The African Road to China

By Owei Lakemfa

The
African leaders journey to Beijing, for the Forum on China-Africa
Cooperation, FOCAC, holding from September 3-4, 2018, actually began
fifty three years
ago.

That was at the infancy of our independence. In 1960 alone, seventeen African countries had gained independence.

Tanzania
became independent in 1961 and Zambia, four years later. Both faced the
same challenge of development, lifting Africans out of poverty, and the
underdevelopment
foisted on them by colonialism.

Also
quite challenging to both countries , were the African liberation wars
especially in Zimbabwe, Namibia, South Africa and Mozambique; colonies
being run
by the racists in Salisbury (Harare) the apostles of Apartheid in
Pretoria and Portuguese colonialists in Maputo.

Newly
emergent Zambia shared borders with all these countries, so it was
quite vulnerable. Worse still, as a landlocked country, its economy
including its exports
and imports depended on the racist and Apartheid regimes.

The
liberation-minded Presidents Mwalimu Julius Nyerere of Tanzania and
Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia knew their countries must play frontline roles
in the decolonisation
and liberation process in those countries, and concluded that a railway
line linking both countries, was an economic and political necessity.

They
turned to the European countries beginning with Britain to assist with
the railway construction. They were turned down as did the then Soviet
Union.

Then,
China was also an underdeveloped country, but out of frustration,
Nyerere during his February 1965 visit to China, raised the issue and
surprisingly, China
committed itself.

In
a follow up visit by Kaunda in June 1967, China agreed to the
construction. Then Chinese leader, Chairman Mao Tse-Tung said given the
need for total African
liberation and African development, China would build the railway even
when it meant his country suspending some of its own development
projects.

 Three months later, the three countries signed the agreement for the 1,860
kilometre Dar es Salaam to Kapri Mposhi (Zambia)railway.

The
survey and design which began in May, 1968 took nine months and
involved technicians and staff, walking from Tanzania to Zambia. It was
funded by an interest-free
loan of 988 million RMB Yuan from China.

The
technologically challenging construction which began in October 1970,
was across some of the most difficult terrains on earth spanning
valleys, drifting
sands, rivers, the Udzungwa Mountains, the Mbeya Plateau and dense,
virgin forests full of wild animals including lions and elephants. It
required the construction of 320 bridges, 22 tunnels and 93 stations.

Over 50,000 people worked on the construction including 16,000 Chinese and, its total cost was $500 million.

Most significantly, it cost the lives of 64 Chinese and 96 African workers.

The first Chinese casualty was Mr. Zang Mincai who was stung by bees in the forest.

So
involved was the Chinese leadership, that its famous Premier, Zhou
Enlai sent top Chinese professor, Wu Jieping to treat Mincai, but he
passed on; a martyr
to African-Chinese friendship (Rafikir in Swahili). The Chinese
casualties were buried on African soil, in Gongo la Mboto, near Dar.

The construction was completed in July 1976.

Thus,
was born the Tanzania-Zambia Railway line better known as TAZARA or the
Great Uhuru Highway. Uhuru in Swahili means freedom; that was how
Zambia, Tanzania
and much of Africa saw the rail project.

Previously,
railways had been built in some Africa countries but they were
primarily by the colonialists, to move looted African raw materials and
cash crops
from the hinterland to the ports for shipment to Europe and America. In
contrast, the TAZARA was built on commitment and solidarity.

It was an ode to African-Chinese friendship, signed with the mixed blood of Chinese and African labour.

The
TAZARA is also the signpost to next month’s China-Africa Cooperation
Summit built around the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-Century
Maritime Silk Road(Belt
and Road) project between China and Africa, the United Nations 2030
Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Agenda 2063 of the African
Union.

Not unexpectedly, railway development remains a major component of Chinese cooperation with Africa.

A
TAZARA-like project, is the 754-kilometre Addis Ababa-Djibouti standard
gauge line which links landlocked Ethiopia with the Djibouti port of
Doraleh. Opened
on January 1, 2018, 95 percent of Ethiopia’s trade passes that corridor
while the latter, accounts for 70 percent of activities at the Djibouti
port.

Much
of the Nigeria-China development projects are also railway-based. The
Chinese-built Abuja-Kaduna Railway was opened in July 2016, the Abuja
Rail Mass Transit
was opened in July, 2018 while the Lagos-Ibadan rail is on-going.

The
Chinese are also building the Lekki Deep Water Port in Lagos and
expanding the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport in Abuja. A major
step in Nigeria-China
relations is the Naira-RMB currency swop which enables both countries
bypass the internationally-dominant American dollar.

For
the 2018 FOCAC Summit with the theme “China and Africa: Towards An Even
Stronger Community With A Shared Future Through Win-Win Cooperation”

Nigeria’s
focus include the construction of the 614 kilometre
Ajaokuta-Kaduna-Kano (AKK) pipeline project designed to enable gas flow
from the East, West and
North. It has a projected 24-month construction period.

Doubtlessly,
the FOCAC has been quite beneficial, but Africa can get a better
mileage by collectively coordinating its activities with China rather
than engage
mainly in individual negotiations.

Africa should also be China-like in transforming from dependency to self-sustenance.

For
instance, the African technicians and workers who were fully involved
in the construction of the TAZARA, should have been built into the
nucleus of a railway
construction and development movement in Africa; that is what China
would have done had it been in our shoes.

African
leaders also need to learn from the Chinese elite who are focused,
programmatic, result-oriented, patriotic, people-centred and for whom
generally, the
law is no respecter of status, beliefs or origins.

Also,
we need to learn from China which concentrates on programmes and
projects that benefit the most people such that it lifted 700 million
Chinese out of poverty
within a short period making it the world’s model.

Also,
unlike the West, China is not domineering and overbearing; it does not
decree that its enemies must be our enemies; it does not ask its allies
to join
its turf battles.

In
contrast, when the Americans are fighting other countries such as its
on-going dispute with Turkey and Iran, it insist that other countries
join its economic
sanctions, or be punished.

China
also teaches Africa that human circumstances and the world order can be
changed not by threats, but in practice; its fundamental role in
building the BRICS
and its Silk and Road coalition are in practice, laying for a New
Economic World Order.

Unlike
our colonial and neo-colonial experience, the Chinese have taught us
that a candle does not lose its brightness by lighting other candles,
rather, it
makes the world brighter.

Source: Vanguard