Let's postulate a limited Axis victory in Europe. Hitler has an aneurysm in spring 1941 and Germany is taken over by a junta of leading Nazi Party figures and generals, leading to no Barbarossa and no declaration of war against the United States. Britain then sees the futility of fighting alone and, with Churchill (no longer PM, obviously) kicking and screaming all the way, comes to the table.
If you don't like it happening that way, imagine it some other. I don't care how it happens, only that it does.
Anyway, when the details are hammered out, Germany keeps Austria, Bohemia-Moravia and its part of Poland. It agrees to withdraw from the Low Countries, Denmark and Norway on the understanding that these countries will be demilitarized and bound to a pro-German foreign and economic policy. And, most importantly for this scenario, the Vichy government is recognized as the sole and lawful government of France, and is confirmed in its possession of the colonies it still holds (good luck keeping Syria, but that's another discussion).
But then there's French Equatorial Africa, consisting of Chad, Ubangi-Shari (now the Central African Republic), Gabon and French Congo. As of 1941, all these colonies, along with Cameroon (which was nominally a separate League of Nations mandate) were held by Free French troops, most of them Chadian. And the governor-general was Félix Eboué, the only black colonial governor in the French empire at the time, and as far as I know, the only black colonial governor anywhere.
Eboué knows he has no future with Vichy. He also has tens of thousands of Chadian troops along with a contingent of Free French soldiers, and he knows that without a navy, Vichy can't make him do anything he doesn't want to do. So in early 1942, he declares the independence of the Federation of Equatorial Africa.
Now, one thing to remember about Eboué is that he wasn't African-born - he was a descendant of slaves born in French Guiana - and he was very much a French civil servant. In the 1920s, as a lower-ranking colonial administrator in Ubangi-Shari, he maintained good relations with local chiefs but also enforced corvée labor. As governor of Chad and hen governor-general of AOF, he promoted African administrators and expanded educational opportunities, and he drafted a plan to increase African political rights, but he took a gradualist approach to all these policies and built them around French-assimilated évolués. So his federation wouldn't be a fully decolonized state - instead, at least in the beginning, it would be a paternalistic, limited-suffrage regime with many Frenchmen retaining positions of authority and with the Church having major influence over education.
Even so, an African state with a black president in the 1940s would no doubt make an impression on other colonized peoples, particularly those in neighboring Belgian Congo. Also, as early as the late 1930s, Eboué had begun to groom educated African civil servants for political leadership. One of his protégés was Jean-Hilaire Aubame, who might well succeed him ITTL and who would move toward universal suffrage and dismantling of remaining colonial institutions. And this, too, will happen under the eyes of the Congolese and Nigerians.
Of course, this raises the question of whether the federation can stay together over the long term. The Muslims in Chad, who will form most of the military (at least at first) might not be comfortable with the political dominance of the coastal Catholics; the relatively underpopulated cantons of Gabon, Ubangi-Shari and Congo might feel disenfranchised in a federation that will probably be run from Douala; and the nomads in northern Chad won't want to be ruled by anyone. On the other hand, the common threat posed by Vichy France, and the need for a strong defense in a world that may be more hostile to decolonization than our own, might provide an incentive to resolve these differences in the short term, and beginning in the 60s, oil rents could be used to bribe restive provinces.
Any thoughts on how this might play out?
If you don't like it happening that way, imagine it some other. I don't care how it happens, only that it does.
Anyway, when the details are hammered out, Germany keeps Austria, Bohemia-Moravia and its part of Poland. It agrees to withdraw from the Low Countries, Denmark and Norway on the understanding that these countries will be demilitarized and bound to a pro-German foreign and economic policy. And, most importantly for this scenario, the Vichy government is recognized as the sole and lawful government of France, and is confirmed in its possession of the colonies it still holds (good luck keeping Syria, but that's another discussion).
But then there's French Equatorial Africa, consisting of Chad, Ubangi-Shari (now the Central African Republic), Gabon and French Congo. As of 1941, all these colonies, along with Cameroon (which was nominally a separate League of Nations mandate) were held by Free French troops, most of them Chadian. And the governor-general was Félix Eboué, the only black colonial governor in the French empire at the time, and as far as I know, the only black colonial governor anywhere.
Eboué knows he has no future with Vichy. He also has tens of thousands of Chadian troops along with a contingent of Free French soldiers, and he knows that without a navy, Vichy can't make him do anything he doesn't want to do. So in early 1942, he declares the independence of the Federation of Equatorial Africa.
Now, one thing to remember about Eboué is that he wasn't African-born - he was a descendant of slaves born in French Guiana - and he was very much a French civil servant. In the 1920s, as a lower-ranking colonial administrator in Ubangi-Shari, he maintained good relations with local chiefs but also enforced corvée labor. As governor of Chad and hen governor-general of AOF, he promoted African administrators and expanded educational opportunities, and he drafted a plan to increase African political rights, but he took a gradualist approach to all these policies and built them around French-assimilated évolués. So his federation wouldn't be a fully decolonized state - instead, at least in the beginning, it would be a paternalistic, limited-suffrage regime with many Frenchmen retaining positions of authority and with the Church having major influence over education.
Even so, an African state with a black president in the 1940s would no doubt make an impression on other colonized peoples, particularly those in neighboring Belgian Congo. Also, as early as the late 1930s, Eboué had begun to groom educated African civil servants for political leadership. One of his protégés was Jean-Hilaire Aubame, who might well succeed him ITTL and who would move toward universal suffrage and dismantling of remaining colonial institutions. And this, too, will happen under the eyes of the Congolese and Nigerians.
Of course, this raises the question of whether the federation can stay together over the long term. The Muslims in Chad, who will form most of the military (at least at first) might not be comfortable with the political dominance of the coastal Catholics; the relatively underpopulated cantons of Gabon, Ubangi-Shari and Congo might feel disenfranchised in a federation that will probably be run from Douala; and the nomads in northern Chad won't want to be ruled by anyone. On the other hand, the common threat posed by Vichy France, and the need for a strong defense in a world that may be more hostile to decolonization than our own, might provide an incentive to resolve these differences in the short term, and beginning in the 60s, oil rents could be used to bribe restive provinces.
Any thoughts on how this might play out?
