In 2025, Russia allocated more than 5,000 state-funded university spots for African students after receiving more than 40,000 applications. According to Russia's cultural diplomacy agency Rossotrudnichestvo, that's double the applications they received in 2024. The highest number of applicants came from Sudan, Guinea, Ghana and Chad.
Officials also report a growing interest in Russian language courses. Observers say it is unsurprising that African students are turning to Russian universities for higher education. Under President Vladimir Putin, the Kremlin has sought to revive Soviet-era relationships and build new alliances across Africa to grow its global influence amid confrontation with the West.
Since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russia has increasingly turned toward countries in the Global South to counter international isolation. Russia has touted education, energy, and military cooperation as tools of engagement. "Offering scholarships is the cheapest possible way to get allies.
Russia needs allies at the moment," Russian historian Irina Filatova, Professor Emeritus at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa, told DW. "Russia has created an image that projects it as anti-colonial, and Africans agree with it." Currently, the number of African students studying in the European Union or United States dwarfs that of African students studying in Russia, with a study estimating there were more than 92,000 African students studying in France alone. Russia has announced plans to expand its network of cultural and education centers across Africa in a program known as "Russian Houses" to strengthen its academic and cultural footprint on the continent.
Yevgeny Primakov, head of Rossotrudnichestvo, told the Russia-Africa Expo 2025 held in Moscow in October that new centers are planned for Egypt, Zambia, Tanzania, South Africa and Ethiopia. "Russian language courses are now offered in many African countries, and attending them opens the door to Russian scholarships, universities, career opportunities and a new way of life," he said. The growing presence of Russian Houses, coupled with language programs and state-funded study grants, helps explain the rise in scholarship applications.
In the Central African Republic, authorities have introduced compulsory Russian language courses for university students. Russian military advisers and private contractors have already established a strong presence in the CAR, whose President Faustin-Archange Touadera relies on Russian military support. Critics, however, accuse Russian Houses of serving as covert propaganda outposts that promote Kremlin narratives abroad.
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