THE voices calling for compensation or reparations from the former colonial powers are becoming louder.

African nations are increasingly reasserting themselves and removing or at least putting on notice the misleaders prepared to do the bidding of the former masters.

Niger is a good example of the new confidence sweeping across the continent.

The country was under brutal French rule from the late 19th century until 1960 when it won its independence through armed struggle.

But France continued to maintain an economic and cultural stranglehold over the west African country for decades. Names of roads and buildings were named after French “heroes” rather than African freedom fighters.

It was essentially a “flag independence” administered by a number of compliant misleaders who were willing to do the bidding of Paris.

The authoritarian French imposed their language, culture and political institutions on the people.

The Nigeriens got poorer as the French got richer.

Under those conditions, as elsewhere on the mother continent, it was inevitable that there would be resistance — and there was.

Independence movements rose in Niger during the 1940s in opposition to the despotism of the colonial authorities, forced labour, racial segregation and the inspiration of anti-colonial movements elsewhere on the continent.

These early liberation groups included the Nigerien Progressive Party and the Sawaba movement.

These and other groups organised strikes, boycotts and protests. Despite vicious French repression the colony was made ungovernable and by 1958, France was forced to grant Niger self-government within its colonial orbit.

These groups were deeply influenced by Pan-Africanist ideas as well as the negritude philosophy of intellectuals such as Leopold Senghor.

These ideas prioritised black African identities over the imposed French identity.

Despite French colonial rule and the influence it maintained over Nigerien misleaders the fires of African pride could never be extinguished.

More and more, Niger began to assert its African independence.

One pivotal shift came in 1974, when Niger decided to withdraw from the CFA franc zone controlled by France. This delivered a huge blow to French financial power.

Despite French attempts to further entrench a neocolonial dependency Niger began the process of replacing French curricula and expanded teaching in indigenous languages such as Hausa, Songhai and Zarma.

The French provided funds and military support to Niger for decades to stifle anti-French sentiment and to protect French mining interests.

These mining interests are at the heart of French attempts to maintain control over Niger.

Niger has been one of France’s top three uranium suppliers, accounting for roughly 15–20 per cent of France’s annual uranium needs — about 1,200 to 1,600 tons per year.

But as changes to Niger’s economy and society took place, so did the realisation that the French should pay reparations for the damage caused to the people of Niger for its brutal rule.

The head of the new military leadership of Niger, General Abdurahmane Tchiani, recently demanded compensation from France “for more than a century of colonial and neocolonial plundering of the natural resources” of the west African country.

He said: “France has uncontrollably plundered our resources for more than 100 years during the period of colonial and neocolonial rule.

“It will pay us in full, we will draw up a detailed programme to pay off all the debts that the French have accumulated towards us, and we will be freed from them forever.

“We intend to fully restore our sovereignty and to do so we will examine and study all archival data on Africa’s recent history,” he added.

One particularly brutal incident during French colonial rule took place in 1899 when French officers, under the leadership of captains Paul Voulet and Julien Chanoine, ordered the troops under their command to carry out a reign of terror over local people.

In Birni-N’Konni alone, an estimated 400 people were massacred in just one day. Entire villages along the mission’s path — including Tibiri, Zinder and smaller communities — were burned and looted, with corpses hung at their entrances.

The French appear to have gone to great lengths to cover up this heinous crime. It has only been through the accounts of survivors’ descendants and some reports of Voulet that light has been shed on the massacre.
It is only the remarkable determination of people in Niger that has kept this case alive.

Case is the operative word. The people of Niger have been pursuing a case with the United Nations special rapporteur for the promotion of truth and justice since 2021 after the making of an important film African Apocalypse.

A group of Nigeriens presented an official demand for reparations in April 2024 to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and presented evidence later that year to the truth and justice rapporteur, Professor Bernard Duhaime.

Along with his team Professor Duhame presents the claim of the group to the permanent UN missions of France and Niger.

France initially dismissed the claim as mere “allegations,” although this year the French government told the UN it was “open to bilateral dialogue” with Niger.

There is no doubt in my mind that the French will continue to deny any responsibility for the atrocities commited in their name.

They may at some point go so far as to find a form of weasel words that amount to some interpretation of an apology. The idea that the country that demanded Haitians pay for their freedom from enslavement will cough up is a long shot — but nevertheless one that it is important to pursue.

The African Union labelled 2025 the Year of Reparations, after a decade of sustained lobbying.

This must be made to be much more than the usual symbolic designation that so often comes from transnational bodies.

Given the seemingly eternal rivalry and sometimes conflict between the French and Germans, perhaps this time Paris can go further than its neighbour.

In 2021 the Germans were, at long last, forced to formally acknowledge the colonial-era genocide they committed in Namibia and pledged €1.1 billion over 30 years in aid.

A mere drop in the ocean to the Germans and only a symbolic form of restitution, though the Germans stopped short of calling it reparation or compensation.

France should commit to going further and agree to reparations for Niger and the whole African continent should get behind the Nigeriens in their demand.

This is not begging for a handout — as reparations are so often portrayed. This is about long overdue justice.

I am sick and tired of these nations that have leached off the backs of Africans by exploiting our labour and the rich resources of the land bleating on about what’s right and what’s wrong.

These nations are criminals and should be made to pay for their crimes. It is entirely up to the people of Niger to decide what form that compensation should take, not me writing this from the relative security of the belly of the beast.

But the reparations must amount to more than weasel words and must make a difference to the material conditions facing Nigeriens.

Roger McKenzie is Morning Star international editor.