By Peter Fabricius

This 12 months’s Brazil-Russia-India-China-South Africa (BRICS) summit could have a particular African flavour. Hosted by its solely African member, the assembly has an African theme and can be attended by many African leaders as a part of an outreach programme. It’s anticipated to contemplate not less than six African international locations’ purposes for membership.

The theme of the 22-24 August summit is ‘BRICS and Africa: Partnership for Mutually Accelerated Development, Sustainable Improvement, and Inclusive Multilateralism’. Sixty-seven leaders from the worldwide south have been invited. Considerably, French President Emmanuel Macron – who informed Pretoria he wish to attend – hasn’t been invited.

Curiosity in becoming a member of BRICS has surged. At a briefing this week, South Africa’s worldwide relations Minister Naledi Pandor stated whereas a number of extra nations had proven curiosity, 23 had formally utilized. These have been Algeria, Argentina, Bangladesh, Bahrain, Belarus, Bolivia, Cuba, Egypt, Ethiopia, Honduras, Indonesia, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Morocco, Nigeria, State of Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Thailand, United Arab Emirates, Venezuela and Vietnam.

Pandor stated this indicated recognition of BRICS as a champion of the worldwide south, and the advantages of membership. South Africa’s BRICS ‘sherpa’ Anil Sooklal believes one purpose for looking for membership now could be the rising polarisation impelled by Russia’s warfare on Ukraine and rising United States-China tensions. These create anxiousness amongst smaller nations, and an impetus to hunt ‘safety in numbers.’

Not all six African governments that formally utilized have formally confirmed this. Algeria, Egypt and Ethiopia have – however Nigeria, Senegal and Morocco’s positions are unclear.

Nations’ motivations for changing into members of BRICS differ even amongst present members

Nigeria’s Ambassador to Russia, Abdullahi Shehu, was recently quoted as saying accession talks hadn’t commenced, however he didn’t rule out future membership. Nevertheless Nigeria’s Guardian cites a number of specialists as saying Nigeria isn’t prepared for BRICS membership. They are saying it lacks financial sophistication – together with having little to export to different BRICS international locations in addition to oil. Additionally, the brand new reformist Bola Tinubu administration has a lot on its plate.

Nigeria analyst and Chief Govt of Africa @ Work Dianna Video games informed ISS At this time she was stunned to see Nigeria on the checklist, however added: ‘Tinubu could be very proactive, so it’s attainable he may very well be driving one thing like that, trying to unfold affect as a result of Nigeria has turned fairly inwards below Buhari in overseas coverage, and maybe he’s making an attempt to regain misplaced floor by way of affect.’

What every African nation hopes to get from BRICS is numerous and considerably unclear. Egypt would in all probability be among the many first to hitch, particularly because it’s already a member of BRICS’ New Improvement Financial institution. Cairo is especially taken with BRICS’ plans to shift extra commerce from the US greenback into native currencies – and even maybe to create its personal foreign money.

Algeria’s President Abdelmadjid Tebboune sees becoming a member of as serving to to create a extra equitable world order, which might assist Algeria distance itself ‘from the attraction of the 2 poles.’ His overseas minister just lately expressed hopes for deriving commerce advantages.

BRICS isn’t a commerce bloc – solely about 6% of the 5 BRICS members’ whole commerce is with one another

These views reveal common misconceptions about BRICS. The two poles Tebboune referred to – which are growing further apart due to the Ukraine war – are clearly the West on the one side and Russia and China on the other. So BRICS can hardly be called non-aligned.

And seeing BRICS as a useful trade booster misses the fact that it’s not a trade bloc at all. Pandor highlighted that BRICS countries have around 42% of the world’s population and 30% of its territory, 27% of global GDP and 20% of international trade. But only about 6% of the total trade of the five members is with each other.

BRICS is nonetheless a helpful financial membership – most concretely by means of its New Improvement Financial institution, which has already loaned US$5.4 billion to South Africa for 5 tasks. However considered geopolitically, BRICS is much less of a non-aligned ‘champion of the worldwide south’ as Pandor put it this week, than an alternative choice to a Western-dominated world, as Tebboune says – and even, extra pointedly, anti-Western.

This can be a prickly level. Pandor stated South Africa didn’t ‘see BRICS as being pro-Russia or anti-Western … South Africa’s buying and selling companions within the West are very, essential to South Africa’s financial progress.’ Video games additionally didn’t assume Nigeria would be a part of BRICS to tip the worldwide energy steadiness in opposition to the West, because it valued all its primary buying and selling companions equally.

Priyal Singh, Institute for Safety Research Senior Researcher, says the motivation for BRICS membership differs even amongst present members. ‘India, for instance, has constantly pointed to its pursuit of “strategic autonomy” on the world stage; and a stronger (or enlarged) BRICS grouping aligns with this overseas coverage goal. That is additionally a compelling narrative for Brazil and South Africa, with Pretoria leaning closely into its pursuit of a extra multipolar worldwide order narrative.’ 

As tensions rise over Ukraine and Taiwan, Russia and China more and more see BRICS as an alliance in opposition to the West

But as tensions rise over Ukraine and Taiwan, Russia and China increasingly appear to regard BRICS as an alliance against the West, and so presumably would some candidate members like Iran and Venezuela.

Yet such an alliance has its own fault lines, most notably the tensions between China and India, especially over their Kashmir border dispute. Last week South African President Cyril Ramaphosa reportedly called Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to persuade him that it was price attending the summit in individual.

And it’s not coincidental that Russia and China, BRICS’ two autocratic members, are apparently most smitten by increasing membership whereas democratic India and Brazil are cautious (with South Africa within the center), a South African official stated off the file.

This appears to be why the 5 BRICS members’ overseas ministers are nonetheless struggling, days earlier than the summit, to agree on membership standards to undergo the heads of state. Defining the bloc’s id and world function has additionally turn out to be a battle.

‘I actually would guard in opposition to any standards for growth that may lead us down a path the place we contribute to growing battle within the world group or in any a part of the world,’ Pandor stated. That’s in all probability not how China and Russia see the difficulty.

BRICS provides advantages to its members, together with extra decisions in improvement financing, collaboration on points equivalent to well being, and gradual independence from the greenback’s dominance. However anybody considering membership should be cautious in regards to the hazard of taking place exactly the trail that Pandor warned in opposition to.

In regards to the writer: Peter Fabricius, Marketing consultant, ISS Pretoria

Supply: This text was revealed by ISS At this time.