Iliyasu Gadu
Ilgad2009gmail.com
08035355706 (Texts only)
We have seen the images of huge demonstrations across cities all over Europe. Demonstrations that have brought cities to a halt with pitch battles against policemen leading to massive arrests and destruction of iconic buildings and structures.
The mainstream media of the west have been struggling to attribute the demonstrations to various reasons; cost of living, immigration, ballooning government debts and rising energy costs.
These factors while to some extent true, do not tell the whole story. Indeed the deliberate attempts to hide the full story of Europe’s present convulsions is itself a symptom of the acute crisis of confidence that has gripped governments in Europe from Portugal to Spain, France, Britain, Germany etc.
The underlying crisis that Europe now faces is that of irreversible decline in global economic and political relevance as the world seems set to get into a period of profound changes in global interaction.
The decline of Europe owes to internal and external factors.
Internally, demographics are not favourable. Several countries in Europe are recording consistent figures in population growth. If the trend continues, in a few decades the population of the continent will be in a steep irreversible decline. And this is bound to affect productivity and economic growth. The population of most countries in Europe will be significantly composed of persons that their forebears were not indigenous Europeans. Not only will this significantly affect the economic prospects of European countries, it will fundamentally affect the cultural foundation of the continent. Many would not know who Napoleon or Lord Nelson was. Lots more will not connect with the music of Mozart and Beethoven. If they did remember Adolf Hitler it is probably to recognize him as a mad fool who tried to destroy Europe because he could not succeed as an amateur painter.
But the fundamental issue is that governments in Europe placed their hopes on creating the European Union as a safeguard for the Welfare state where the economic and civic rights of the European population would be guaranteed. With Germany as the economic powerhouse leading the continent and the others contributing their shift, the Europeans thought they had found the perfect template for a permanent life of ease and convenience. With United States providing the defence and security umbrella and Russia supplying cheap energy resources to power their homes and factories, the Europeans even dared to permit themselves what the Germans called ‘’gemutlichkeit’’, a state of well being and convenience. Indeed in Germany, there was the illusion of de-industrialisation in which the heavy steel and chemical industries as well as the nuclear energy would be scaled down gradually to make way for clean, environmentally compliant industries.
But all these expectations were shattered by the Russia/Ukraine war and exacerbated by the US/Iran war. In the Russia/Iran war, Europe made a willing choice to aggressively antagonize Russia by massive arms supply to Ukraine, but also by joining the economic sanctions against Russia. It did not occur to the Europeans that doing so amounts to shooting oneself because Russia being the source of Europe’s cheap supply of energy might decide to shut down the taps conveying the gas to Europe.
But if the Europeans thought they could ride the shortages from the Russian source and continue to rely on the Middle Eastern sources, they probably did not reckon with the closure of the straits of Hormuz by the Iranians. Now with closure of the straits of Hormuz to oil and gas shipping adding to the cut off from Russian energy sources, the Europeans have found themselves in a double whammy. And to make matters worse, Donald Trump’s United States has decided to punish the Europeans who have decided to stay out of the Iran war with a phased withdrawal of US troops thereby leaving Europe literally and figuratively in the cold defensively.
Economically Europe is staring down the barrel and the future does not seem hopeful. For centuries Europe used to dominate the world. From the fifteenth century to the twentieth century a succession of European states, Portugal, Spain, Netherlands, France and Britain, then Germany and Italy created and controlled trade routes like the Suez Canal, the Cape route etc and in that period orchestrated the transfer of unquantifiable resources from the world to build Europe. These countries also exported millions of their citizens to grab and found countries made up mostly of persons of European origins in Asia, Latin America and Africa. A clear testimony to Europe’s loss of relevance is that sometime this month a summit of leaders involving China, United States and Russia will be holding in China to determine the Ukraine question. No European country nor even Ukraine has been invited.
Now in the 21st century Europe finds itself being aggressively challenged economically by the rise of China. Europe used to be the workshop of the world and the incubator of ideas, innovation and creativity. China has today completely taken over all of that. China is also not only the creator and innovator but also the workshop and market for every country in the world.
Within the EU there seems to be a growing crisis of confidence in its future relevance. France in particular has been hard hit by the loss of its influence in Sahel Africa. As the largest producer of nuclear energy in Europe, France used to rely on cheap source of Uranium found in Niger which is now under a hostile military government that has terminated the relationship. France also finds itself losing the lucrative mineral extraction operations in Burkina-Faso and Mali which contributes significantly to France’s economy. With the loss of these cheap sources of resources, France now finds it difficult to meet its debt obligations leading to cuts in public services and hence the demonstrations that has ripped the country.
Britain which had hoped to cut new economic deals with India and the Commonwealth countries following Brexit now finds that expectation hard to achieve.
In the light of these developments, it has become convenient for leaders in several European countries to blame immigrants. All across Europe now extreme right wing political parties are rising in Germany, France, and Britain aiming for power on the issue of immigrants. But what the mainstream media will not admit is that it was the governments of these countries that invited the immigrants to help with the post war reconstruction. Germany invited millions of Turkish citizens as ‘’Gastarbeiter’’ or guest workers; Britain brought in millions of Indians, Pakistanis, Bangladeshis and Jamaicans and France took in millions from its former colonies in Africa and the Caribbean to help reconstruct its destroyed factories and infrastructure.
Ironically it is the descendants of the people who toiled to revive these European countries that are being targeted as culprits for the existential issues Europe finds itself today.
