Day: September 11, 2020
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The Bondholders’ View of the African Debt Crisis
The ongoing debt crisis in Zambia and several other African countries is proving to be much more difficult to resolve than in previous years because of the expanded role of both Chinese lenders and bondholders. Both of these creditors have starkly ...
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Critical Zambian Bondholder Vote to Take Place Today
A coalition of Zambian bondholders is expected to cast their votes today (Wednesday) to decide on whether or not to grant the government a six-month repayment holiday on $3 billion of Eurobond notes, according to sources quoted by Bloomberg. Results are scheduled to ...
COVID Vaccine Narrative Battles Intensify Following Pfizer Announcement
A narrative battle over COVID-19 vaccines is emerging in the aftermath of this week's announcement by Pfizer that its vaccine is reportedly 90% effective. That news also coincided with an interruption of a Chinese-made COVID vaccine clinical in Brazil ...
COVID-19 Tops the Agenda at China-Gulf Countries Foreign Minister Meeting
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met with six of his counterparts from the Gulf Cooperation Council on Tuesday for a virtual conference, where COVID-19 was atop the agenda. The ministers focused on access to a future C19 vaccine as well as PPE and other pandemic mitigation resources. ...
All This Talk About Vaccines Gives a Desperately-Needed Boost to Two of Africa’s Largest Oil Producing Countries
The prices for Nigerian Bonny Light and Angolan Cabinda crudes have regained some lost ground in November thanks to the Pfizer vaccine news and the U.S. elections. Given that both countries face enormous debt servicing challenges, these higher oil prices will help to replenish government coffers. China ...
Where Does China Buy Its Oil?
Africa's share of China's oil imports has been steadily declining over the past 15 years but the continent nonetheless remains Beijing's second-largest source of crude after the Persian Gulf. In 2008, according to George Washington University China-Africa scholar David Shinn, China imported close ...
South Africa Moves to Diversify Its Trade Ties in Asia Beyond China
South Africa is expanding its trading ties in Asia by becoming the newest partner country in the Association for Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), marking the first time a sub-Saharan country joins the regional body. Morocco and Egypt are also ASEAN partners. The move ...
Upcoming China-Africa Media Forum Highlights a Key Component of China’s Soft Power Diplomacy
The Chinese and Kenyan governments will hold a media conference next week in Nairobi that's part of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) action plan. While a lot of U.S. and European observers dismiss these kinds of events as mere propaganda exercises, they're often enthusiastically embraced by ...
Wait. Is 11.11 is Actually a Thing in Zambia? Really?
Today is the most important day on the calendar for hundreds of millions of Chinese consumers, who are expected to buy an astonishing $45 billion worth of stuff in just 24 hours. Yes, that almost $2 billion AN HOUR. While Singles Day (named for being the anti-Valentine's ...
Africa, You’re On Your Own
Back in March, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed was the first leader to sound the alarm that Africa's economies were "staring at an abyss" due to the financial crisis brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic. He rightly predicted that without urgent, large-scale assistance, ...
Rethinking China’s Participation in African Agricultural Development in the Post-COVID-19 Era
This article was co-authored by Duncan Chando, a Nairobi-based international development consultant Africa was already facing food insecurity and agricultural underdevelopment prior to COVID-19. In 2018 studies showed that Sub-Saharan Africa was the world’s most food-insecure region, hosting 239 million ...
China-Africa Trade Update with Walter Ruigu
Two-way China-Africa trade fell sharply in the first half of the year to $82 billion, down 20% from the same time last year. Trade between the two regions has been severely disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic and the ...
Nigeria’s China Moment
The current anti-Chinese sentiment in Nigeria is a fascinating sign of the times, but I'm a it baffled about what it signals. I don't know enough about Nigerian society to be able to unpack it in detail. However, it seems like a symptom that China's narrative of ...
Africa in the New Era of U.S.-China Relations
African leaders have said repeatedly that they want to stay clear from the escalating conflict between the United States and China. But despite their best efforts, a growing number of African countries are nonetheless being drawn in to disputes over Huawei, ...
