Iran’s strategy for hegemony in Africa

By Ali Rajab and Hind Ahmed

Iran’s new leaders have been trying to export the ideals of their country’s Islamic Revolution since the Ayatollah Khomeini-led revolution erupted in 1979. Over the past three decades, these leaders used sectarian rifts to control Shiite communities in other countries. They tried to link these communities to the Iranian project which seeks to create Iranian protégés that work to expand Iranian interests everywhere. To reach this goal, Iran is ready to go to all lengths, including harming the security and stability of target countries, if necessary.

Iran seeks to be present in most of the world’s strategically important or resource-rich countries through a network of governmental and non-governmental organizations. Known as the Iranian Action Network (IAN), this Iranian policy tool draws up and implements Iran’s secret foreign policy action plan.

IAN’s four actors are: the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps; the Quds Force; the Iranian Security and Intelligence Ministry, and the Lebanese Hezbollah militia.

The first three entities are mainly responsible for promoting the ideals of the Islamic Revolution internationally. They collaborate with Hezbollah and complex network of authorized agents and entities, including the Muslim Brotherhood, pro-Shiite groups and even al-Qaeda, to do this.

The Organization of the World Assembly of the House of the People (did not find it), which is controlled by Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, oversees the work of these entities in cooperation with the intelligence service, known as “Etsla” and the intelligence unit of the Revolutionary Guard through the Quds Force. This reveals the nature of the Iranian project and also its different dimensions.

African countries were always part the Iranian project. Here too, the Iranians worked to spread the Iranian version of the Shiite doctrine. Iran did the same in several Arab states, including Iraq; Syria; Lebanon, and Yemen. It worked to apply the same strategy in some Arab Gulf states too.

Iran sought to expand its influence in Africa for economic considerations. It poured investments in some African countries with the aim of dominating these countries and taking its share of their wealth. Africa has extractable stocks of crude oil; gas; coal, and uranium that water the mouths of countries with major regional and international plans. Estimates put these stocks at $13- $14.5 trillion. The combined potential output of the African agriculture, tourism and water sectors is also estimated at $1.7 trillion, according to a recent study by the Africa Investor and Africa Group for Investment Research (did not find it).

Trade exchange between African states, on one hand, and Iran, on the other, reached $1 billion (when), a figure that is not huge. Trade is, however, an important door through which Iran gets unfettered access into Africa to achieve other goals that can only be achieved through investments and trade partnerships.

Iran has more than 30 embassies in Africa. This large number of diplomatic missions has qualified Iran to an observer status at the African Union. Most Iranian ambassadors in African countries are leaders of the Revolutionary Guard whose only job is to spread Shite Islam in Africa.

Iran’s plan to spread Shite Islam in West Africa depends on three main strategies:

1 – Initiating a campaign to spread the Arab-Islamic culture. This culture is an intrinsic part of the programs of the centers Iran found in African countries. So far, Iran has established 25 middle schools in four of Nigeria’s northern states.

2 – Offering scholarships to African students to study Shiite Islam in Lebanon and Iran. When they return to their home countries, these students become Iran’s emissaries who actively spread Shiite ideals in these countries.

3 – Focusing on social relief operations whereby Iran sends relief workers to poor and deprived areas to be part of charity activities that are in essence a pretext for spreading the Shiite ideology.

Iran’s influence can be found the most in Nigeria, due to the huge size of its population. Nigeria is the most populous state in Africa. It also has a strategic location and huge natural resources, most important of which is oil.

Iran sought to have its political arms and newspapers that speak for it in Nigeria to ensure the African state’s full allegiance to the Supreme Leader in Tehran. It backed Sheikh Ibrahim Zakkaki, who was described by Iranian media as the “leader of Nigeria’s Shiites community”.

Iran, observers say, wants Zakkaki and his group to found Nigeria’s answer to Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia to put pressure on the Nigerian government to succumb to Tehran, being the most important oil-producing state in the African Continent.

