By He Wenping, Director of the African Studies Section of the Institute of West Asian and African Studies, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

Given their underdeveloped manufacturing industry, most African countries have long had to import manufactured products and consumer goods. In the past, they bought products from Europe and the United States, which were too expensive for ordinary Africans. With the flourishing of Sino-African trade, Africans now have access to affordable goods from China. As a result, their purchasing power and living standards have been improved.

Gratitude

A Nigerian military officer who came to China for further studies said Nigeria is grateful to China because Nigerians, who used to wear second-hand clothes from Europe and the United States, can afford new clothes from China. In his view, the change has enabled them to enjoy a long-awaited sense of self-esteem.

China's Sinohydro Corp. signed contracts with the Angolan Government for the construction of stadiums in Lubango and Benguelag at the end of 2007. The two stadiums, which hosted soccer matches during the African Cup of Nations in 2010, became landmark buildings in Angola and the whole of Africa.

At first, Angola turned to Brazil and Portugal for assistance. The two countries declined Angola's request because the stadiums had to be completed in only 18 months. Companies from other countries were also unwilling to take part in the bid given the Angolan Government's financial strains. After a one-day conference, Sinohydro decided to lend a hand despite difficulties. It pumped funds into the projects and ensured their completion on schedule. As it contributed to Angola's preparations for the African Cup, it helped preserve the country's national image.

In the Republic of Congo, designated by the UN as one of the least developed countries, there was barely any transportation infrastructure, except the Pointe-Noire port, whose cargo handling capacity was almost negligible. The Republic of Congo subsidiary of the China State Construction Engineering Corp. overcame unimaginable difficulties and built the 600-km National Highway 1 with the support of local workers.

The 15-meter wide, four-lane asphalt highway winds its way through rugged mountains and primitive forests in the sub-Saharan nation. Both the country's government and people welcomed its completion. Notably, former Prime Minister Isidore Mvouba expressed his heartfelt thanks to the Chinese. In contrast, during the long colonial rule by Western powers, colonialists built no highways in Africa except makeshift roads along its coasts and in mining areas to transport natural resources.

While Western countries focus on "capacity building," China channeled most of its investment to tangible projects that can deliver direct benefits to African people such as roads and bridges. To date, China has built more than 2,000 km of railways, 3,000 km of highways, 100 schools and 60 hospitals in Africa. It has also canceled more than 20 billion yuan ($3.1 billion) in debt owed by African countries.

Compared with Western aid, Chinese assistance exhibits distinct features, such as attaching no political strings, refraining from interfering in African countries' domestic affairs, valuing bilateral aid over multilateral aid and concentrating on "hardware projects" such as infrastructure construction instead of "software projects" such as research and capacity building. Despite the growing volume of its assistance, China has never labeled itself a "donor country." It considers its aid to Africa mutual assistance between developing countries and part of South-South cooperation.

Partnership

Unlike Western countries that have adopted an interventionist policy by linking aid to so-called "democracy" since the end of the Cold War, China's assistance to Africa has transcended ideological differences. It stresses non-interference in African countries' domestic affairs and respect for their independent choices of development paths, while imposing no preconditions on its assistance. Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao reaffirmed this principle in his keynote speech at the opening ceremony of the Fourth Ministerial Conference of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, on November 8, 2009. "China has never attached any political strings to its support and assistance to Africa, nor will it do so in the future," he said.

China respects African countries' right to choose development paths suited to their national conditions. It does not seek to export its values and development model to African countries. After colonizing African countries directly or indirectly, former colonial powers continue to make attempts to maintain their influence in Africa through arrangements such as the British-led Commonwealth of Nations and the Franco-African Summit.

Since the end of the Cold War, Western countries have offered assistance based on whether African countries practice Western democracy. Western powers led by the United States have imposed their political concepts such as democracy, freedom and human rights on African countries with a carrot-and-stick approach. From the Bill Clinton administration's African Growth and Opportunity Act, which introduced quotas and tariff exemptions on African countries' clothing and textile exports to the United States, to the George W. Bush administration's Millennium Challenge Account, the United States establishes preconditions and thresholds in terms of democracy, freedom and human rights for every aid package it provides. Countries failing to meet these standards are denied access to U.S. aid.

