The row over the presence of Robert Mugabe at the weekend’s EU-Africa summit served only to conceal the other bitter divisions between the two continents. Most serious is the failure of their five-year attempt to agree rules for trading with each other.

This summit, the first in seven years, was supposed to put colonial history firmly in the past. On that, it was a sour disaster. Some African leaders persisted in blaming former colonial rulers for all the ills of the present; many demanded special terms of trade; all had an eye on China as a more attractive partner.

There is a chance to repair the damage, at least in relation to new trade deals, at the European Union summit on Friday, although that will be consumed by members’ own rifts over the EU constitution.

The EU-Africa row over trade has been five years in coming and is no easier to solve. At the moment, Britain, France, Belgium and Portugal give former African and Caribbean colonies privileged trading terms, granting them easy access to European markets while letting them shield their own. Under World Trade Organisation rules, these deals become illegal on January 1, when a waiver allowing special treatment expires.

The EU has proposed a patchwork of replacements, called Economic Protection Agreements (EPAs). They offer African, Caribbean and some Pacific countries full access to EU markets while allowing them to protect about a fifth of their own industries, including some of the most vulnerable. Exposure to competition from Europe would be phased in only gradually. It would be a gentle introduction to the world of free trade, said the EU.

No way, said African leaders: too much, too fast. President Abdoulaye Wade, of Senegal, said: “It’s clear that Africa rejects the EPAs.”

They have some good points. South Africa and others, objecting to the opening of services markets, can argue that they simply cannot compete. They are justified in saying, too, that their agriculture could not compete against grotesque EU subsidies.

The poorest countries have a powerful case, backed up by many development academics, that their markets should be protected until they are better able to compete.

The excuses have come too fluently, however, and from the biggest and most competitive, not the poorest. The EU argues that some African governments are shielding their own big businesses — and are blocking services, such as cheaper mobile telephones, or transport — which could help Africans enormously.

The deadline is not a real one. There is the option to strike an interim agreement while working on a more solid deal; a dozen African countries have already done just that. Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor, hinted that there might be room for improving Europe’s offer on Friday. The EU meeting must at least decide whether to impose punitive tariffs on some African countries, or to keep talking.

But there is a contradiction in the position of some African leaders: wanting, in spirit, for Europe to treat Africa as an equal, yet wanting anything but that when it comes to formal trade deals.

Post-colonial rancour was a running theme of the summit, with Europe blamed for Africa’s underdevelopment and thus for the current wave of migration northwards. President Wade also gave Europe warning that it was in danger of losing the competition for the new Africa to China, which is rushing to pour billions into resources deals, no strings attached.

Guilt and fear: African leaders may extract something from the EU by pulling those strings. But they would do better with an argument based on the economics of trade and development — and only the poorest among them can make that.

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