President
Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete and his guest Chinese President Xi Jinping take a
souvenir photo with their wives before the Chinese leader handed over
the centre to Tanzania and made his maiden speech in his first visit to
Africa.
President Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete and his guest Chinese President Xi Jinping applaud and later take their seats
* China's new president in Africa on first foreign trip
* Officials reject accusations of new colonialism
* After Tanzania, Xi heads to South Africa, Congo
By Fumbuka Ng'wanakilala and George Obulutsa
DAR ES SALAAM, March 25 (Reuters) - China's new president told Africans
on Monday he wanted a relationship of equals that would help the
continent develop, responding to concerns that Beijing is only
interested in shipping out its raw materials.
On the first stop on an African tour that will include a BRICS summit of
major emerging economies, Xi Jinping told Tanzanian President Jakaya
Kikwete that China's involvement in Africa would help the continent grow
richer.
"China sincerely
hopes to see faster development in African countries and a better life
for African people," Xi said in a speech laying out China's policy on
Africa, delivered at a conference centre in Dar es Salaam built with
Chinese money.
Renewing an offer of $20 billion of loans to Africa between 2013 and
2015, Xi pledged to "help African countries turn resource endowment into
development strength and achieve independent and sustainable
development".
Africans broadly see China as a healthy counterbalance to Western
influence but, as ties mature, there are growing calls from policymakers
and economists for a more balanced trade deal.
"China will continue to offer, as always, necessary assistance to Africa
with no political strings attached," Xi said to applause. "We get on
well and treat each others as equals."
But gratitude for that aid is increasingly tinged with resentment about
the way Chinese companies operate in Africa where industrial complexes
staffed exclusively by Chinese workers have occasionally provoked riots
by locals looking for work.
Countering concerns that Africa is not benefitting from developing
skills or technology from Chinese investment, Xi said China would train
30,000 African professionals, offer 18,000 scholarships to African
students and "increase technology transfer and experience".
"ALL-WEATHER FRIENDS"
"The Sino-Tanzania relationship has endured a lot," said Tanzania's
Kikwete, whose nation built close ties with China in the early years
after independence from the British in 1964. "Now we have become
all-weather friends."
China built a railway linking Tanzania and Zambia in the 1960s and early early 1970s.
The two leaders witnessed the signing of trade and other deals,
including plans to co-develop a new port and industrial zone complex, a
loan for communications infrastructure and an interest free loan to the
government. No details were given on the size of the loans or the
industrial projects.
Xi's next stop is South Africa for a BRICS summit on Tuesday and
Wednesday where he could endorse plans for a joint foreign exchange
reserves pool and an infrastructure bank.
Those proposals respond to frustrations among emerging markets at
having to rely on the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, which
are seen as reflecting the interests of the United States and other
industrialised nations.
Nigeria's central bank governor, Lamido Sanusi, wrote in the Financial
Times this month that the trade imbalance between China and Africa was
"the essence of colonialism" and cautioned the continent was vulnerable
to a new form of imperialism.
China is keen not to be perceived as an imperial master.
"The legacy of (the) West is the feeling that Africa should thank them,
and that Africa should recognise that it is not as good as the West,"
Zhong Jianhua, China's special envoy to Africa, said before Xi's trip.
"That is not acceptable."
Lu Shaye, head of the Chinese Foreign Ministry's African affairs
department, said it was the West which was only interested in African
resources, not China.
"What have Western countries done for Africa in the 50 years since
independence? Nothing. All they have done is criticise China and that is
unfair," he told a Hong Kong television station, in remarks carried on
the ministry's website.
Xi's African tour ends in Republic of Congo,
from where China imported 5.4 billion tonnes of oil last year, just 2
percent of its total oil imports, but potentially the source of a lot
more.
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