US-China contest ‘hands opportunities to Africa’

Africa should take advantage of the geopolitical tension between China and the US for the benefit of its own development.

This is the view of Mapungubwe Institute for Strategic Reflection executive director Joel Netshitenzhe.

He said Africa should take advantage of China’s Belt and Road Initiative and, at the same time, harness the new Partnership for Global Infrastructure Investment of the US and allies.

Africa should take advantage of the tension

At a conference focusing on the multipolar world and challenges and opportunities for Africa, he cited the competition between China and the US for global economic dominance.

Beijing’s rapid rise as an economic power is seen by the US as threat to its economic hegemony.

World Bank and the International Monetary Fund reports say China, which is in second spot, is on the brink of replacing the US as the number one economy in the world within a decade.

Africa’s approach, said Netshitenzhehe, should be understanding that this competition presents opportunities and threats.

Africa has a “demographic dividend” of a youthful population, arable land lying fallow, critical minerals that are in high demand and its geographic location in its favour.

Africa ‘demographic dividend’

There were opportunities for Africa in manufacturing and participation in global value chains. “Domestic people-centric development should define Africa’s posture.”

Global attitudes – that the continent is a hapless object of great power stratagems and a passive theatre of great power competition – should be challenged, he added.

Advantage should be derived from US-led projects to construct the Lobito Corridor linking the copper-belt of Zambia and the Democratic Republic of Congo with Angola.

Similarly, Africa could benefit from the recent tripartite agreement between China, Zambia and Tanzania to revitalise the Tazara railway line in the east.

“African countries should intensify their campaigns at the UN and other platforms,” he said.

Countries should intensify campaigns

Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung South Africa’s resident director Sebastian Sperling told the gathering no major power was able to contain the escalation of wars and the UN seemed equally helpless.

“It is helpless in part because its institutions are built on an outdated reading of the world,” he said. “We see not only terrorism, militarisation and imperialism and a return of the rule of the strongest; we also see the rise of authoritarianism and ethno-nationalism globally.

“The rise of a patriarchal backlash to feminism, of racism, xenophobia, identity-based exclusion and economic nationalism and a new wave of protectionism.

“Democracy is on the back foot almost everywhere and so is the idea of a liberal world order.”