Jeremy Hunt hopes to improve his skills and those of the UK in Africa | Policy

Jeremy Hunt will begin a five-day tour of Africa that will give the Foreign Secretary a chance to advance his personal agenda before the next election of conservative leaders and convince Africa that Brexit will bring commercial benefits.

Hunt will begin his tour Monday in Senegal before traveling to Ghana, Nigeria, Ethiopia and Kenya, which have five of the most dynamic economies on the continent.

In addition to strengthening post-Brexit trade links, Hunt should highlight some aspects of his Foreign Office personal program (FCO), including the persecution of Christians, the development of media freedom as a bulwark for emerging democracies and the link between climate change and threats to democracy. security, including mbad migration.

He should also highlight language training in English, source of his own substantial private wealth.

As a health secretary, he earned a multi-million pound fortune with the sale of Hotcourses, an English-language ad site that he created. He left his active role in 2011 when he became a deputy. He used a portion of the site's revenue to create a foundation in eastern Kenya that runs a primary school for 300 AIDS orphans and supports the education of another 300 HIV-positive children in the slums of Nairobi, Kenya's capital.

Hunt will be accompanied by his Chinese wife, Lucia Guo, whom he described as "great diplomatic weapon for the UK". FCO officials greet her during Hunt's travels, saying she helps him absorb some of his stress during visits of this magnitude.

At the first of many announcements of the trip, the FCO announced additional funding of £ 4 million for English language training in French-speaking Africa, including Senegal, claiming that English was considered the language of English. opportunities in Africa.

Before the visit, Hunt said, "Africa is a continent that is growing at an extraordinary pace, full of potential for transformation. In a future when Great Britain will no longer be a member of the European Union, I hope that we will work within and with African nations to make sure together we fight the threats that all of us face. on us and take advantage of the opportunities that citizens have, wherever they live. To do this, I want the UK to be the new partner of choice in Africa. "

The conservative government has been accused of neglecting Africa over Emmanuel Macron's repeated visits to the French-speaking countries of the continent since his election to the French presidency. Theresa May went to South Africa last year, promising that the UK would be the biggest G7 investor in Africa by 2022.

However, criticisms have been made that the UK has been so distracted by Brexit that its perceived interest in Africa has declined. Traders and aid recipients have remained on guard pending to know what form of Brexit the UK will ultimately choose. Hunt was criticized as a former candidate for showing such support for Brexit, critics accusing him of wooing conservative party members extremely skeptical.

This trip will give him an opportunity to express his point of view on immigration, the United Kingdom being more and more concerned by the Sahel region of North and Central Africa, a source of migration aggravated by instability. in Libya and Sudan.

The concern has led to a renewed interest of the FCO in the region, symbolized by the opening of embbadies in Chad and Niger, as well as by the expansion of the 39, embbady in Mali.