President Wade at the European Commission: All for the Europe-Africa tunnel, nothing for immigration control

Responding to a question from the Courier, Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade (who was invited by the European Union (EU) to discuss EU-Africa cooperation in the area of transport), spoke of the African Union’s priorities for which he wanted European aid: the Dakar-Niamey and Dakar-Djibouti railways and the Ndjamena-Cape Town and Ndjamena-Lagos motorways. Speaking personally, he stressed his great expectations at the prospect of the project linking Europe to Africa via the Strait of Gibraltar, preferably with a tunnel rather than a bridge.

On the issue of air transport, the Senegalese Head of State pointed out that he did not particularly want European public aid, except possibly for airport infrastructure, since this area is a concern for competition and African companies were currently in a repositioning process. The President underlined that even Dakar’s airport, which is one of the most modern on the African continent, was rebuilt exclusively with private funds.

President Wade feels that a Europe-Africa tunnel would be a great development tool for Africa, and rejects claims that it would only make immigration easier. His view is that it is easier to control the traffic through a tunnel than policing thousands of miles of shoreline. The tunnel would also help in opening up the continent to the global economy. President Wade took this opportunity to highlight the distortion of competition due to the limitation of movement of African entrepreneurs; who cannot easily travel to Europe to develop and conclude business. He recalled that he had personally – but to no avail – proposed the adoption of a ‘business visa’ for African entrepreneurs, although he agreed that the EU’s delivery of long-term visas had gone someway to making this possible.

Answering a question on immigration control, Abdoulaye Wade, explained that he had nothing against such controls by Europe. Referring to the specific case of Italian immigration policy, he “saluted the Italian government and the successive governments of Italy where 70,000 Senegalese enjoy good living and working conditions.” Still, Spain is the country that set the example. Indeed, the country launched a large-scale training operation for farmers and welcomes many trained workers on its territory, a total of around 40,000 today. On the other hand, the President is deeply concerned by the French proposal for ‘controlled immigration’, which was adopted by the EU. “I am not against controlling immigration, but I am against a competency-based selection. We have made some great sacrifices to train managers who are then taken away from us. It is therefore logical that we should demand reimbursement. I also ask that you send me new engineers if you take mine away from me. I need competencies”, he said.