The same observers refer to Iranian attempts to establish a political party in Nigeria whose goal will be to take over; become of part of decision-making in the country; participate in forming the government, or – at least – turn into a major opposition force to ensure the implementation of Iranian strategies.

Economic aid, social work, and relief operations were Iran’s tools to gain access into Nigeria. Poor Nigerians brooked no delay in sending their children to Iranian schools, which at the end created a new generation of Shiite Nigerians. In May 2009, the Iranian Cultural Attaché in Nigeria organized a conference at the University of Lagos on the challenges, facing Nigerians as they learn Persian and study the Iranian culture.

Outstanding Iranian school pupils are usually sent to Iran to study theology. When they return to their country, they work as teachers at the same Iranian schools.

There is a sizeable Lebanese community in Nigeria. The number of the members of this community has reached 30,000 and these members are scattered throughout the whole of Nigeria, including in the city of Kano, according to the Lebanese newspaper, al-Akhbar, by far the most important Iranian foreign policy mouthpiece in Nigeria, in January 2012. The members of the Lebanese community, the newspaper said, are especially active in the textile industry, the plastics industry and the leather trade.

Some of the members of the Lebanese community in Nigeria are members of Hezbollah and the Islamic Movement which is led by Zakkaki, which confirms the presence of links between the two entities.

The Revolutionary Guard also helped Zakkaki establish a number of movements and organizations, apart from financially sponsoring him and giving him backing through Shiite media, in general. This media always portrays the man as a symbol of resistance in Nigeria against Israeli aggressions in Palestine and western interference in Nigerian affairs.

The Islamic Union of African Students in Iran has played a big role in helping Africa youth, in general, and Nigerian youth, in particular, visit Iran.

The union also encourages several institutions to spread Shiite Islam in Nigeria. Most important among these institutions is the “Haider-Nigeria” which identifies itself on social networking sites as “an important institution in the history of foresight in Nigeria”. It even boasts of playing A large role in disseminating the doctrine of Ahl al-Bayt [peace be upon them] in Nigeria.

The fighters Tehran sends to Syria were properly trained to engage in combat under the supervision of the Iranian Embassy in Abuja and the Consulate in Lagos, according to Daoud Omran, the secretary-general of the Sunni Islamic Group in Nigeria.

Omran called on the Nigerian government to address those moves, considering them unlawful and a flagrant violation of Nigeria’s sovereignty.

In February 2013, Nigeria’s intelligence service announced the arrest of the members of a militant cell that was instructed by Iran to stage attacks against Israeli and western targets in Nigeria.

Agency spokesman, Marilyn Ugar, said at the time that the group also planned to assassinate the former military ruler of Nigeria, Ibrahim Babangida.

In May, Reuters revealed that Nigeria’s security services had discovered a cache of weapons inside a house owned by some Lebanese nationals in the northern city of Kano. The weapons would have been used in attacks against Israeli and Western targets, Reuters said.

Kano state security chief, Bassi Ittang, said the house belonged to a terrorist cell linked to Hezbollah. According an army statement, the weapons included anti-tank, rocket-propelled grenades, anti-tank and anti-personnel mines and other dangerous weapons.

Investigations later uncovered a plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in Nigeria. One of the defendants in the case, namely Ahmed Rawda, admitted to the plot during his trial in Abuja.

In December 2010, Western diplomatic sources revealed that a shipment of Iranian arms seized by Nigerian authorities inside 13 building material containers at the Port of Addis Ababa before entry into the country was most probably sent by the Quds Force to militias operating in Nigeria.

These militias, the Western diplomatic sources said, included the Hesba Organization, which enforces Islamic law in the northern province of Kano, the militant organization Boko Haram, and the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, which fights for control of oil revenues in the north.

Nigerian sources said some of the weapons would have been sent to Senegal, specifically to the Movement of Democratic Forces in Casamas, which is active in rebel areas in Senegal, south of Gambia.

The shipment was part of Iran’s strategy to strengthen its influence and presence in the African continent, the sources said.

This was also part of the mission of the African Quds Force unit, they added.