Author: Eric Olander
Eric Olander is the co-founder of the China Global South Project, an independent, non-partisan media initiative dedicated to exploring every facet of China’s engagement in Africa. Eric is a fluent Mandarin-speaker and a longtime China-watcher with more than 25 years of journalism experience at many of the world’s leading media companies, including CNN, the BBC, and FRANCE24, among others. He received his undergraduate degree in East African History from the University of California at Berkeley and holds a master’s degree in Chinese Public Affairs from the University of Hong Kong.
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Burundi's official press agency published a flurry of tweets today in both English and French that provide new details on a statement that the government released one week ago in support of China's controversial new election law in Hong Kong.
Chinese Medical Team, Vaccines Land in the Comoros Islands
A 12-member medical team from China's Guangxi Autonomous Region landed in Moroni on Wednesday, capital of the Comoros Islands in the Indian Ocean. The team is there to help with COVID-19 mitigation and also brought with them a supply of vaccines. (XINHUA) ...
Data Reveals Africa’s Inefficient Distribution of Road Building Projects Financed by China and the World Bank
The Brookings Institution today showcased some of the findings from an earlier working paper by Harvard doctoral student Tilman Graff who studied the spatial inefficiencies of Africa’s transportation industry and its impact on trade. According to Graff, road building projects financed ...
Ugandans Unhappy That Chinese-Built Road is Falling Apart Soon After It Was Built, But the Contractor May Not Be To Blame
Residents in northern Uganda are expressing disappointment that a $25 million, 106-kilometer Chinese-built road is pockmarked with dangerous potholes just six years after it opened. The Gulu-Atiak-Nimule highway is a key transport link to the border with South Sudan and is ...
Chinese Jabs Land in Namibia as Beijing’s Global Vaccine Distribution Drive Shows No Signs of Slowing
Namibia kicked off its national vaccine campaign on Tuesday following the arrival of 100,000 doses of Chinese COVID-19 jabs. The shipment came aboard an Air Zimbabwe flight that dropped off 344,000 doses in Harare before heading to Windhoek. Namibian Health Minister Kalumbi ...
Why Chile’s Growing Trade Dependence on China Provides a Cautionary Tale to Other Small Countries in the Global South
Chile, in recent years, has been very successful in attracting large amounts of Chinese investment in the country's copper and lithium mining sectors, agriculture, and more. So, successful in fact that it's sparked growing concern among lawmakers about the risks of Chinese ownership of key strategic sectors ...
How Smaller Countries Can Negotiate More Effectively With China
China's enormous size affords it tremendous advantages in its relations with smaller countries, particularly developing states in the global south. Beijing regularly leverages its huge economy, growing military power, and diplomatic muscle in international organizations to both cajole and even coerce ...
Kenya’s Treasury Chief Refutes Media Reports that the Port of Mombasa is at Risk of Forfeiture to China
Kenya's Treasury Cabinet Secretary Ukur Yattani denied, again, on Monday that the Port of Mombasa could be handed over to China in the event that Kenya Railways is unable to repay its SGR debt. Yattani responded to a front-page story in The Star ...
The Star Editorial Board: SGR Needs to Go Regional to Repay Its Chinese Creditors
Kenya needs to invest even more money into the embattled SGR if the railway has any chance of becoming financially self-sufficient to the point where it can repay its Chinese creditors, according to an editorial in today's The Star newspaper. For ...
MP: Rampant Corruption, Poor Planning and “Pooh Pooh” Leadership to Blame for SGR’s Woes (Not China)
Kenyan Member of Parliament for Kitutu Chache, Richard Onyonka, gave a very entertaining assessment of why the Standard Gauge Railway is facing so many difficulties which all, more or else in his view, relate to poor leadership and governance.
With Chinese Engineers Back on Site, Zimbabwe’s New International Airport is Almost Half Done
Construction of the new international terminal at Harare's main airport is now 46% complete according to Zimbabwean officials who credit the return of Chinese engineers for the recent progress. Chinese staff on the project had been unable to get back into ...
While Everyone Focuses on Vaccine Distribution, China Appears to Be Ramping Up Donations of Medical Supplies Again
Chinese donations of PPE and other COVID-19-related medical supplies to African governments appear to be picking up again. In recent months China shifted its focus away from shipping masks, ventilators, and other materials to focus instead on the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines.