France pledges extra 50 million euros to G5 Sahel alliance

French President Emmanuel Macron on Monday met with his Burkinabe counterpart, Roch Marc Christian Kabore at the Elysee Palace where Macron pledged an additional 50 million euros ($56,757,500 US dollars) to the G5 Sahel alliance.

“In keeping with the Sahel emergency plan put in place by the Burkina Faso government, the French development agency will invest near to 50 million euros additional funding in the region in 2019 in the areas of professional integration, electrification of rural areas and in water and water purification,” Macron said.

The G5 Sahel alliance, which is composed of five West African countries, Burkina Faso, Mali, Chad, Niger and Mauritania, is focused on the fight against organized crime and terrorism which is on the rise in the region.

Kabore stressed that the fight against terrorism in West Africa is urgent as over 600 schools in the east of the G5 Sahel region and northern Burkina Faso are closed due to the presence of jihadist activity.

“What we wanted to state was that set of counter-terrorism measures are really urgent because today we have almost 600 schools which are closed between the east, the Sahel and the north of Burkina Faso. These are large figures and demands that we can co-ordinate our operations between countries, between Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso and be able to reduce the circulation of these people between our borders,” said Kabore.

During his visit Kabore and Macron signed two agreements pledging the extra cash injection to contribute to the electrification of train lines between Nigeria, Niger, Benin and Burkina Faso and to contribute to investments in professional integration, rural electrification and water treatment.