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Seventy-five percent of Europeans believe the European Union (EU) should strengthen its partnership with Africa, and increase investments on the continent to boost job creation and development. This is according to a survey published by the European Commission last week.

It’s the kind of consensus policy makers in Brussels are struggling to find.

Two years ago, at the 5th Africa-EU summit in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, there was much talk about a reset in relations between the two. This reflects a general consensus that the EU’s engagement with Africa needs an overhaul.

How exactly to go about this is proving harder to work out.

There has been talk of more trade and investment, rather than aid, with outgoing Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker pushing the idea of “partnership of equals”.

Such ambitions are struggling to overcome divisions about how to handle migration, an issue that dominates much of EU policy towards Africa. There’s also disagreement about which of the bloc’s institutions should lead its efforts on the continent.

Hopes for less ambiguity under incoming Commission president Ursula von der Leyen have been dashed. There had been speculating that a commissioner for Africa would be appointed, but the brief has instead gone to a general commissioner for international partnerships.

Europe can’t quite decide what it wants from Africa.

This report reflects the views of the author alone, not those of How we made it in Africa.

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Today’s picks

From the continent

Mozambique’s president Filipe Nyusi has been declared the winner of elections on October 15 with 73% of the vote according to the electoral commission, while his ruling Frelimo party has secured 70% of seats in the national assembly. The vote, disputed by the opposition Renamo party, comes amid massive investment into the development of large, untapped natural gas reserves. More: Al Jazeera

Nigeria has said it will not borrow from international debt markets in 2019 due to time constraints before the end of its budget cycle. Africa’s biggest economy is facing a fiscal crisis amid soaring debt servicing costs. More: Reuters

The global perspective

Plans for a $14 billion, 11,000MW hydro plant in Democratic Republic of Congo have reportedly stalled amid ‘serious disagreement’ between Chinese and Spanish developers working on the project. The plant is part of the long-delayed Grand Inga dam project, which has the potential to generate up to 40,000MW of power from the Congo River. More: Bloomberg

The African Union has called for the removal of international economic sanctions on Zimbabwe, following new sanctions by the US on the country’s state security minister over human rights concerns. Washington has maintained Robert Mugabe-era sanctions on the country despite the longtime ruler’s ousting in 2017, seen as a major obstacle to government efforts to kick-start its struggling economy. More: CGTN

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