Like the coast of the Gulf of Guinea in West Africa, the North Eastern coast of South America was heavily contested by European colonial powers. Suriname is bordered by France to the east. Yes, French Guiana is part of France and the European Union. It is bordered by Guyana to the west. Suriname came under Dutch rule in C17th and in 1954 became one of the constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. In 1975, it left to become an independent state. Suriname is the only country outside Europe where Dutch is spoken by a majority of the population. The local dialect is an English-based creole. In South Africa, English is the majority language but Afrikaans, is a Dutch-based creole. It is the first language of more than 75% of mixed race South Africans and was referred to as "Kitchen Dutch". It was only in 1925 that Afrikaans was recognised as a real language by the Government as a White Afrikaans national identity started to grow. No particular ethnic group is a majority in Suriname. Just over a quarter are descendants of indentured labourers from India.
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