Welcome to Foreign Policy’s Africa Brief.

The highlights this year: Africa adjusts to the shifting global order under the second Trump administration, Gen Z-led protest movements roil several governments, citizens respond to sham elections across the continent, and other major stories that stood out in 2025.

Welcome to Foreign Policy’s Africa Brief.

The highlights this year: Africa adjusts to the shifting global order under the second Trump administration, Gen Z-led protest movements roil several governments, citizens respond to sham elections across the continent, and other major stories that stood out in 2025.

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Ahead of last year’s U.S. elections, Africa Brief predicted that the battle against China for critical minerals in Africa would be the primary driver of U.S. foreign policy in the region—regardless of who won the presidency.

That turned out to be true—as did our analysis that a victory by President Donald Trump would spell disaster for trade, immigration, and the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), one of the most successful global health programs launched by a president within the U.S. Republican Party.

Still, Trump’s “America First” policies have been far more disruptive than many envisioned. The suspension of funding for PEPFAR and the U.S. Agency for International Development has shuttered clinics and disrupted lifesaving services across Africa. Talk from analysts that these cuts would force African governments to be independent of foreign aid in health care was mostly full of hot air. In Malawi, HIV/AIDS services have all but disappeared.

Predictably, Trump has committed to backing the Lobito Corridor, a railway project intended to export critical minerals from central Africa, and brokered a

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