China-Africa relations are invariably refracted through a Western prism, presenting China as seeking to exploit Africa for its own interest. Closer scrutiny would suggest this to be a somewhat unimaginative projection, that loses currency with each Africa-China summit.
The ninth Africa-Summit, formally known as the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) opened today in the Chinese capital, Beijing. In attendance, will be fifty-three African heads of state, governments, and their delegations. They are accompanied by the United Nations (UN) Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, representatives of the African Union, and several regional and international organisations, which attend as observers.
For the Chinese hosts, FOCAC, is an intensely busy time. As well as welcoming their guests with a banquet, there will be general summits and bilateral meetings, including with President Xi Jinping.
If you are looking at the summit through a Western lens, you will see it as China’s strategy to steal a march on the West, in a superpower strategy to gain influence in Africa, and control the continent’s minerals resources.
A more dispassionate observation however, will see what is indeed a superpower, for all intents and purposes, but which is convinced that its interests are best served by cooperating with others, for mutual benefit.
This outlook is reflected in the themes for the summits. This year’s theme for instance, “Joining Hands to Advance Modernisation and Build a High-Level China-Africa Community with a Shared Future” makes up in genuine friendship, what it may lack in pithiness.
And it is not just warm words. The promise is accompanied by concrete, potentially transformative action.
China is now Africa’s largest trade partner. According to Chinese calculations, this trade could reach an eye watering $300bn by 2035. And at almost $200bn in loans and credits, over the last decade or so, China is also the largest investor in Africa.
Claims of “dept trap diplomacy”, accusing China of “trapping” African countries into taking up loans they struggle to repay, not only deliberately or mistakenly, miss the nature of China’s approach to its relations with African countries, but it also betrays the West’s paternalistic attitude towards the continent.
For China, it is for Africans to negotiate in a way that is advantageous to them, as it is for China to look to its own interests, and for the two parties to work out a mutually beneficial agreement.
Few understand and appreciate the need to take this responsibility more than Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame, who together with China’s President Xi Jinping, have established strong relations between their two nations.
Although not without minerals, Rwanda boasts few natural resources, and is nearly 400 times smaller than China. Few can claim that the friendship between the two peoples, that is so rewarding for Rwanda, is based on any cynical intent for exploitation.
In his remarks at the summit, President Kagame pointed to a relationship that is based on mutual regard.
Thanking his host and Chinese counterpart, and congratulating China on its forthcoming 75th anniversary, since the founding of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), the Rwanda head of state, further thanked President Xi Jinping, for being a “steadfast champion of stronger Chaina-Africa relations.”
“For over seven decades, the Chinese people have worked together to transform their nation, bringing it to the helm of the global economy. Effective state governance is, without doubt, a central commponent of this achievemnt. However, to be effective, state governance must be based values and expectations of citizens. It cannot be imposed from outside.”
“The Chinese experience in poverty alleviation, development, and technology adoption offers many lessons for accelerating our modernisation efforts.”
China, said Kagame, has demonstrated “a strong desire to shared development with other nations, based on mutual respect and common interests.” It is, he added, an approach that “allowed the relationship between Africa and China to flourish, including infrastructure devlopement, scientific innovation, and peace and security on the continent.”
Rwanda’s journey of self reliance, since the 1994 Genocide Against Tutsi, Kagame continued, has “allowed many productive partnerships to flourish between Rwanda and friendly nations, notably China, as well as many African countries. We are grateful for this steadfast support and collaboration, which manifests itself in many forms, including resource sharing, market access and knowledge transfer.”
Kagame pointed to advances since the establishment of FOCAC, including trade, industrialisation, and people to people exchanges.
Africa stands ready to build on the momentum he said, but “to do so, we msut remain mindful of the importance of effective state governance, and support each other to do the right things for our people.”
President Kagame’s words, characteristically apposite, dovetailed with President Xi Jinping much longer address, a mixture of the poetic and the practical.
“Blossoms in spring turn into fruits in autumn, and a bumper havervest is the reward of hard work” he began, “In this season of harvest, I am delighted to gather together with so many old and new friends, in Beijing to discuss grand plans for China-Africa friendship and cooperation in the new era…”
The Chinese head of state, and Secretary-General of the governing Communist Party of China, then went to deliver a suggested plan of action, that rendered the words “grand plans” quite an understatement. Suffice to say that if even half of what he proposes is taken up and fully implemented, it can amount to transformative change.
It is a speech so replete with concrete offers and suggestions, that only looking at it separately would do it justice.
He ended as poetically, as he began, quoting an African proverb.
“A friend is someone you share the path with. On the path to modernisation no one, and no country, should be left behind. Let us rally the more than 2.8 billin Chinese and African people, into a powerful force on our shared path toward modernisation, and write a new magnificent chapter of development in human history. Let us join hands to bring about a bright future of peace, security, prosperity and progress for our world.”
It was a speech at the end of which it was difficult to resist the temptation to add, now over to you Africa.
