Economy

Why is Turkish influence growing across Africa?

For many, modern Turkey is free of colonial baggage and hence able to extend a commercial and cultural hand unburdened by past transgressions.

Image credit: Shutterstock / lexosn

 

The African continent is unquestionably on the up.

According to the African Development Bank Group’s current Macroeconomic Performance and Outlook (MEO), by 2050, its population is set to double to 2.5 billion, with economic output projected to have already tripled a decade earlier.

A burgeoning middle class is demanding products and services hitherto unaffordable or unavailable, while in broader terms, diversifying economies—coming from a low base in many cases—in pursuit of technology and knowledge transfer are opening the door to commerce and foreign investment to maximize the economic potential of plentiful natural resources.

The MEO identifies eleven African countries as among the world’s fastest-growing performers in 2024. And Africa, still second only to Asia by pace of growth, is forecast to average 3.8% and 4.2% GDP growth in 2024 and 2025, respectively.

Tabula Rasa

Clearly, there’s nothing like entering a good investment at ground level.

It follows, then, that the queue of foreign nations seeking to penetrate these lucrative markets is long. Yet the approach among them is not uniform—Turkey being a case in point. Until quite recently, the investment focus had been largely confined to North Africa, but promising new Sub-Saharan markets boast opportunities in rare earth materials and natural resources vital to the new century, as well as the drive for renewable energy and a sustainable industrial matrix.

Turkey argues that the momentum of its African relations stems from more than the power plants and infrastructure projects its companies contribute to developing.

For many, modern Turkey is free of colonial baggage and hence able to extend a commercial and cultural hand unburdened by past transgressions. In fact, Ankara insists, there is an inherent similarity of experience and vision that Turkey is tapping into for mutual progress.

In brief, Ankara is presenting itself to Africa and, in turn, viewing the continent as an alternative to the West.

An Islamic bond

Two decades ago, Turkey was actively seeking EU membership and was declined by the European Council, a move Ankara insists was due to the country’s conservative Islamic society.

A year later, Turkey launched its ‘Action Plan for Africa.’

Africa’s Muslim population now stands at one-third of the total. In 2024, Nigeria led the field, with around 105 million Muslims, followed by Egypt and Algeria, with 90.4 million and 39.4 million, respectively. Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, therefore, makes official visits not just as a fellow leader but as a kindred spirit under Islam.

Soft power…

Turkey’s mammoth soft power initiatives have underpinned its formal African relations. Those initiatives have spanned education, charitable relief, and other humanitarian work done through its Directorate of Religious Affairs and the sponsoring of promising African students.

Over 100 schools teaching Turkish have been established across the continent, teaching around 60,000 students. With pitch-perfect messaging, NTR TV, the first Turkish Television Channel broadcasting to the continent, today reaches close to 50 countries.

Aside from the Turkish language itself, the channel promotes Turkish lifestyle, culture, and products.

Flag-carrier Turkish Airlines, too, plays its part, flying to over 60 African destinations accessing Turkey’s 45 joint Business Councils across the continent.

Diplomacy

Diplomatic traffic with Africa has never been so active as under Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (Adalet ve Kalkinma Partisi, AKP).

While Turkey had just two embassies in 1992, today’s number is 44. And while in the 1990s, only Sudan had an embassy in Turkey among Sub-Saharan nations, the current number is 38.

Turkey’s president personally has made over 50 state visits to 31 countries continent-wide, during which he is accompanied by key industrialists and other specialists to better explore economic relations, including both civil and military trade.

Tomorrow’s global powerhouse?

In January 2013, the African Union (AU) Summit adopted Agenda 2063—‘The Africa We Want’—as the continent’s roadmap for sustainable development and economic growth.

Turkey has been a notable component in the pursuit of the AU’s objectives.

In 2005, Turkey became an observing member of the African Union (AU) and a strategic partner in 2008.

That same year Istanbul hosted the First Türkiye-Africa Partnership Summit from 18-21 August.

The 2015-2019 Joint Implementation Plan was adopted at the Second Türkiye-Africa Partnership Summit in November 2014, held in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea.

The Plan pertained to the priority of respective African nations in such core areas as trade and investment, security, education, technology transfer, rural economy, energy, and transportation.

Turkey’s African Initiative Policy, once concluded, was replaced by the Africa Partnership Policy in 2013. The Policy promotes shared state-private initiatives and, according to the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, aims, “…to contribute to the peace, stability, economic and social development of the Continent, and develop our bilateral relations on the basis of equal partnership and mutual benefit…”

The third Summit, themed ‘Enhanced Partnership for Common Development and Prosperity,’ returned to Istanbul in December 2021, hosting 38 countries.

Ankara emphasized at the time that its African relations were carried out under the broader umbrella of the AU’s 2063 Agenda and the UN’s 2030 Agenda in pursuit of the continent’s sustainable and inclusive development.

Commerce

In commercial terms, the numbers speak for themselves. At the 10th World Cooperation Industries Forum in Istanbul in February 2024, attended by over 1,600 African business figures, Turkey’s Deputy Minister revealed that their “bilateral trade with the continent has expanded around five times in the last 20 years, reaching about USD32 billion in 2023 [having] increased by 26% to USD3 billion in January.”

Exports to the continent had sky-rocketed twelve-fold from 2002, when the AKP came to power, to USD21.3 billion for 2023, with Africa accounting for 8.3% of Turkey’s total exports.

The rough with the smooth…

TurkStat puts Ankara’s trade with West Africa at around USD6.5 billion and USD4.1 billion with the Sahel region, comprising Senegal, Gambia, Mauritania, Guinea, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, Chad, Cameroon, and Nigeria.

Yet, while sharing commercial progress on the continent, Turkey is also susceptible to some of its travails.

The potential instability arising from recent coups, such as in Niger on July 26, 2023—neighboring the major market of Nigeria—risks jeopardizing commercial arteries that carry around USD35 billion of trade in Sub-Saharan Africa.

The primary concern is that the political vacuum left by a coup could be filled by the fundamentalist Islamic terror group Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP), well entrenched along with Al-Qaeda-linked terrorist groups.

Turkey has institutionalized its African relations through regular diplomatic events and systematic commercial traffic.

Moreover, based on cultural similarities observed on the continent, most notably among Muslim nations, Turkey presents itself as a spiritually compatible alternative to the West.

Through active participation across every avenue of life, from education and culture to economy and industry, Ankara is well-positioned to ride the continent’s ascension.

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