President Donald Trump wasted no time in signing executive orders to withdraw the United States from the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Paris Climate Agreement. Along with billionaire aide Elon Musk, he has also been trying to shut down USAID, the United States Agency for International Development.

The US has long been a leading investor in global health, climate action and development aid. But Trump’s sudden directives to reverse the status quo may allow for other powers to expand geopolitical reach by investing heavily in health and climate initiatives, particularly across Africa.

When Trump's administration cut WHO funding in 2020, Germany stepped in to fill the financial gap. The European Union could take a similar approach — but the bigger question is if the EU is ready to play a bigger role in Africa's future on health, climate, and geopolitics.

“In the long term all of us, not just the European Union but also countries in the global South, can use this as an opportunity to facilitate and enable a changing world order, a real multipolar world,"........

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