmounting pressure; giving away access to strategic ports and mines in exchange for short-term political reliefs and modest economic relief.
This phenomenon has been creating various fault lines along the African continent and eroding power of regional blocs like the African Union (AU), which once dominated negotiations with powerful states and institutions with Africa’s collective leverage.
Trump’s preference for bilateral, one-on-one deals is also dismantling multilateral frameworks, enabling Washington to cherry-pick nations based on their vulnerabilities. In the process, assertive democracies risk economic penalties and diplomatic fallout and compliant transactional states discover the long-term consequences of trading sovereignty for survival. The current scramble in Africa seems to be motivated by prospects of immediate gains and might prove detrimental in the long run. The repercussions of a myopic scramble will leave behind a more divided Africa at its new low of strategic vulnerability.
The current scramble in Africa seems to be motivated by prospects of immediate gains and might prove detrimental in the long run. The repercussions of a myopic scramble will leave behind a more divided Africa at its new low of strategic vulnerability
Rebellion Begins
When Nigerian Foreign Affairs Minister Yusuf Tuggar sat down for an interview with the local Channels TV in Abuja in July, he anticipated the question. Rumors had been circulating for weeks of a quiet US proposal for Nigeria to take in Venezuelan prisoners and asylum seekers facing deportation from the United States. The Donald Trump administration was under pressure at home to act decisively on immigration, and Africa, in Trump’s calculus, was part of the solution.
Tuggar did not mince words. “We have enough problems of our own,” he said. “We cannot accept Venezuelan deportees. We already have 230 million people.” With that, Africa’s most populous democracy had publicly rebuffed one of Washington’s most controversial overtures in years. It was not alone. Ghana’s president, John Mahama, broke with the usual diplomatic caution to openly criticize Trump’s treatment of South African president Cyril Ramaphosa during a White House meeting on May 21. Mahama condemned Trump’s remarks about “white genocide” in South Africa as “deeply insulting to the collective memory and dignity of Africans.”
US Pressure Tactics
“Trump’s refugee diplomacy is about outsourcing America’s immigration headaches to countries it sees as disposable or easily leveraged. These are not partnerships. They’re pressure tactics dressed up as diplomacy,” says Curtis Smith, a global affairs analyst in San Antonio, Texas. “It’s domestic politics, plain and simple.”
The refugee arrangements are opaque, but analysts say they are part of wider transactional packages including aid, security guarantees or preferential access to US programs. In Central Africa, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is offering Washington privileged access to cobalt and other critical minerals essential to US supply chains. In the Horn of Africa, the self-declared republic of Somaliland is courting the Trump administration with access to strategic port facilities, including a Red Sea military base, and critical minerals in exchange for diplomatic recognition.
Likewise, “Trump’s 30% tariffs on South African goods are not about economics, they’re about politics,” says South African political economist Phumlani Majozi. “The Trump administration wants South Africa to make concessions on land laws and affirmative action policy, what it sees as the mistreatment of the Afrikaner minority. The Trump administration also wants Pretoria to shift away from its anti-Israel positions. There is no investment offer attractive enough to change Trump’s mind unless those things change,” adds Majozi.
These cases show how immigration deals, trade pressure and control over strategic resources are increasingly intertwined in Washington’s Africa policy. Deportation deals create openings for security cooperation; mineral access strengthens US supply chains; and both are tied to tariffs as leverage in bilateral negotiations. These intertwined tools of pressure have sparked strong and divergent reactions across Africa, dividing nations into two broad camps: defiant democracies determined to resist Washington’s demands, and transactional states willing to comply for strategic or economic gain.
Africa nations are divided into two broad camps: defiant democracies determined to resist Washington’s demands, and transactional states willing to comply for strategic or economic gain
Bloc of Defiant Democracies (Nigeria – Ghana – South Africa)
The diplomatic chill between Ghana and US deepened after Ghana’s Foreign Minister Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa publicly clashed with James E. Risch, the Republican chair of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Risch had accused Ghana of favoring Chinese creditors over American companies and taxpayers, following Ablakwa’s meetings in Washington on trade, immigration and looming US visa sanctions.
Ablakwa fired back on social media, calling the remarks “hypocritical” and reminding Washington of its unpaid “reparations” for the transatlantic slave trade. While reaffirming Ghana’s commitment to honor its debts, he insisted repayment would be on Accra’s terms, a sovereignty-first message that mirrors the assertive posture of other African democracies resisting Trump-era economic and political pressure.
In Pretoria, where the economy braced for the shock Trump’s 30% tariffs on South African goods, Ramaphosa’s government refused to bow. Instead, it has doubled down on its sovereign right to set domestic and foreign policy even as it scrambles behind the scenes to salvage a last-minute trade reprieve. In recent weeks, South Africa has confronted Eswatini over its decision to accept US-deported criminals, intensified its rhetoric against Israel’s war in Gaza, held firm on land reform policies affecting Afrikaner farmers and even signed a condolence book at the Iranian embassy. Washington has taken note. The Trump White House wanted concessions on race-based economic policies like Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) and a softening of South Africa’s Middle East stance. It has got neither so far.