By Xin Zhongchu

After President Xi Jinping’s successful visit to Africa earlier this year, the Chinese dream has long been a topic of discussion in both China and Africa. Recently, Ethiopia’s mainstream English language newspaper The Daily Monitor published a number of opinion articles on the Chinese dream and African dream by Asha-Rose Mtengeti Migiro, Former Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations and former foreign minister of Tanzania. These fresh and well-informed views on the subject have brought new insight into the media.

The inter-connection between the Chinese and African Dreams

Asha-Rose Mtengeti Migiro wrote: During his visit to Africa in March 2013, President Xi Jinping stressed to connect China’s development closely to that of Africa, and connect the Chinese people’s interests closely to those of the African people’s, and also connect China’s development opportunities closely to Africa’s. Currently, African countries are committed to reducing poverty, developing the economy and realizing sustainable development. Both the Chinese dream and African dream stress common development and the sharing of prosperity. This is the main reason why the Chinese dream is “echoed” in Africa.

Indeed, the Chinese and African peoples have developed an intimate brotherly friendship in the fight against colonialism and imperialism and for the independence and liberation of nations, as well as walking together on the road of development and prosperity, through mutual support and sincere cooperation. President Jacob Zuma of South Africa said, when we were fighting for our nation’s independence and freedom, we had already fought shoulder to shoulder with the Chinese people.

President Denis Sassou-Nguesso of the Republic of the Congo said, “The so-called China’s neo-colonialism in Africa is ill-disposed,” he also added that the African people once lived under colonialism and know what colonialism is and as such they will never be convinced by this argument. President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda once said: China has always been steadfast in fighting against colonialism, and in history, China belonged to the same world as Africa did. In the past century or so, Africa has been working hard to realize the dream of “gaining strength from unity and achieving development and rejuvenation” and China is committed to the great revitalization of the Chinese nation. Common experiences in history, common development tasks, and common strategic interests have tied China closely to Africa. The interweaved Chinese dream and African dream presents a beautiful prospect.

Mutually beneficial

Migiro said that for African products, China has become a major export destination and will become a “door” through which African commodities can tap into the Asian market. China’s investment in Africa has helped fill gaps in Africa’s basic infrastructure construction, thereby injecting vitality into the social and economic development of Africa. A strong relationship between China and Africa will help fully release Africa’s economic potential. As for China, the improvement of Africa’s economic environment is providing China with a huge market of more than 1 billion people for its products, helping fuel the rapid growth of its new middle class.

As Migiro put it, China’s rapid development has brought opportunities and tangible benefits to Africa that is pushing forward Africa’s economic and social development and is widely praised by the African people.

By 2012, China’s direct investment in Africa had accumulatively exceeded $15 billion. At last year’s Fifth Ministerial Conference of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, the Chinese Government committed to helping Africa train 30,000 highly skilled individuals in various areas in the coming three years, in order to help African countries with the building of their human resources. China will achieve this by offering government scholarship to 18,000 people.

Meanwhile, Africa’s development has also brought big opportunities to China. Since 2009, China has become Africa’s largest trade partner. In 2012, the bilateral trade volume approached $200 billion. At the breakfast jointly attended by President Xi Jinping and African leaders, during his visit to South Africa, President Yayi Boni of Benin said emotionally, “today we’re gathering here together with the common ideals and wills: Africa needs China, just as China needs Africa.”

Cultural exchange

Migiro said the integration of the Chinese dream and African dream should not be limited to the economic arena alone, but it should also cover cross-cultural communication. As President Xi stressed during his visit to Tanzania earlier this year, “We should pay more attention to cultural communication and exchanges between China and Africa in order to promote mutual understanding between the Chinese and African peoples.” In this era of knowledge sharing driven by the globalization of information technology as well as new ideas, it’s necessary for Chinese and African people to further strengthen their mutual understanding.

The development of strong and long lasting friendship in China-Africa relation is fundamentally attributed to the support of the ordinary people. African countries generously offered their assistance after a massive earthquake hit Wenchuan in China. Equatorial Guinea may not be rich, but it generously donated 1 million euros to the quake-stricken region, equal to one euro for each person living there. This is moving friendship. More and more young African people hope to learn about China and Chinese culture, so that they can build themselves a better future and work to preserve the relationship between China and Africa. As we Chinese always say, relations between states thrive when there is friendship between the people. Such friendship grows out of close interactions between the people of those nations. Rich cultural exchange is serving as a bridge for China and Africa to help each other realize their dreams.

Benefiting the common people

Migiro believes both the Chinese dream and the African dream stress the importance of benefiting the ordinary people and that what we are doing, discussing and planning should all center on the interests of the people.

This is where the common values of the Chinese dream and the African dream lie. President Xi Jinping said, “The Chinese dream is finally a dream of the people, and the achievement of the dream should depend on the people and we must try to offer better life for the people.” In recent years, the governments of African countries are also stressing that the improvement of people’s livelihood should be taken as a priority in governance. This shows that the realizations of individuals’ dreams are an important necessary condition for the realization of a nation’s dream. Only when each and every individual dream has come true can the grand national dream find a solid foundation. Every ordinary person is a member of the dream team in either the Chinese dream or the African dream.

Migiro pointed out China-Africa relations have made great headway. The strategic cooperation between China and Africa proves that Africa is a land that is ready to offer opportunities to those who are interested in developing a mutually beneficial relationship with Africa. Looking to the future, China-Africa relations will achieve greater accomplishments through the fulfillment of the Chinese dream and the African dream together.

Today’s Africa is among the fastest economically growing regions in the world. We believe, in the process of achieving each other’s dreams, stronger cooperation between China and Africa and deeper solidarity will make greater contributions to the building of a harmonious world with lasting peace and common prosperity.