China and America's renewed interest in Africa
Seifudein Adem
2014-09-10, Issue <
http://www.pambazuka.org/en/issue/692> 692
Chinese officials work hand in glove with Africa's dictators during the day
and dine and wine with them at night. American officials criticize African
dictators during the day and dine and wine with them at night. So, how does
Africa ensure its interests are served?
'My advice to African leaders is to make sure that if, in fact, China is
putting in roads and bridges, number one, that they are hiring African
workers; number two, that the roads don't just lead from the mine, to the
port, to Shanghai.' These were the words of US President Barack Obama,
uttered on the eve of US-Africa Leaders Summit which took place in
Washington, DC from 4-6 August 2014. In attendance were about fifty heads of
state and government from Africa. Incidentally, the Summit received little
attention from the US Congressional Republicans; and in the mainstream
media, the Ebola crisis in West Africa dominated the news. Many decades ago,
there was a time when an African head of state who was visiting the US would
be invited to address the Joint Session of the US Congress, when The New
York Times would carry the full text of his address, and when TIME magazine
would name him the man of the year, carrying his photo on its cover. The
African head of state in question is Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia. But
that was long ago.
President Obama's carefully-worded statement mentioned above obviously
disheartened Beijing. Probably China never expected the first
African-American President of the United States would hold such a view about
what it was doing in Africa. Although not as cut and dried as the President
implied, there are certainly areas in which China's behaviors in Africa look
either suspiciously similar to or worse than those of the ex- colonial
powers. But, it must be admitted, it was also China which almost
single-handedly ended the steady marginalization of Africa in the global
economy by buying more from Africa, by selling more to Africa and by
investing more in Africa.
Barack Obama was not the first or the only American high official to hint
that China was exploitative and less forthright in its relations with
African countries. Three years ago, Hillary Clinton, then US Secretary of
State, said: 'We saw that during colonial times, it is easy to come in, take
out natural resources, pay off leaders and leave.We don't want new
colonialism.' Clinton was, obviously, talking about China. Similarly, in a
barely disguised swipe at China, Joe Biden, the US Vice President, told
Africa's leaders on 5 August 2014: 'The United States is proud of the extent
to which our [sic] investments in Africa goes hand in hand with efforts to
hire and train locals to foster economic development, not just to extract
what is in the ground.' Biden's observation is generally accurate - but is
misleadingly incomplete. In 2012, only one per cent of America's overall
direct investment was in Africa.
America's renewed interest in Africa is not therefore totally unrelated to
the growing influence of China in Africa. The US-Africa Leaders' Summit took
place more than a decade after the 'China-Africa Leaders' Summit,' or, as
the Chinese leaders prefer to call it, the Forum for China-Africa
Cooperation (FOCAC), was held in Beijing, China. FOCAC now takes place every
three years. To the question of whether the US was playing catch-up after
China's accelerated activities in Africa, the typical answer out of official
Washington is sometimes formulated in this way. It was others who were
playing catch-up; after all, the US had been in Africa long before them.
True, US engagement with Africa is long, but is it also deep?
What comes out of Washington also suggests America is trusted or even loved
more than China in Africa. What emerges from Africa itself is nevertheless a
more complex picture. This was, for instance, what a leader of a major
opposition group in Ethiopia told me about the perceived gap between China's
and America's diplomacy in Africa. Chinese officials work hand in glove with
Africa's dictators during the day and dine and wine with them at night;
American officials criticize African dictators during the day and dine and
wine with them at night. In other words, on this specific issue, Chinese
leaders say what they mean and mean what they say; Americans follow a
different approach at least for the time being.
The Washington Summit also demonstrated the variation in the level of
comparative specificity in Sino-American diplomatic discourse. Chinese
leaders generally seem to believe, or would like us to believe, that they
are Africa's 'all-weather' friends. Americans like to highlight their own
'self-interest' as the guiding principle of their foreign policy toward
Africa. Accordingly, American leaders are not shy about specifying in
concrete terms how the relationship with Africa is beneficial to them, too.
For instance, on 6 August 2014, US Congressman Gregory Marks gave concrete
numbers about how many jobs were created by African Growth and Opportunity
Act (AGOA) related investments- 300,000 jobs in Africa, and 120,000 jobs in
the US. China's diplomatic pronouncements lack this level of specificity.
Chinese leaders say they welcome a deeper US involvement in Africa. However
that may be, there is no doubt in my mind that it is in Africa's own
interest to invite and encourage a greater participation of all major powers
in Africa's political economy. As Ali A. Mazrui says: "To be owned by one
master is outright slavery; but to be owned by many masters, who can be
played against each other, may be the beginning of freedom."
* Seifudein Adem, PhD, Binghamton University.
Received on Wed Sep 10 2014 - 19:01:30 EDT