Author: Dr Kweku Ampiah.

This article examines Japan's relations with the African countries from a post-World War II perspective and identifies an Anglo-Japanese initiative in the early 1960s to collaborate about matters relating to Africa's socio-economic development. The analysis pertains essentially to the Commonwealth African countries and further shows that apart from attempts to expand its exports to these countries, Japan's initiatives towards Africa until the 1990 left no landmarks that call for celebration, not least because Tokyo's foreign policy towards Africa was saddled with immobilist tendencies. The advent of the Tokyo International Conference on African Development since 1993 has, however, brought some dynamism to how Japan attends to issues relating to Africa's economic development. The article outlines recent events that demonstrate the dramatic transformation in Japanese foreign policy towards the Commonwealth African countries.