Today is a public holiday in South Africa – Human Rights Day. There’s a certain irony in spending the day focusing on China’s President Xi Jinping’s visit to Vladimir Putin, knee-deep in a human rights disaster.
What one makes of the Ukraine crisis increasingly maps on where one lives. This is made clear by a remarkable new set of polling data recently published by the European Council on Foreign Relations ...
Category: Corruption
A Chinese Giant’s Complicity in South Africa’s Corruption Disaster
Anyone who knows a South African will be amply aware that the country is currently undergoing economically ruinous rolling blackouts labeled ‘loadshedding.’ Even if you don’t know them, South Africans are liable to follow you down the street, foam-flecked and shouting about Eskom, the corruption-addled ...
South African Rail Company Puts Out Tender to Fix Faulty Chinese-Made Trains
South Africa’s state railway company Transnet has put out a tender for any company that can fix non-operational Chinese-made locomotives acquired under a corrupt deal. The original manufacturer of the locomotives, China Railway Rolling Stock Corp (CRRC), refused to supply the needed ...
Why the U.S. Shouldn’t Be Surprised About China’s Close Ties With DRC Mining Companies
U.S. officials in Washington and Kinshasa are apparently disappointed, according to a new investigation by the Paris-based Africa Intelligence, that they’ve failed to dislodge China from its dominance of the Congolese mining industry, particularly in strategically important metals like cobalt.
Corruption Documentary Rocks China-Guyana Relations
Guyana’s ruling party faces controversy following a documentary by the U.S. media outlet VICE alleging that Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo took bribes from a Chinese businessman. President Irfaan Ali rejected calls by opposition parties in the South American country calling for Jagdeo’s ...
Nigerian Garment Union Calls Out Local Officials in Fight Against Cheap Chinese Imports
Nigeria’s national union of textile workers is complaining about the complicity of customs officials in the flooding of the local market by Chinese textiles. While cheap imports from China have long been blamed for undercutting the local garment sector, the National Union of Textile, Garment, and Tailoring ...
Analysis from Cobus van Staden
Xi Bets on Global South in Moscow
Rampant Illegal Chinese Mining and Logging in Eastern DRC Drives Poverty and Empowers Ruling Elites, Says New Report
Illegal Chinese mining and timber companies are running rampant in the DRC's eastern province of South Kivu, fueling corruption that empowers ruling elites and impoverished local communities, according to a scathing new report by two researchers at the French Institute of International Relations (IFRI) in ...
Ethiopian Embassy in Beijing Responds to Video of Addis Ababa Airport Officials Trying to Extort Money From a Chinese Tourist
It is quite likely that at least one, and possibly two, customs officials at the Bole International airport in Addis Ababa are unemployed today, after a Chinese traveler recorded them trying to extract a fictitious "camera tax." The Chinese traveler was ...
Investigating Chinese Corruption in the DRC Linked to the “Deal of the Century”
China's role in the landmark Congo-Hold Up corruption scandal was relatively small compared to those of other actors that were found to have funneled millions of dollars to former Congolese president Joseph Kabila and his associates. Nonetheless, investigators found that Chinese ...
Chinese Involvement in the “Congo Hold-Up” Corruption Scandal
19 media outlets together with five NGOs in the U.S. and Europe pored through 3.5 million leaked documents from a Gabonese bank to produce Congo Hold-Up, a landmark report that detailed breathtaking corruption in the DR Congo during ...
A DRC-Government Affiliate Forcefully Refutes Congo Hold-Up Allegations, Calling the Report a “Western Conspiracy”
An agency affiliated with the DR Congo government issued its most forceful denunciation to date of the Congo Hold-Up investigative report that detailed massive corruption related to the $6 billion 2008 Sicomines deal. John Omombo (photo), spokesman for the ...