The one-day summit was attended by over a dozen African leaders and top officials of the European Union and United Nations. The summit held in Rome was the first major event of Italy’s Group of Seven presidency.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni addressed a summit of African leaders from various countries yesterday. It was focused on showcasing Italy’s development plans for the continent. Italy aims to curb illegal migration and establish an energy hub for Europe.
Premier Meloni won the 2022 election with immigration issues as a main agenda. She promised to put forward Italy as a juncture between Africa and Europe, bridging energy supplies from down south and investing in trade deals to restrict migration.
Italy has been the origin point for migration in Europe and is advocating for developmental plans to establish security and economic stability to generate employment in Africa. This could prevent younger generations from risking their lives to migrate across the Mediterranean Sea.
The first hard-right wing leader, Meloni, since the end of WW2, has kept migration at the top of her government’s priority list. However, her first year of rule registered a significant increase, with up to 160,000 people migrating from Africa and arriving on Italy’s coast.
The one-day summit was attended by over a dozen African leaders and top officials of the European Union and United Nations. The summit held in Rome was the first major event of Italy’s Group of Seven presidency.
In the 1950s, Enrico Mattei, founder of ENI, a government-owned multinational energy company, proposed a cooperative for African nations to invest and tap into their natural resources. Meloni launched several initiatives under a ‘Mattei plan’ named after the ENI’s founder.
Meloni said that the plan is a new approach, non-predatory and non-paternalistic, besides being non-charitable and focused on growing equally. She has promised an initial investment of 5.5 billion euros ($5.95 billion) for these initiatives backed by government guarantees.
Italy may face a struggle to gather support from the European Union for a new deal because they have already launched their African package in 2022 worth €150 billion ($160 billion)
The Meloni administration has reduced foreign aid cooperation funds in 2022 and has officially allotted €2.8 million annually from 2024 to 2026 to fund the Mattei plan.
Italy’s best-selling Corriere della Sera daily said that the government has provisions to set aside €4 billion for funding the plan for the next 5-7 years. Funds will be used for schemes crafted to build African agribusiness and organise Italian transport facilities, but the major investment is anticipated to be in energy.
Energy Dependence
The Russian invasion of Ukraine in early 2022 awakened the European Union towards their dependence on Moscow for energy requirements. Meloni is planning to develop Italy as an entry portal for energy to capitalise on the demands of fellow EU nations.
40 African civil society organisations have raised concerns that the Mattei plan is primarily focused on making African fossil fuels accessible to Italy for Europe’s requirements and emboldening Italian companies’ foothold on the African natural and human resources.
Dean Bhekumuzi Bhebhe, Head of the Don’t Gas Africa campaign, said that Italy’s inconsiderate aim overlooks the climate crisis concerns and demands of the African civil society.
Francesco Sassi, a researcher in energy geopolitics at the RIE think tank, said that Meloni is devising a purblind and uniform strategy to counter energy security and roadblocks of energy transition.
Her short-sighted approach also hints at the overrunning of the domestic policies of African energy players, be it human rights concerns or energy and environmental policies.
Migration
The Mattei plan depicts energy as the primary concern, but Meloni is investing political capital to prevent migration, said Giovanni Carbone, head of the Africa Programme at the Insititute for International Political Studies (ISPI) in Milan.
The plan also aims to curb push factors and persuade migrant-originating countries to sign readmittance deals for migrants being refused permits to live in Italy. This scheme attracts critics saying that such long-withstanding deals are meant to last countries that have political stability.