How Wagner is providing cover for Putin in crisis-hit Niger
The spectacle of Russian flags waved by coup-supporters at Sunday’s rally in Niamey, Niger, shows just how much Russia’s effort to pitch itself as an anti-colonial flag bearer resonates.
The reality though is that it is utterly disingenuous.
Russia’s war in Ukraine is a blatantly imperialist undertaking, however Putin tries to sell it to African leaders who have, by and large, stayed neutral on the invasion.
Wagner’s activities across many African nations, especially in Mali, Sudan and the Central African Republic, bear all sorts of similarities with the very worst of colonial excesses – mineral extraction, mass atrocities and security for politically unsavoury regimes at the expense of their populations.
There is no direct evidence that Wagner had a hand in the Niger situation.
Yevgeny Prigozhin’s comments in relation to the coup seem deliberately ambiguous.
“Thousands of Wagner fighters are capable of bringing order, of destroying terrorists and of not allowing them to harm the local populations of these states,” he said in a voice message on Telegram, while hobnobbing with African leaders in St Petersburg.
That suggests Wagner would be more than willing to help, but isn’t necessarily now.
Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov has condemned the coup as unconstitutional.
The Kremlin is understandably not at all keen on the idea of democratically elected leaders being overthrown either by their people or their militaries.
But if Wagner does throw in its services to Niger’s military plotters, the Kremlin has the cover of distance from the group – which Putin rather bafflingly declared did not even exist a few weeks ago – while securing a foothold into the politics of yet another African state.
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One of Prigozhin’s array of services across the continent has been in the information field, manipulating public discourse, especially around elections.
Think a Russian version of Cambridge Analytica.
Those flags in Niamey testify to just how successful Wagner has been in crafting an impression of Russia – and of the Kremlin’s intentions for Africa – which is a very long way from the truth.