Abstract
TotalEnergies is facing an historic choice: to continue long-standing patterns of fossil-centric, corrupt abuse of underdeveloped (especially African) economies, governments, societies and ecologies backed by the might of the French state; or – as the firm claims it desires – to genuinely transition into a renewable-energy supplier, capable of doing business in an honest and fair way across the world. Its legacy of imperial power plays – unveiled in Total’s 1990s scandals across the oil-rich Gulf of Guinea – is an ongoing embarrassment to those claiming France plays a civilising, democratic role in Africa. Now, with climate considerations foremost in the minds of many compatriots, the urgency of Total’s break from the ancient regime is unprecedented. Yet what can readily be discerned from Total’s current ongoing operations in several Southern African countries is an amplification of the contradictions. This was most obvious when Emmanuel Macron intervened in 2021 to arrange military intervention on behalf of Total’s $20 billion Mozambican gas investment by soldiers from Rwanda and South Africa. The ‘sub-imperialist’ role of Pretoria coincides with its desperate support for new oil moguls whom Total allied with since the mid-2010s, striking major gas deposits and pursuing further seismic-blasting exploration. But since 2021, two kinds of resistances have tripped up Total: Islamic guerrillas in Mozambique and eco-social protesters across the beaches of South Africa’s Indian and Atlantic Ocean shorelines. Struggles in Uganda and Tanzania against Total’s oil drill and pipeline enjoy French solidarity – but in coming months and years, a more exhaustive campaign against renewed fossil imperialism – and sub-imperialism – will be needed, as the planetary stakes heighten as fast as Total’s offshore drilling deepens.