French West Africa and Equatorial Africa aren't split up

Some of the countries in these blocs did try to form bigger countries like the Sahel-Benin Union or the Mali Federation. However, I think that there has to be a change in how these countries were governed, or a uniting movement amongst the populations themselves, be it Pan African or socialism/communism, or cultural ties. I could see L'Afrique Occidentale Française (Fr. West Africa) somehow managing to stay intact, with some bumps and bruises along the way, but it requires stable governance, infrastructure, and education (both for men and women) for something like this to work. It would also have to work through the movements that arose from decolonisation, and the desire of minority groups to have there languages, cultures, and religions expressed and protected. Remember, within just FWA there is Wolof, Akan, Baoulé, Bembara, Malinké, Touareg, Fon, Ewe, Fulani, Hausa, Toukolor, among many other tongues and peoples brushing up alongside French, not to mention the religious divide between Muslim North, and Catholic South (with other things mixed in). That being said, West Africa kept economic ties, helped pioneer La Francophonie (the French Commonwealth), and even had a common airline company between them (Air Afrique until 2002). I would argue that in order for FWA to stay one country post 1960, there would need to be major changes in French colonial governance as far back as 1900. Perhaps start with a more desperate WW1, which allows Africans such as Blaise Daigne (who got elected to the National Assembly pre ww1, if you could believe that) to trade more rights for more manpower from the colonies. Additionally, have the Colonial Troops prove their mettle in way similar to how Canada, and Australia did against the Germans, and the French attitudes begin to shift ever so slightly. With more political rights, put some really compotent (and relatively less racist) governor generals at Dakar and Brazzaville, and you can get a shift in political governance, and perhaps investment in industry and education in the big cities Dakar, Libreville, Brazzaville, Grand Bassam, Bamako, Porto-Novo, later spreading out to the country side. Additionally, supporting some precolonial structures (which requires changes in French society away from Colonial worldviews and the Human zoos) would be to the benefit of creating unity (such as supporting the university at Timbuktu)

When it comes to Equatorial Africa, I know far less, and I'm not sure how it would work. It is a very large country with a long border, only the northern one being particularly defensible. With instability in Neighbouring Sudan, and particularly Belgian Congo (or Zaire, DRC, or Congo Kinshasa, take your pick) I'm thinking there's a high chance that it'll spread spread into FEA. Both countries run the risk of being pawns in the cold war, similar to how Congo/Zaire was, and the US or the USSR would encourage separatism if only to destabilise the enemy (and the same thing could happen in FWA too. Heck, Dahomey/Benin was communist during the 70's and 80's)

And of course if I'm talking about French Colonialism I have to bring up the giant elephant in the room...Algeria. France let go of it's colonies in Africa due to the political instability caused by the Algerian War of Independence (among many other factors, but I digress). Algeria caused a coup d'état, a bloody war, mass exodus, loss of prestige and loss of confidence in French governance. Since the late 1940's, France had already been rearranging and integrating French Africa in to citizenship and Metropolitan French governance style. However, Algeria was already part of France. The government saw it as much a part of France as Provence or Bretagne. Plus it had a lot of French settlers who wanted their privileges maintain at the expense of the Arabo-Berber majority. There has to be shift in the French handling of Algeria (which might need a POD in pre 1900, or at the latest the French-Indochinese War, but again I digress), in order for the rest of French Africa to have a chance at unity.
 
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raharris1973

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Why does it have to be a better country just to be a bigger country? Were the separate countries that came from Equatorial and West Africa just departments or some subdivision of the whole colony?
 
It would be probably wise in both cases to avoid centralism and try to create federal states and a balance of power between various regions.
In both cases, the main task of a new independent government would be to try to maintain national unity.
On key of national unity is infrastructure, which could become a problem, if most railways and roads focus more on connecting resource extraction and plantations to the harbors at the coast then connecting cities and population centers.
Controlling the Sahara would be difficult, if the capital is in a city at the coast.

It seems likely that various parts could break away. Another scenario would be a central government without real power, or that these countries are de facto nothing more than federations of various more powerful provinces and sub-states.

It seems very difficult for me to connect and control a newly independent country the size of French West-Africa. How could a new government gain the resources necessary to create a bureaucracy and a military big enough to control their territory?

The relationship to France depends on various factors. What are the ideologies of the new independent governments? Does France try to influence the area to maintain their power? What happens in Algeria?
We need to know who rules France and who rules these two countries to predict their interaction.

Why would another country want to join a malfunctioning federation?
It is impossible to predict the next 20-40 years after independence, so maybe then some country could join them. But I predict the opposite. Some regions could separate themselves from your countries.
 
It seems likely that various parts could break away.
The different sub-division or ethnic break away states?

What are the ideologies of the new independent governments?
Democratic and given many nations in West Africa were Pan-Africanist I imagine a United French West Africa would be the same

Does France try to influence the area to maintain their power?
Yes
What happens in Algeria?
We need to know who rules France
OTL just both are keep following the fifth republic

Why would another country want to join a malfunctioning federation?
Ghana under Kwame Nkrumah espoused pan-Africanism and there is a large African nation next door and Senegal and Gambia had a confederation
 
Why does it have to be a better country just to be a bigger country? Were the separate countries that came from Equatorial and West Africa just departments or some subdivision of the whole colony?
The issue with a big country imposed from the top down is that if its not supported by the population, it runs the risk of being destabilised in times of crisis (see yugoslavia, British Raj, Ethiopia nowadays, Congo in the 60's, USSR in the 90's)
If they want to pull this off, food sceurity, water security, and stability are key imho
If you can get this thing to hold together, you might just have an economic rival to Nigeria in West Africa, with the potential to explore a stronger economic situation for the region as a whole and more trade with Latin America, other parts of Africa, and Europe (on it's on terms)
Honestly I would love to see a TL like this
 
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