Pax Africana: Italy's Ambitious plan for Africa
By Moss Gillespie
Earlier in June, on the dazzling sun-bleached coasts of Puglia, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni hosted the annual G7 summit. Members of the G7 include many of the largest Western economies, including the United States, Canada, Germany, France, England, Italy, Japan, and the EU. As the current holder of the annually rotating position of president of the G7, Italy had the unique opportunity to dictate some of the summit’s priorities in favor of the country's political ambitions. This year, Italy wanted the attending nations not to just focus on the dramatic wars in the East, but to turn south towards the continent of Africa. Meloni cleverly decided to leverage her position as host to sweeten the Western economic bloc’s taste of her grand strategy for Africa: The Mattei plan.
Prior to exploring the Mattei Plan, it is important to understand why Italy is so keenly invested in Africa’s future. Before her election as Prime Minister of Italy, Giorgia Meloni’s platform was partially popularized by an anti-immigrant wave of sentiment felt across Italy. 2023 saw the largest ever influx of immigrants arriving in Italy, with more than 140,000 entering the country. Building on consistent growing trends over the past few years, this phenomenon suddenly burst to the top of the most pressing matters in Italian politics. Her Brothers of Italy party, an ideological descendant of the party World War II era Dictator Benito Mussolini led, established itself as a platform for “Christian, identitarian, patriotic” politics. Therefore, the tens of thousands of immigrants entering Italy from African and Muslim-majority countries have galvanized the far right’s immigration reform and consequently led to Melon’s election.
However, Meloni and her party originally struggled to deliver any success in curbing the rate of immigration. Detailed in an article by Foreign Policy, many of the solutions pushed by Meloni failed to provide any substantive results. At the time of the publication of the article, two-thirds of Italians believed Meloni was “not capable of handling the issue,” a devastating revelation for the Italian far-right coalition. Almost immediately after the scorching article came out, Meloni turned to the public with a new solution, one that would hopefully repair the public’s dismal perception of her government’s effectiveness and provide long-term solutions to the immigration crisis.
The Mattei Plan, announced in a Council of Foreign Ministers press release on November 3rd, 2023, is a 4-year long collaboration with an assortment of African states who constitute the bulk of most frequent nationalities immigrating to Italy. The plan’s objective is “strengthening collaboration initiatives between Italy and the States of the African continent, promoting sustainable and long-lasting economic and social development of the latter and preventing the root causes of irregular migration.” Essentially, Meloni is creating an investment council run by the Italian government and the EU with the explicit goal of increasing the material conditions within African states.
Meloni is gambling that her plan will address the root causes of migration, like education, opportunity and security within Africa. Furthermore, the plan will strengthen Italian-African relations at a time when many Western states have found their footing in the region unstable. Meloni may be looking at the emerging gaps on the continent as spaces for her country to build meaningful alliances and strategic relationships. She may also be looking to help Italian corporations win some lucrative contracts on the continent, especially in the realm of natural resources. ENI, the Italian state-owned natural gas giant from which the name of the plan originates (from founder Enrico Mattei), is playing a particularly elevated role despite their glaringly obvious special interests in securing drilling contracts. Regardless of Meloni’s scheming, utilizing the West’s economic power to achieve this goal must be a priority, as Italy cannot financially undertake this project alone.
To convince the West of her plan, Meloni capitalized on her special powers as president and host of the 2024 G7. What started as a Western ad-hoc committee to address the international energy crisis in 1973, the G7 has evolved into a self-described “formal, prominent venue to address major global issues.” Therefore, the president of the conference can steer the overall direction of the summit in a manner of their choosing. To promote the Mattei Plan, Meloni invited many of the leaders involved in the initial stages of its development to the conference. Attending were leaders of African States involved in the Mattei Plan. Kenya, Mozambique, Ethiopia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Côte d’Ivoire, Tunisia, and representatives from the African Union (AU) and African Development Bank were present. Furthermore, relevant strategic partners such as Turkey, which has been involved in direct military intervention in Libya, Somalia, and Ethiopia, were attending the convention as well.
The G7 was for Meloni the golden opportunity to soften up the West for investment in the plan, which was ultimately reflected in its elevated status in the agenda and press releases of the convention. It was only third in discussion to the conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine, demonstrating the West’s attitudes towards immigration shifting in a similar direction to Italy’s. The Leader’s Communique, which broadcasts the general consensus reached by the G7 nations at the end of the meetings, even included the G7’s formal approval of the Mattei Plan written at the end of the section Fostering partnerships with African Countries, stating“we welcome the Mattei Plan for Africa launched by Italy.” It has only been a few weeks since the G7 conference concluded, but Meloni’s political maneuvering may prove to be a critical move in the rapidly changing landscape of African geopolitics. The plan relies on Meloni’s ability to lead the coalition of African states, maintain the West’s financial commitment, and secure her party's power at home over the next 4 years. She faces a formidable task indeed.
