China’s new Head of State, Xi Jinping is set to visit Africa on his first foreign trip as president later this month. This is a strong indication of where China-Africa relations are headed. It highlights the importanceChina attaches to China-Africa ties.
During his stay, he will attend the 5th Meeting of the BRICS in South Africa, the first summit held in Africa from March 24–28. Apart from South Africa, he will visit Tanzania and the Republic of Congo.
President Xi is no stranger to Africa. He has visited Africa on several occasions before and his policies on Africa and his ideas are well known in the continent. During his trip to Africa in 2010, while he was vice-president, he called for concerted efforts to make the Forum on China-Africa Co-operation (FOCAC) stronger and to boost the development of the new type of China-Africa strategic partnership.
Addressing a seminar to mark the 10th anniversary of the establishment of FOCAC in Pretoria, South Africa, Xi proposed to strengthen strategic planning, practical co-operation and institution building of FOCAC so as to make it a solid base for political mutual trust, a major engine driving common development and an efficient and mature platform for China-Africa co-operation.
President Xi stressed that China and African countries should continue to respect, trust and treat each other as equals. He urged for enhanced coordination and co-operation on global issues of mutual interest and proposed that China Africa co-operation be expanded to new areas and taken to higher levels.
He committed to promote export of African goods to China, facilitate investment and technology transfer to Africa, provide more job opportunities for the African people and enhance African countries’ capacity in self development so as to bring more benefits to the African people.
By Shifan Wu
President Xi Jinping’s life and times thus far point towards a journey that the modern-day African leader is likely to take or to have taken. He was formally elected as China’s new president on March 14, 2013 by the country’s top legislature at the 12th National People’s Congress in Beijing.
His endorsement comes four months after he took charge of the Communist Party of China (CPC) at the 18th National Congress of CPC in November 2012. He is now the President of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and Chairman of the PRC Central Military Commission.
Mr Xi’s formal appointment as head of the world’s most populous nation, followed by the naming of Li Keqiang as Premier, marks the final step in China’s once-in-a-decade power handover.
Xi Jinping was born in June 1953 in Fuping, Shaanxi province. He started working in 1969 and joined the CPC in January 1974. He received his undergraduate education at the Chemical Engineering Department of Tsinghua University and later graduated from the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at the same university with a major in Marxist theory and political education.
Special economic zones
He has an in-service postgraduate education and holds the degree of Doctor of Laws.
The new president is the son of a respected communist elder and founding member of new China, Mr.Xi Zhongxun, who was a former politburo member, vice-premier and one of the architects of the successful special economic zones in China in the 1980’s.
Xi himself was sent to the Chinese countryside to live and work alongside farmers in the 1970’s, as were many educated youths then.
He is in touch with the history and transformation of China as he has lived and participated in it.
Rising from a CPC branch secretary in a village brigade, Xi fostered his experience in dealing with domestic and international affairs while serving higher positions. He is an enterprising leader who analyses national and global conditions with an impressive determination.
Since the 1980s while serving in different capacities in the State Council, Hebei Province, Fujian Province, Zhejiang Province and Shanghai, he has visited over 60 countries and regions to gain experience and seek cooperative opportunities. Shortly after his election last year, he met foreign experts working in China and sought their views and suggestions on China’s development.
Much about President Xi points to a person who, by the standards of current leaders, will be comparatively progressive. He has abundant experiences in working at local governments of Chinaand knows China in a comprehensive and all-round way. He is well traveled and intimately familiar with Africa as well as the west.
On China’s Africa policy, Xi has said for several times that consolidating unity and co-operation with African countries are one of the vital corner stones for China’s foreign policy and also a strategic choice that China will firmly adhere to for a long time. Africa therefore should expect a deeper, stronger and more harmonised engagement going forward.
Writer is the Spokesman, Chinese Embassy in Kenya.
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