With his new book, The Banquet of Minerals, Amadou Tidiane Cissé invites his readers to an intellectual feast where geopolitics, economics, history, and security intertwine. The author, a customs officer by training and a seasoned analyst, explores the multiple layers of Africa's subsoil to reveal its strategic stakes and the threats that arise from them.

The book highlights the fierce struggle between global powers—China and the United States in particular—for control of critical minerals essential to the energy transition, the digital revolution, and military rivalries. Africa, described as a "geological scandal," holds colossal reserves: 55% of the world's cobalt, nearly half of its manganese, more than 20% of its natural graphite, not to mention copper, nickel, and lithium. These riches could be the driving force behind an African industrial revolution, but they too often fuel conflict, crime, and instability.

The author points out that mining finances armed groups, such as the M23 in the DRC, and fuels wars in the Sahel and Sudan. It also fosters organized crime, particularly in gold mining areas like Kédougou, where trafficking and transnational networks flourish. Finally, it leads to the increasing militarization of mining areas, with the involvement of private military companies like Wagner in the Central African Republic and Mali, China in Southern Africa, and Turkey in Niger, all of which undermine state sovereignty.

Faced with this situation, the author calls for a collective awakening. Africa, absent from the "banquet" where its resources are plundered, must establish transparent governance mechanisms, process its minerals locally to generate added value, and strengthen its continental cooperation, particularly through the AfCFTA. The metaphor of the "empty chair of the future" illustrates the urgent need to preserve these riches for future generations.

The Minerals Banquet thus serves as a warning: if Africa does not organize itself, it will remain condemned to receive only crumbs from this global feast. But by regaining control of its resources, it can hope to finally occupy its rightful place at the banquet of the emerging world.