State Of Mankind - How Much Do You Know?

Excerpts from "How the Specter of Communism Is Ruling Our World"

After World War II, Africa underwent decolonization, and many African countries gained independence. As technology and capital were transferred from the West to China, Africa gradually lost the attention of the West. Strengthened by the West, the Chinese Communist Party steadily encroached on Africa. The forces of the CCP started replacing what the Western sovereign powers had set up in Africa and infiltrated its politics, economy, and society. On one hand, the CCP has wooed African states under the banner of aiding those countries’ development, creating a united front against the United States and other free countries in the United Nations. On the other hand, through economic bribery and military aid, the CCP has relentlessly manipulated African governments and opposition groups, controlling the affairs of African countries while imposing the Chinese model and its values on them.

From 2001 to 2010, the CCP-controlled Export-Import Bank of China supplied US$62.7 billion dollars in loans to African countries. The interest rates on these loans were relatively low and superficially do not appear to come with political conditions, but because these loans use natural resources as collateral, the CCP has obtained the effective rights to extract massive amounts of resources.

In 2003, the loan provided by the Export-Import Bank of China to Angola used crude oil as collateral in what is called the “Angola Model.” The following situation developed: “There are Chinese to drill the oil and then pump it into the Chinese pipeline guarded by Chinese strongmen on its way to a port built by the Chinese, where it is loaded onto Chinese tankers headed for China. Chinese to arm a government committing crimes against humanity; and Chinese to protect that government and stick up for it in the UN security council.” [72]

In 2016, China became Africa’s biggest trading partner and foreign direct investor. [73] In Africa, the CCP’s management model has been roundly criticized for its many ills: low wages, poor working conditions, shoddy products, “tofu-dreg engineering,” environmental pollution, bribery of government officials, and other corrupt practices. China’s mining operations in Africa also frequently met with protests from the local people.

Michael Sata, former president of Zambia, said during his presidential campaign in 2007: “We want the Chinese to leave and the old colonial rulers to return. They exploited our natural resources too, but at least they took good care of us. They built schools, taught us their language and brought us the British civilisation. At least Western capitalism has a human face; the Chinese are only out to exploit us.” [74] In Zambia, Chinese influence can be seen everywhere. Sata was faced with no choice but to make deals with the CCP. Once he gained power, he immediately met with China’s ambassador, and in 2013 visited China.

Sudan was one of the earliest bases that the CCP established in Africa, and over the past twenty years, the CCP’s investment in Sudan has grown exponentially. Apart from its abundant oil reserves, Sudan’s strategic location at the Red Sea was also vital to the CCP’s plans. [75] In the 1990s, when Sudan was isolated by the international community because of its support for terrorism and radical Islam, the CCP took advantage and rapidly became Sudan’s largest trading partner, purchasing most of the oil exported by Sudan. [76] The investment by the CCP helped Bashir’s totalitarian regime survive and develop despite being contained by the West. The CCP’s military even exported weapons to Sudan during this period, indirectly facilitating the Darfur genocide in Sudan at the beginning of this century.

In the international community, the CCP played a two-faced role: While China sent out a peacekeeping team to the U.N. to mediate the conflict in Sudan, Beijing also openly invited the Sudanese president, a criminal wanted by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity, to visit China, and declared that no matter how the world changed, no matter what the situation was in Sudan, that China would always be Sudan’s friend. [77]

The CCP spares few efforts in wooing developing nations. The Forum on China-Africa Cooperation was established in 2000 and first held in Beijing. In the subsequent forums that were held during key years, the leaders of the CCP threw money at Africa. In 2000, during the inaugural meeting, Jiang Zemin announced debt relief of 10 billion yuan for the poor countries in Africa. In 2006, when Beijing was again the host country of the summit, the CCP not only announced the relief of debt as of the end of 2005 for poor African countries it had diplomatic relations with [78], but also sent over US$10 billion in funding, credit, scholarships, and various aid projects.

In 2015, during the summit in Johannesburg, South Africa, the CCP announced that it would provide capital of US$60 billion to work with African countries to carry out the ten major cooperation plans. [79] On August 28, 2018, the CCP’s vice minister of Commerce noted that “97 percent of products from thirty-three of the least-developed African countries have zero tariffs.” [80] On Sept. 3, 2018, during the China-Africa Cooperation Forum held in Beijing, the CCP again pledged that it would provide Africa with US$60 billion of no-strings-attached aid, interest-free loans, and project-specific capital and investment. At the same time, the CCP promised that for African countries with diplomatic relations with the CCP, it would cancel their inter-government debts that matured at the end of 2018. [81]

After several decades of painstaking effort, through commerce and trade, the CCP gained control over Africa’s economy. By using economic incentives, it has bought off many African governments, such that they follow Beijing’s every instruction. The outside world has noticed how the CCP regime is attempting to conquer Africa, and how it is using Africa as the stage for promoting and advocating the Party’s model. A scholar in the Chinese regime establishment declared: “China’s progress over the past forty years has proven that it doesn’t need to do what the West did to achieve success. History has not ended yet. The impact of this on Africa is beyond what you can imagine.” [82]

Following China, the former prime minister of Ethiopia, Meles Zanawi, established a Five-Year Plan for Ethiopia. The organization and structure of the ruling party, the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), also bore a striking resemblance to the CCP regime. An anonymous source within the Chinese Foreign Ministry said that many high-level officials in the EPRDP had gone to China to study and undergo training, and that the children of many important officials also went to China for their education. It was even more apparent at the ministerial level, where virtually every official was reading The Selected Writings of Mao Zedong. [83]

In March 2013, at the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) summit, the Ethiopian prime minister stated that China was both a trading partner and a development model for Ethiopia. Today, Ethiopia is called Africa’s “New China.” Its internet monitoring and censorship, the totalitarian nature of its government, its media control, and the like are all cast in the same mold as China’s. [84]

Ethiopia is not the only example. In 2018, the International Department of the Central Committee of the CCP held the fourth China-Africa Young Leaders Forum and the second China-Latin America Political Parties Forum in Shenzhen, Guangdong. The training was targeted at leaders and government officials.

Yun Sun, co-director of the China Program at the Washington-based Stimson Center, said that this kind of political training was to export the Chinese model to developing countries. She said:

They organized this kind of political training with three objectives in mind. First, that the CCP’s regime is legitimate — it is attempting to tell the world how the CCP has successfully managed China and how this success could be replicated for developing countries. Second, the CCP seeks to promote the experience China had in its development, during the so-called “exchange of ideas on how to govern the country.” Although the CCP is not explicitly “exporting revolution,” it is certainly exporting its ideological approach. The third objective is to strengthen exchanges between China and Africa. [85]

From Chapter Eighteen
The Chinese Communist Party’s Global Ambitions