Without any aid or World Bank poverty reduction strategy papers, one country is bringing more people out of poverty than the rest of the world put together: China. Is a mix of authoritarian government, rampant capitalism and vast inequality really the best way to propel pre-industrial societies out of poverty in the 21st century? The aid industry must be worried. Have the decades spent struggling to pin down a development model based on democracy and liberal economic reform been a waste of time?
China will also have more effect on Africa than any other external power in the next ten years—for good and ill. Its engagement in Africa in the independence period was a flop. Its most notable protégés then were Jonas Savimbi, the murderous Angolan, Julius Nyerere, Tanzania's saintly president who left his country ruined, and Robert Mugabe.
Cheap Chinese goods are swamping Africa, destroying the last vestiges of Africa's manufacturing industry. Even mighty South Africa is worried. Africa's textile industries are being wiped out at a rate that makes Europe's recent bra war with China look like a minor skirmish. Africa has already lost 80,000 textile jobs in the last decade, and the numbers are rising. Between 1990 and 1995 China's trade with Africa quadrupled from just under $1bn to nearly $4bn and then almost trebled in the next five years to nearly $11bn. By 2003 it had reached $18bn. And African countries, whose economic decisions are taken by the IMF, the World Bank and the western donors, are not allowed to impose quotas as Europe did.
At present, all that Africa has to offer the world is mineral resources—and China wants them desperately. Some competition for the big western companies may be no bad thing. But there is more at stake than cheap minerals. If the western model for Africa's development is to work, it means strict conditionality on African governments in exchange for investment, whether in the form of aid, budget support or capital. The big corporates, which have been accused of raping the continent in the past, have at last been persuaded that doing well in Africa means doing good. Business is now signing up to anti-corruption codes of conduct and so on. The big western mining companies have agreed to the extractive industries transparency initiative—internationally agreed guidelines of best practice and accountability for mining companies and governments in poor but resource-rich countries.
But just as western capitalism is deciding to behave better and joining governments and NGOs in playing its part in the great development plan, along come the Chinese to reintroduce some geopolitical competition into the development game. The appallingly corrupt Angolan government was about to be necklaced by a garland of virtues like accountability and transparency by the west—but then along came the Chinese with a $2bn loan, without strings. With one bound the thieves are free. In Sudan, China's oil interest— and a strict "non-interference" policy on issues like human rights and governance—led it to block UN sanctions for the Darfur massacres. Though Beijing seems to have resisted Mugabe's "spare us some change," the Chinese could give bad government in Africa a new lease of life.
A parting gift to Kenya?
In late July, Britain withdrew the visa of Chris Murungaru, Kenya's transport minister. It seems to have been Edward Clay's parting shot—or leaving gift—to Kenya, as he retired as British high commissioner in August. Earlier this year, Clay spectacularly accused Kenyan ministers of being so corrupt they were "vomiting on the shoes" of foreign donors. But President Kibaki's feelings about Britain's move are unclear. He hasn't sacked Murungaru, as some MPs suggested he should, but neither did he take him on his recent trade trip to China, even though the agenda included road improvements and air links—surely matters for a transport minister. Murungaru, however, is not taking the visa ban lying down. His attack on Britain's "neocolonial attitude" has earned him the nickname "Murunmugabe" in Kenya's very pro-Clay free press. But the minister is seeking the assistance of Matrix, the law firm of the prime minister's wife, to seek a judicial review of the ban.
African journalism
There's been so much upbeat coverage of Africa this year that I have begun to wonder if the great continent is finally finding the plot. In particular, people have been talking about Nigeria as if it were transformed. But a glance through the Nigerian headlines on the web reassures me that some things don't change. "Chinese brands invade Nigeria"; "How Nigerian movie stars live off screen"; "The late Sam Okoye—corpse arrives from Iraq Tuesday"; "Sex for marks syndrome on campus"; "How we sell arms to robbers—the police"; "Kalu [the vice-president] tells Obasanjo [president]—you're corrupt"; "Japanese ambassador accuses Nigerian officials of frustrating development"; "Italian vomits to death after Lagos hotel meal"; "Suspected ritualist lynched over possession of human body parts"; "40,000 passports and 10,000 blank British Airways tickets seized in Oluwole raid"; "250,000 Nigerians apply for British visa monthly."
I love the blunt way Nigerian journalists cover raw life in their great country, all recounted in an elaborate literary style that Jacobean dramatists would have revered. Some people blame western journalists for giving Africa a bad image. They obviously haven't read African journalists.