Zambian Hip Hop Star B’Flow Speaks Out Against Chinese Discrimination Towards Local Patrons in Lusaka
Popular Zambian hip hop artist B'Flow said he actively tries to stay away from commenting on political issues but felt the need to say something in the wake of Lusaka Mayor Miles Sampa's humiliating public apology last month for cracking down on Chinese businesses who ...
Kenya or Djibouti: Who Will China Support For a Seat on the UN Security Council?
With only a few days left before next week's election to fill the rotating open seat on the U.N. Security Council for the 2020-2021 term, a lot of the attention is now focused on China and whether it will throw its support behind Djibouti or Kenya.
South Sudan Closes a Chinese-Built Highway Due to Poor Quality
South Sudan's Vice President of Infrastructure announced this week that construction of the 392km Juba-Rumbek highway to Uganda will be suspended due to quality concerns. Portions of the road were swept away during a heavy storm ...
Bloomberg’s Alonso Soto: “The Ticking Debt Bomb in Africa Threatens a Global Explosion”
Bloomberg's Nigeria correspondent Alonso Soto is covering the burgeoning debt crisis in Africa more closely than any other international journalist, filing 2-3 stories a week on the topic. Until now, his reporting on the issue has been quite measured, with straightforward stories on the progress of various ...
Kenya’s Parliament Warned That Unpaid Debts to China Threaten Standard Gauge Railway Service
Kenya Railways is falling behind in its debt service payments for one of the country's new Chinese-built and financed Standard Gauge Railway lines, according to a new budget report submitted to the Kenyan parliament on Wednesday. In its fiscal year 2020-2021 ...
China’s Ties With Nigeria Are a Lot Better Than They Seem
Lagos State University political science lecturer Abdul-Gafar Tobi Oshodi joins Eric & Cobus this week to discuss the current state of China-Nigeria relations. After a turbulent past few months following the events in Guangzhou back in April and now calls ...
Who’s Who in China’s COVID-19 Diplomacy?
The global COVID-19 pandemic has sparked a flurry of Chinese efforts to supply medical assistance around the world, including in Africa. In late March 2020, airports in Shanghai, Beijing, and other major Chinese cities turned from international business and tourism hubs to centers for the dispatch of ...
China’s Misguided Twitter Strategy in Africa
There's been a lot of discussions recently over the rise and effectiveness of China's new class of "Wolf Warrior" diplomats, named after the hugely successful 2018 China-Africa action movie, who've made a name for themselves by targeting the U.S. and other critics with aggressive ...
Many of Washington’s Top Africa Experts Participate in All-Day Hearing on the State of U.S.-China-Africa Relations
Nine of the top Africa experts in Washington testified in an all-day hearing on Friday organized by the congressionally-mandated U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC). The hearing, entitled "China’s Strategic Aims in Africa," coincided with this ...
China’s Subtly Revising the Narrative of the Origin of Its “Miscommunication” With Nigerians and Other Africans in Guangzhou
Confronted with overwhelming criticism in Africa following widespread reports of maltreatment of and discrimination against African residents in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou last month, the Chinese government has been trying (largely unsuccessfully) to reshape the narrative according to their interpretation of the events.
How the U.S. is Catching Up With China in the PR Battle Over COVID-19 Relief in Africa
Although U.S. stakeholders have given a lot more money to COVID-19 relief in Africa than those from China, the Chinese have done much better on the PR side. But Judd Devermont, Director of the Africa Program at the ...
165 Kenyan Evacuees Return Home From China
165 Kenyans stranded in China arrived in the early hours Sunday morning at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport. Kenyan ambassador to China, Sarah Serem, helped to coordinate the charter flight from Guangzhou back to Nairobi and was at the airport in southern ...
Moody’s Warns That Kenya’s High Borrowing Costs Could Prompt a Downgrade
The global credit rating agency Moody's is becoming increasingly concerned that Kenya will not be able to keep up with the payments on its comparatively expensive loan portfolio. Moody's adjusted Kenya's rating from B2 stable to B2 ...
The Economic Implications of COVID-19 in Cameroon and Key Lessons for Policymakers
COVID-19 has infected more than 100,000 people in at least 77 countries, disrupting global manufacturing supply chains and causing a slowdown in key service sectors such as tourism, transport, and recreation. While the virus will cause exports from Cameroon to China and Italy to fall, policymakers must ...
