The independence of French Indochina after the Second World War triggered a wave of independence in the French-speaking African countries, and it appeared that French colonial foundations had suffered a huge blow in the early 1960s. However, the main tool of the economic exploitation of its West African colonies, the CFA franc financial system, an old appendage of its colonial empire, resisted the decolonization wave. An apparent contradiction presents itself in the survival of an overt colonial superstructure in Africa in an epoch of formal political independence. Therefore, this article will analyze French imperialism through a careful study of its main superstructural tool, the CFA franc system.