Iran Continues to Gain Influence in Africa

   By Henry Srebrnik, [Fredericton, NB] Daily Gleaner

Since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the Islamic Republic of Iran’s interest in Africa has evolved. Iran has been expanding its footprint on the continent, offering arms and partnerships as it works to boost its influence there.

Iran saw an ideological kinship between itself and many African countries due to their shared desire to fight against the “foreign Western occupier.’’ Tehran also sought to exploit the continent’s resources for its own needs. These reasons, along with Africa’s geographical proximity to the Middle East, made Africa particularly attractive to the Iranian leadership.

Iran hopes to build partnerships that will help it bypass international sanctions while carving out new ground for its “axis of resistance’’ against its global and regional adversaries. Iran’s engagement in Africa is marked by efforts to export Tehran’s version of political Islam, the establishment of proxies, and weapons supplies to both states and nonstate actors.

Iran uses religious soft power to extend its influence in Africa. Tehran organizes conferences, religious and political events, and collaborates with local partners. More than a hundred Islamic centers, schools, seminaries, and mosques are present in over thirty African countries. Al-Mustafa International University, founded in 2007, trains religious scholars and missionaries, thereby increasing Shiite influence on the continent. Since its inception, more than 45,000 religious scholars have graduated.

Other key institutions include the Mostazafan Foundation, the Iranian Red Crescent, the Ministry of Islamic Guidance and Culture, and the Organization of Culture and Islamic Communication. In addition to these institutions, parliamentary groups, friendship associations, chambers of commerce, charitable organizations, religious seminaries, and universities are involved.

Iranian officials have lauded the potential to gain access to Africa’s agricultural and mineral wealth while finding new destinations for Iranian exports, including sophisticated weapons.

In August 2022, Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian visited Mali and Tanzania, then South Africa in 2023. President Ebrahim Raisi, underscoring the importance of the strategy, made a three-country tour to Africa in July 2023 -- the first by an Iranian president to the continent in more than a decade. While in Uganda, Zimbabwe, and Kenya, he “praised the resistance of African countries against colonization as a symbol of their awakening and vigilance.’’ These visits were accompanied by the signing of numerous agreements in the industrial, energy, agricultural, pharmaceutical, and telecommunications sectors.

Geopolitically, Kenya, Uganda, and Zimbabwe have been of assistance to Iran. They have held seats and memberships in important multilateral institutions including the UN Security Council, the UN General Assembly, and the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Board of Governors. As such, they have occasionally been able to tone down pivotal votes, resolutions, and sanctions against Iran’s nuclear program and human rights record.. Furthermore, Uganda and Zimbabwe produce and export uranium, the chief resource for Iran’s nuclear program.

 Iran also seized the opportunity to reach out to a trio of anti-Western military juntas that have taken power in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger. Weapons sales could address their needs while aligning with their anti-Western and aggressively militarized outlooks.

Ali Bagheri Kani, a senior diplomat and now foreign minister, visited Niger and Burkina Faso in January 2023. Raisi praised “the resistance of these African countries’’ in the face of “hegemonic European policies and colonialism.’’ When Nigerien Prime Minister Ali Lamine Zeine came to Tehran in January 2024, Raisi said Niger has a “brilliant future’’ and lauded the West African country’s “path of independence and freedom.’’

With Tehran’s strained relations with rival Saudi Arabia restored in early 2023, normalized ties with Horn of Africa countries followed. Iran reestablished relations with Djibouti, which had cut ties with Iran at Riyadh’s urging. Tehran also worked to patch things up with Eritrea and Sudan, which fell out with Iran after joining a Saudi-led coalition against the Houthis in Yemen.

Iranian weapons sales to Sudan’s armed forces, which are fighting a civil war against rebels, have recently allowed the military to reverse losses and regain territory. Iran began sending drones to the Sudanese army in early 2024 and unsuccessfully attempted to obtain a permanent naval base in Sudan in exchange for a helicopter-carrying ship. An Iranian naval base at Port Sudan would directly support Iranian naval operations.

Deepening ties with the Sudanese army, the desire to strengthen diplomatic relations with Egypt, and renewing diplomatic relations with Djibouti, with its strategic location near the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, will allow Iran to increase its security presence in this strategic region. This move serves several important objectives from an Iranian perspective, including increasing the “economic siege’’ on Israel, possibly rebuilding channels for transferring weapons to Hamas in the Gaza Strip, and enhancing its ability to project naval power in this region.

Iranian authorities are gradually carving out a new area of influence across the African continent, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa and, even more so, in West Africa and the countries of the Great Rift Valley. The head of the Iran-Africa Joint Chamber of Commerce, Masoud Berahman, at a conference on Iran-Africa trade opportunities in the city of Zanjan last August, called for strategic planning to enhance Iran’s trade relations with the continent, which currently stand at about $1.3 billion.

Iran’s growing influence in Africa is multifaceted, combining active diplomacy, religious soft power, and economic expansion. This strategy allows Iran to strengthen its geopolitical positions while gaining valuable allies on the African continent.