Flexing its Muscle, Turkey Is Spreading Its Influence in Africa

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(Bloomberg) — Turkey, seeking to expand its influence in Africa and boost energy security, plans to send its 86-meter research vessel Oruc Reis to explore offshore oil blocks in Somalia next month.

Mohamed Hashi, director of Somalia’s petroleum ministry, confirmed the move, which could help diversify Turkey’s crude oil supplies and is part of Ankara’s growing push to strengthen ties in a region where China, Russia, Gulf states and the West are also competing for influence.

With the continent’s mineral wealth and a growing population that could lead to a new wave of economic growth, this focus makes great sense for the country as it strengthens its international influence.

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“Africa is interesting for Turkey because it is a point where it can experiment with all its newly discovered active foreign policy tools and objectives,” said Batu Coskun, a research fellow at the Ankara-based Sadeq Libya Institute.

“It’s about soft power on the one hand, such as aid, education and Turkish language centres, and trade and economic relations on the other hand,” he added.

There is no better example of this than Somalia, where Turkey operates its largest overseas military base and Turkish companies run the capital’s port and airport.

Turkish drone company Baykar, run by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s son-in-law, Selcuk Bayraktar, has supplied an unknown number of its TB2 drones to Somalia, expanding Somalia’s offensive against the Islamist group al-Shabaab.

playing with power

Earlier this year, Turkey’s parliament approved a proposal by Erdogan to send naval support to Somali waters amid a surge in piracy stemming from insecurity in the Red Sea linked to attacks by Iran-backed Houthi militants.

“For Turkey, Somalia provides a strategic geographic location to enhance its influence in the Horn of Africa and Indian Ocean region,” said Omar Mohamud, a senior East Africa analyst at the International Crisis Group. “Engaging with Somalia has served as a test case and cornerstone of Turkey’s overall strategy to deepen diplomatic, trade and security ties across the African continent.”

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Since famine decimated Somalia’s population in 2011, Turkey has thrown its weight behind the impoverished country, which has been associated with conflict and suffering since a decades-long civil war erupted in 1991.

Today, young Somalis can attend state-supported Turkish schools run by the Maarif Foundation in Hargeisa and Mogadishu. Turkey has provided more than $1 billion in aid to Somalia over the past decade, according to the Turkish Foreign Ministry, and Turkish consumer goods from medicine to clothing are available everywhere in the capital.

“Our connection with Turkey is rooted in centuries of shared Islamic culture. Their support has been transformative,” said Mohamed Osman, an 18-year-old student at the Maarif Foundation School in Mogadishu. Once a dilapidated shelter for internally displaced people, the school has been renovated and transformed into modern classrooms equipped with computers.

Abdulkadir Mohamed Nur, Somalia’s defense minister, speaks fluent Turkish and graduated from a university in Ankara.

Since 1992, more than 1,000 Somali students have received scholarships at Turkish universities, and visa restrictions on Somalis visiting Turkey have been minimal compared to other African countries.

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broader strategy

Turkey’s incursions into Somalia are part of a broader policy in Africa. Exports to the continent were $28.6 billion in 2023, down from $30.6 billion in 2022, according to data compiled by Bloomberg, with the lion’s share going to Egypt, Morocco, South Africa and Nigeria.

Increasingly, Ankara’s dealings with African states have combined intelligence and defense cooperation with deals in the mining and energy sectors.

Earlier this year, a delegation led by Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan visited the Nigerien capital, Niamey, and signed a number of deals after the country’s military government expelled French troops and ordered the United States to close its military base.

Niger is the world’s seventh-largest producer of uranium. Turkish mining company MTA is already looking for gold in the country, and has held talks with Algeria, Ivory Coast and Zimbabwe in the past three months.

Turkey has signed similar deals with Algeria, where state energy company BP has said it will look for oil and gas. Avro Turk has made efforts to enter Burkina Faso’s gold market, and Turkish Airlines now flies to some of the continent’s most remote corners.

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Baykar’s TB2 drones have been sold to at least 11 African countries, according to data compiled by PAX, a Dutch organization that seeks to promote peaceful societies.

Other seeds of influence include SADAT, a Turkish private military contractor, which has sent Syrian personnel to the Sahel to support Niger’s military junta, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The company’s chief executive, Melih Tanriverdi, told Bloomberg in a written response to questions that his company was keen to do business in Africa but denied it was in Niger.

Such infiltrations have been made easier by Erdogan’s centralized leadership style, analyst Coskun says, noting the lack of controls on exports of Turkish military products.

“If Erdogan approves the deal, it will simply go through. It’s not like the US Congress that scrutinizes every sale,” he added.

Risky business?

Türkiye’s quest for influence in Africa—especially Somalia—is not without risks.

Somalia is currently in a dispute with Ethiopia – another powerful partner of Turkey – over Addis Ababa’s decision to recognize the sovereignty of the breakaway state of Somaliland in exchange for a naval base and access to a port in the coastal city of Berbera.

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Ankara is currently mediating talks between Ethiopia and Somalia on how to resolve the dispute, a key foreign policy goal for Ankara if it wants to begin exploiting the region’s oil reserves. That drew a scathing complaint from Somaliland on Tuesday, which accused it of meddling.

“For Turkey, the best scenario is an agreement, with Ankara emerging as a mediator and Turkey strengthening its role on the political front in East Africa,” Coskun said. “Turkey does not want clashes when it starts exploring for hydrocarbons.”

But the upside if it succeeds in brokering an agreement between the two parties, and exploiting the oil that lies beneath the Somali seabed, could be enormous.

Turkey has long sought to reduce its dependence on energy imports from Russia and Iran, and has succeeded in increasing its imports from the United States, Algeria, Egypt and Azerbaijan.

“Exploring oil in offshore fields in Somalia and elsewhere would contribute to Ankara’s strategy of diversification, growing Turkey’s energy business, and expanding the regional presence of Turkish companies,” said Ali Bakir, an assistant professor at Qatar University and a former Qatari diplomat in Turkey.

—With the assistance of Patrick Sykes.

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