Togo’s northern borderlands are emerging as a discreet yet high-stakes theatre of geopolitical competition, according to multiple security sources. Over 300 operatives linked to Russia’s African Corps the successor to the notorious Wagner Group are reportedly active or present in the country. Concurrently, Turkey is said to be expanding its security engagement, notably through connections to the private military firm SADAT. Should these assertions hold true, they would mark a decisive shift in Togo’s security calculus, transforming it from a participant in ad hoc military collaborations into a contested space for global power play.
Both Moscow and Ankara publicly frame their involvement as counterterrorism support and stabilization efforts in the north. Yet beneath this security narrative lies a more consequential struggle: the battle for influence. Access to decision-makers, lucrative contracts, intelligence sharing, military cooperation, equipment deals, training programs, and strategic positioning are all prizes in a region where external powers seek to entrench their foothold.
The central question is not merely who defends Togo, but who gains influence within its borders, at what cost, and with what guarantees for its citizens.
The Togolese army: reduced to a bystander?
The influx of foreign actors raises a critical issue: what substantive role remains for the Togolese Armed Forces?
Togo possesses a structured national army, experienced officers, and personnel trained at various international military academies. The growing reliance on external security partners cannot, therefore, be automatically justified as a response to the incapacity of national forces. Instead, one must scrutinize the political choices underpinning this strategy.
When a state delegates an increasing share of its security concerns to foreign entities, it risks fostering a dependency that extends well beyond the military sphere. The provider of equipment can become indispensable. The supplier of intelligence can gain privileged access to decision-making structures. The trainer of units can subtly shape operational doctrines. In the long run, sovereignty is measured not only by the size of a nation’s army but also by its capacity to independently determine its defense policy.
This is precisely where the debate in Togo becomes troubling. The issue is not whether Togo should cooperate with Russia, Turkey, France, or other partners a sovereign state is free to pursue multiple partnerships that serve its national interest. The real concern lies in transparency, democratic oversight, and the balance struck between these alliances.
What contracts have been signed? For how long? What do they cost the taxpayer? What authority is granted to foreign personnel? Under whose command do they operate? Which legal framework governs incidents? Who monitors their activities? These questions grow more pressing when private military companies or foreign units operate in areas where civilian populations are directly exposed.
The peril of outsourcing security
Outsourcing security carries another danger: it can progressively weaken the national institutions it purports to strengthen. A foreign power can rapidly supply troops, matériel, or niche capabilities, but it cannot substitute for a durable national defense strategy.
If investments in the Togolese army, domestic intelligence, officer training, border surveillance, and development of vulnerable regions do not keep pace, reliance on external partners risks becoming structural. Togo could then find itself in a vicious cycle: the more it depends on foreign capabilities, the harder it becomes to build its own; the weaker its national capacities, the greater its reliance on outsiders. Such a scenario would be paradoxical for a nation that professes to defend its sovereignty.
The JNIM pretext: measuring the real threat
The terrorist threat in northern Togo is genuine and must not be underestimated. Armed groups active in the Sahel have repeatedly exploited porous borders, fragile rural areas, and economic grievances. However, counterterrorism must not become a catchphrase invoked to justify any security policy.
This argument warrants closer examination, especially since the presence of the Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM) in Togolese territory should be distinguished from its regional influence or operational capacity. The existence of a cross-border threat does not necessarily imply that a permanent foreign military presence is the only viable response.
A serious security policy should integrate intelligence, border control, regional cooperation, professionalization of national forces, economic development in marginalized areas, and civilian protection. After all, a border secured by arms yet surrounded by poverty, unemployment, and administrative neglect remains inherently vulnerable.
The question power can no longer evade: the cost of this strategy
One blind spot in the debate is financial. Foreign military partnerships incur expenses salaries, equipment, logistics, infrastructure, security contracts, maintenance, transport, and technical assistance can amount to considerable sums. When such expenditures fall under national security, they are frequently shrouded in particular opacity.
