(SenePlus) – In a column published on January 9, 2025 in Le Monde, Marie de Vergès draws up an alarming observation of the movement of people on the African continent, revealing the numerous obstacles which still hinder the mobility of Africans within their own continent.
While Ghana has just opened its visa-free borders to African passport holders since the start of 2025, this decision appears to be a notable exception. According to the chronicle, only four other states out of the fifty-four on the continent – Benin, Gambia, Rwanda and Seychelles – grant such an exemption to African nationals.
This paradoxical situation spares no one, not even the most influential. Nigerian tycoon Aliko Dangote, presented as the richest man in Africa, publicly complained about this during an economic forum in Rwanda in May 2024: “As an investor who wants to make Africa prosper, I have to apply for thirty-five different visas,” he said, emphasizing the absurdity of having to “file [son] passport in embassies” despite its status as a major investor present in eighteen countries on the continent.
The chronicle highlights particularly aberrant situations, such as that of the two Congos. Residents of Brazzaville and Kinshasa, whose capitals are only separated by a twenty-minute ferry ride across the Congo River, must present passports and visas to travel from one bank to the other.
Certainly, progress has been made, as Marie de Vergès notes. According to the African Development Bank’s Visa Openness Index, the number of countries offering electronic visas has increased from less than ten to twenty-six since 2016. Spaces for free movement also exist within some regional blocs, such as the Economic Community of West African States.
However, obstacles remain numerous. The columnist cites in particular “the vague eligibility criteria, the paperwork, the long processing times” which complicate obtaining visas. This situation has major economic repercussions: intra-African trade represents only 15% of the continent’s trade.
However, a solution exists on paper. In 2018, the African Union adopted a protocol to allow Africans to travel visa-free to any country on the continent for up to ninety days. But the chronicle reveals that of the thirty-two signatory countries, only four have ratified it (Mali, Niger, Rwanda and Sao Tome and Principe), far from the fifteen ratifications necessary for its entry into force.
The reluctance of States can be explained by various fears: competition in the labor market, increase in smuggling and crime, or even the spread of diseases. But as the journalist from Le Monde concludes, “more than sixty years after independence, Africa would have more to gain from opening up to itself, rather than protecting borders drawn up by European settlers a hundred years ago. forty years.”
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