Category: Francophone

Unpacking Wang Yi’s Africa Tour

China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi is in Africa this week. It has become a Chinese tradition that FMs make their first overseas trip to Africa. It triggers a second (less red-carpeted) tradition: people like me puzzling over why certain countries were chosen over others. ...

Q&A: Why is Benin on Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang’s African Tour Itinerary?

The newly appointed head of Chinese diplomacy, Qin Gang, has begun his first African tour which will take him to five countries. A visit that is part of the long tradition of Chinese diplomacy to reserve the first overseas tour to the African continent. ...

How This One Tweet Conveys Three Important China-Africa Trends

A Tweet on Wednesday by China's top diplomat for sub-Saharan Africa, Wu Peng, about yet another ground-breaking ceremony for a new school in Africa, this time in Ivory Coast, may seem mundane but it actually communicates three important trends in Africa-China relations:

Former Ambassador’s Column in Le Monde Highlights the Negative View of “Chinafrique” Among Political & Media Elites in France

Generally speaking, the widely-held narrative among media and political elites in France about the Chinese in Africa is very similar to that in the United States where the Chinese presence on the continent is viewed in decidedly negative terms.

The French Media’s View of FOCAC Was Decidedly Negative

Generally, the French view of last week's Forum on China-Africa Cooperation conference that took place in Senegal was not very positive. With headlines that spoke of Africa's "disillusionment" with China or overtly racist cartoons depicting China's vaccine donations on the continent, pessimism ...

Analysis from Cobus van Staden

How to Lure Chinese Financing Back to the Global South: Report

Global South countries face increasing financing pressure, endangering their ability to keep developing while also implementing measures to deal with a growing climate crisis. The disruption of global trade is coupled with a larger megatrend: flows of international capital to the developing world have turned negative. This means that countries are now routinely paying more to service loans than they receive in disbursements.

The vast majority of Global South borrowers ...

France Watches FOCAC 8 With Skepticism

Coverage of this week's FOCAC 8 in the French media is considerably higher than in previous years, most likely because it's taking place in Senegal -- a francophone country that Paris has long viewed as in its traditional sphere of influence. ...

Youth Activists at France-Africa Summit: “We Expect to Be Part of the Process”

The young African civil society activists who attended last week's France-Africa summit in Montpellier gave voice to the surging frustration over their countries' ties with France, and by extension other foreign powers. Among the key themes that emerged was the demand ...

Hunan Provincial Authorities Provide Film & Media Training to 65 Journalists From Across Francophone Africa

Media companies and government officials from China's central Hunan province are in the midst of a two-week training program for French-speaking journalists from across Africa, including 20 from the Democratic Republic of the Congo and others from Senegal, Cameroon, and Gabon among other countries. ...