This is precisely why parliamentary and civic oversight becomes essential. Togolese citizens have the right to know how public resources are allocated. They also have the right to question whether every security expense translates into tangible improvements in their everyday safety. A sophisticated military apparatus cannot be deemed a success if populations continue to lack access to healthcare, potable water, education, infrastructure, and economic opportunities.
While powers negotiate, Togolese citizens wait
Here, the contrast is starkest. As the government seeks to solidify ties with various foreign powers, the day-to-day concerns of Togolese citizens remain far more mundane: purchasing power, employment, cost of essentials, healthcare access, education quality, housing, clean water, electricity, and prospects for the youth. The social question does not vanish because a security threat exists. On the contrary, experiences across many countries demonstrate that poverty, territorial marginalization, and weak public services can cultivate fertile ground for instability.
Investing in the populations of the north is thus not merely social policy; it is security policy. An unemployed young person in an area with minimal state presence represents a strategic vulnerability far more significant than any budget line item.
Democratic discourse stifled by security logic
Compounding the security issue is another concern: the nation’s political trajectory. Over recent years, criticisms of Togo’s democratic space, restrictions on mobilization, and tensions over institutional reforms have fueled perceptions of an increasingly closed political system. The constitutional change and new institutional architecture have sparked intense debate over power concentration and the actual role of popular suffrage in governance.
In this context, the growing prominence of the security apparatus demands particular vigilance. A democracy cannot be sustainably governed by security logic alone. When any dissent is liable to be branded a threat to stability, those in power risk conflating political opposition with security danger. This is precisely the slippery slope that must be avoided.
A strong army to defend the nation, not to shield a regime
A national army’s fundamental role is to defend territorial integrity, protect citizens, and preserve sovereignty. It should not become the preferred instrument for preserving a political system. The distinction is critical: an army that protects the state upholds republican institutions; a force used primarily to shield a political power defends a regime. The danger for Togo is that these two functions could become blurred.
The arrival of foreign actors in the security apparatus does not resolve this issue; it may complicate it further if the priority becomes safeguarding the regime rather than building a national defense architecture subject to oversight mechanisms.
Togo must not become a playground for external powers
Togo occupies a strategically important position in the Gulf of Guinea and serves as a gateway to West Africa, naturally attracting interest from various powers. But the strategic interests of other nations must not become the compass for Togolese national policy. The country should be able to cooperate with multiple partners without becoming dependent on any single one. It should procure equipment without surrendering decision-making autonomy, receive foreign training without marginalizing its own experts, and fight terrorism without turning security into a permanent justification for opacity.
Above all, it must answer to its foreign partners while being accountable first and foremost to its citizens.
The urgency is also political, social, and economic
The real threat to Togo extends beyond the possible advance of armed groups. It also resides in the risk of building a state where the security apparatus expands faster than democratic institutions, where military spending evades public debate, and where foreign partnerships outpace national capabilities.
What use is costly military cooperation if citizens do not feel safer? What benefit is an active diplomatic engagement with multiple powers if the daily concerns of the population remain unaddressed? What value is political stability if it comes at the price of a sustained contraction of democratic space?
The Togolese government faces a strategic choice. It can continue to multiply security partnerships, play rival powers against one another, and gradually fortify the security state. Alternatively, it can invest more heavily in genuine national sovereignty: a professional and autonomous army, democratically supervised institutions, transparent contracts, a credible judiciary, and, crucially, economic development capable of reducing the vulnerabilities that breed instability.
The problem is not that Russia is present, that Turkey is interested in Togo, or that other Western partners continue their cooperation with Lomé. The problem arises when foreign and security policy becomes an end in itself, while the people’s urgent needs are relegated to a secondary concern. By prioritizing geopolitical equilibria, the government risks losing sight of what matters most: a nation’s sovereignty is measured not by the number of foreign powers vying for its territory, but by the ability of its institutions to serve its citizens.
And if Togo gradually turns into a competitive arena for Moscow, Ankara, and other capitals, the question Togolese citizens are entitled to ask is simple: who truly protects the country, and who truly protects the regime?