Of all the rulers in Africa over recent decades, only one could claim power that extended across the entire continent year after year – and she lived in central London.
The passing of Queen Elizabeth II has prompted an outpouring of tributes and testaments, but also difficult questions that may pose a challenge to King Charles III as he seeks to continue his mother’s work in Africa.
The most famous of the Queen’s many voyages to the continent was to Kenya in February 1952. Aged 25, she had spent the night in a treehouse, rising at dawn to view wildlife before learning of her father King George VI’s death and her accession to the throne.
Last week Uhuru Kenyatta, president of Kenya, called the Queen “a towering icon of selfless service to humanity and a key figurehead of … the entire world”. Among the many major historical actors in Africa that she knew personally was his father, the independence leader and Kenya’s first president, Jomo Kenyatta.
Such ties, reinforced by the Queen’s instinctive sense of diplomacy and charm, helped Britain to cope with a potentially traumatic end to the nation’s imperial power across much of the continent, observers say.
“Her grace was absolutely instrumental in ensuring smooth relations before and after independence. Her personal efforts … were indispensable in accommodating the British to the loss of their empire and enabling independent countries to maintain a relationship with Britain that was emotional without being oppressive,” Nicholas Westcott, director of the Royal Africa Society, told the Observer.
A key moment was the Queen’s dance with Kwame Nkrumah, president of Ghana, in 1961. This sent a powerful anti-racist message, underlining that the Queen would treat leaders of new countries as equals.
“It was profoundly symbolic and quite characteristic of her approach,” said Westcott.
But if the Queen’s charm offensive was instinctive and authentic, it also served British strategic interests. The dance in Ghana – the first of 14 former British colonies in Africa to win independence during her reign – was credited with stalling both Nkrumah’s tilt towards the USSR and his country’s departure from the Commonwealth. The Queen cared deeply about the Commonwealth, which was key to London’s continuing influence on the continent.
Some have said the Queen’s diplomacy distracted from a less attractive reality: that Britain relinquished its colonies with reluctance and amid significant violence. Her famous trip to Kenya came just as the Mau Mau movement, which aimed to take back seized land and push for an end to colonial rule, gathered pace. Its brutal repression hurt relations for decades and led to a £19.9m payout by the UK government three years ago.
The shoals of African politics in later years also offered anything but placid sailing, even in the Royal Yacht Britannia.
When Rhodesian white supremacists unilaterally declared their independence in 1965, the Queen was adamant that she would not accept the role of head of state of a rebel regime. When Margaret Thatcher refused to impose sanctions on apartheid South Africa in the 1980s, the monarch’s displeasure was reported on the front page of the Sunday Times, the closest she ever came to a public dispute with an elected politician.
The monarch had other ways of making her views known: a first official visit to South Africa only came a year after the first free elections in 1994. Nelson Mandela, democratic South Africa’s first president and a friend, called her “dear Elizabeth” when they spoke. The Queen apparently welcomed the breach of protocol.
Last week Cyril Ramaphosa, president of South Africa, said that the Queen’s “commitment and dedication … remains a noble and virtuous example to the entire world”.
Others in South Africa took a different view. The Congress of Traditional Leaders of South Africa confessed to “mixed feelings” even as it sent “heartfelt condolences to the people of the entire United Kingdom”.
“You will understand that we have come through a very brutal system of colonisation,” said general secretary Zolani Mkiva.
The leader of the radical leftwing Economic Freedom Fighters party, Julius Malema, told followers that anyone mourning the Queen was celebrating colonialism and called for reparations from the UK.
There have also been calls for the return of valuable diamonds mined on the continent now among the crown jewels, while BBC News Africa had to urge its audience to be more “respectful” when its account was flooded with posts highlighting the negative impact of British colonialism after the network sent a tweet celebrating the Queen’s “longstanding connection” to the continent.
The royal family has recently sought to address Britain’s imperial past, often appearing well to be ahead of Downing Street in tackling difficult issues. As prince, Charles gave a conciliatory speech in Barbados last year referring to the “appalling atrocity of slavery” that “forever stains British history”.
But though he has travelled widely on the continent, the new king may still struggle to match his late mother’s combination of charm and knowledge. From Cape Town to Algiers to Kampala – which she visited in 1947, 1980 and 2007, respectively – the Queen was respected by rulers and welcomed by hundreds of millions of people.
“When the Queen visited Uganda in 1954, I was in primary school. She was a young and small woman who looked very humble. She was very admirable and smiling,” Vincent Rwosire, an 84-year-old retired postal worker, told Reuters.
“We could not believe that such a young woman could have so much power,” he said by phone from Mbarara, western Uganda.
The links between African nations and peoples and the British monarchy will now evolve in new ways, observers say.
“It will be the next generation that will define what the new relationship should be,” said Westcott.