Racially Charged Conspiracy Theories About Why COVID-19 is Rarer in Africa Circulate Widely on African Twitter
While COVID-19 is now rapidly spreading in Europe and the United States, Africa, as far as we know, has so far largely been spared. This has prompted a heated discussion online about why the continent has seen so few infections. While ...
As the COVID-19 Crisis Recedes at Home, China Promises New Support for African Countries
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang addressed Africa's struggle against COVID-19 at yesterday's regular press briefing in Beijing. Geng acknowledged that a number of African countries had provided China with money and supplies in recent weeks and promised that Beijing would provide additional support in return.
South Africans to be Evacuated From Wuhan Will be Home by Friday Says Government
After weeks of delays and uncertainty, details of the operation to evacuate 122 South African nationals from Wuhan, China, the epicenter of the COVID-19 epidemic, were suddenly revealed on Tuesday. President Cyril Ramaphosa paid a visit to the military crew who ...
Tweet of the Day: African Expatriates in China Join the Frontlines to Help Contain Coronavirus Outbreak
University of Oslo China-Africa scholar Heidi Østbø Haugen shared a compelling image on Twitter yesterday of an increasingly common theme that we've been seeing recently in Chinese state-run ...
Everything’s Still OK For Now Warns South African Economist… Coronavirus-Induced Economic Pain is Coming
The more that the free movement of people and goods between South Africa and China shuts down due to the coronavirus outbreak, the great the threat to the South African economy, warned Nedbank economist Walter de Wet on Monday. A lot ...
New Study: African Countries Among Most at Risk to Economic Consequences of Coronavirus Outbreak
A new study published today by the London-based think tank Overseas Development Institute explores the economic impact of the burgeoning coronavirus outbreak in China on those countries around the world with the highest levels of exposure to the Chinese economy. Not surprisingly, many of ...
Economic Shockwaves from the Coronavirus Crisis in China Are Now “Battering” Africa: Investment Firm
Even though Africa has so far been spared an outbreak of Novel Coronavirus, economies across the continent are beginning to grapple with the costly implications for what this viral contagion is doing to their largest trading partner and overall demand for the raw materials that most African ...
How Can the International Community Help Africa to Combat Novel Coronavirus?
Africa is at risk of an outbreak of coronavirus, even if, so far, there are no confirmed cases of the virus. Several days ago, the World Health Organization declared that a coronavirus outbreak as a “Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC)”. Tedros Adhanom, Director-General of ...
Ethiopian Airlines CEO: Stopping Direct Flights to China is Not an Option
It looks increasingly unlikely that Africa's largest airline, Ethiopian Airlines, will join most other African airlines and temporarily halt direct flights to China due to the coronavirus outbreak. While six of eight African carriers have stopped flying to China out of fear of transporting passengers infected with the ...
China and Rwanda Sign Loan Deal for New Hydroelectric Power Plant
The China Exim Bank will provide a $214 million concessional loan to Rwanda to build the 43.5mw Nyabarongo II power plant in the southern Muhanga District, according to a report in industry news site Energy Voice. The deal also includes a substation and a 110 Kv ...
A Taliban security personnel operating an anti-aircraft gun keeps watch for Pakistani airstrikes near the Torkham border crossing between Afghanistan and Pakistan in the Nangarhar province on February 27, 2026 following overnight cross-border fighting between the two countries. Photo by AIMAL ZAHIR / AFP
Pakistan’s Defense Minister Khawaja Asif declared "open war" against Afghanistan on Friday amid a surge of fighting between the two South Asian neighbors. Pakistan said it's retaliating against Afghanistan for a series of attacks, including a suicide bombing in early February that killed at least 36 people ...
Rethinking China’s Participation in African Agricultural Development in the Post-COVID-19 Era
This article was co-authored by Duncan Chando, a Nairobi-based international development consultant Africa was already facing food insecurity and agricultural underdevelopment prior to COVID-19. In 2018 studies showed that Sub-Saharan Africa was the world’s most food-insecure region, hosting 239 million ...
China-Africa Trade Update with Walter Ruigu
Two-way China-Africa trade fell sharply in the first half of the year to $82 billion, down 20% from the same time last year. Trade between the two regions has been severely disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic and the ...