"Don't do to others what you don't want others to do to you," said the ancient Chinese philosopher Confucius. The Chinese, who see great value in Confucian traditions, are confident that Africans are able to find suitable paths to development independently without foreign preaching or intervention. Africa needs development partners rather than "preachers."

China's confidence in Africa results from its positive perception of the African continent. Professor Kenneth King, former Director of the Center for African Studies of the University of Edinburgh in Britain, said Western donors often regard Africa as the world's poorest continent with almost no hope of fulfilling the UN's Millennium Development Goals. Interestingly, he noted, China's Africa Policy white paper issued by the Chinese Government in 2006 reaffirmed the importance of economic cooperation without even using the word "poverty."

While the West tends to look at the darker side of Africa--an undeveloped continent plagued by civil war, poverty, disease and corruption, China characterizes Sino-African relations with positive phrases such as peaceful coexistence, common development, mutual benefit, win-win results, friendship, sincerity and mutual respect.

Senegal's President Abdoulaye Wade wrote in the British newspaper Financial Times in early 2008, "With direct aid, credit lines and reasonable contracts, China has helped African nations build infrastructure projects in record time…These are improvements, moreover, that stay in Africa and raise the standards of living for millions of Africans, not just an elite few."

"I have found that a contract that would take five years to discuss, negotiate and sign with the World Bank takes three months when dealing with Chinese authorities," he wrote. "The Chinese are more competitive, less bureaucratic and more adept at business in Africa."

Western media and politicians have accused China of pursuing "neo colonialism" in Africa primarily out of concern that China's growing relations with Africa may harm Western interests and that the rising influence of China and Africa in international affairs may pose a challenge to the Western-dominated international political and economic order.

Geoff Lamb, a former Vice President of the World Bank in charge of financing for poor countries, said the reason for these accusations is "China's commercial encroachment on the terrain of traditional aid providers has caused consternation among Western policymakers." In a sense, they are "alarmist or disingenuous," he said.

Success

At a seminar on Sino-African relations at Cambridge, I asked a Western scholar why the West is so interested in hyping Sino-African relations. "That's because China is too successful in Africa," he replied.

Friendly cooperation between China and Africa over the past five decades provides evidence that the development of Sino-African relations does not target any other country and the Sino-African relationship is a South-South partnership featuring equality and mutual benefit.

During a visit to Zambia in June, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned African countries of the risks of "new colonialism" when dealing with China. "New colonialism" is spreading in Africa as China does not always take African people's interests into account when making investment and providing aid, she said.

Zambian President Rupiah Banda responded to Clinton's remarks at a press conference. He said Zambia, which established a close relationship with China before its independence in 1964, worked with China during its pursuit of independence and after independence. During the global financial crisis, China supported Zambia as it continued to buy Zambian products. "I think that the whole world benefited from that and we were able to emerge from the financial crisis sooner than later," Banda said.

During his visit to Africa in June 2006, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao made it clear that there is no reason whatsoever to put the label of "neo-colonialism" on China. "From the Opium War in 1840, China suffered colonialist aggression for almost 110 years," he said. "The Chinese nation understands the sufferings brought about by colonialism and is deeply aware that we must fight against colonialism. That is one major reason that we have been long supporting the national liberation and rejuvenation of Africa."

Western colonists turned Africa into their raw material supplier and a market where they could dump their products through bloody plundering. Both the slave trade 300 years ago and the 1884 Berlin Conference that led to the partition of Africa are testaments to their cruelty. Worse still, African countries developed an excessive economic independence on colonial powers. An Indian newspaper said China's practices in Africa differ fundamentally from what colonists did in that China has not occupied weak African countries militarily, caused damage to their economies or imposed trade preconditions on them.

German business magazine Wirtschaftswoche said China helped Africa achieve an economic growth of more than 5 percent in 2005 and keep its inflation rate at the lowest level in 25 years. For the first time in African history, funds that flew into Africa in the form of foreign investment exceeded development aid. Thanks to the opportunities created by the Chinese, Africa finally became master of its own fate, it said.