IT was in the anti-colonial environment of a cold war and bipolarity in world affairs that the process of decolonisation gathered momentum. America traditionally had been opposed to colonialism, with the exception of the aberrant behaviour of the conquest of Spanish territories in Cuba and the Philippines in the 1890’s. America’s anti-colonialism has been demonstrated since their intervention on the world stage from the time of James Monroe in the 1820’s through the time of Woodrow Wilson to the time of F.D. Roosevelt. Their opposition to Franco- British intervention in the Suez Canal in 1956, during the presidency of the 34th president of United States, Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) was in tune with their opposition to propping up the old Empires of Britain and France. Throughout the Second World War American policy makers had left the British in no doubt that they would strenuously work for the dismantling of the old Empires. The existence of colonial empires, the Americans reasoned, contributed to the outbreak of wars. America also wanted to occupy the high moral ground in their titanic struggle with the Soviet Union. Both the United States and, ironically their foe, the Soviet Union were committed to a policy of decolonisation for different reasons. America was driven by anti-colonial idealism fundamental to the origin and evolution of the United States itself but for Soviet Russia, right from its foundation by Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (1870-1924) antiimperialism was an article of faith because Lenin believed that all wars were imperialistic wars fought for carving out the world into markets as a result of not knowing what to do with surplus production and primitive accumulation of capital in the highly industrialized countries. Whatever may be the reasons for support of the liquidation of the European Empires in Asia and Africa, the nationalist leaders of these areas exploited the situation to their countries’ advantage in the traditional European fashion of power politics and national interest. By 1947, beginning in India and ending in the 1970s the Europeans lost their colonial empires in Africa and Asia and by 1990 the remnant of colonial empires in Africa notably Namibia was freed. The biggest prize, South Africa, has been freed from institutionalized policy of racial discrimination and apartheid. She has since joined the civilized world under a non-racial majoritarian democratic regime. This happy ending could never have been achieved but for the determined effort and struggle of independent African countries joined by other progressive forces in the world notably in the Socialist countries and the Scandinavia. The United States policy oscillated between support for justice, benign neglect and what in the Reagan years was called constructive engagement which was a euphemism for support of racist oppression in South Africa. One can look at events during this period from reactive and active perspectives. The African saying that when two elephants fight it is the grass that suffers guided the actions of many Afro- Asian and Latin American countries at this time. The point was that no developing country wanted to be caught in the middle of the struggle for hegemony between the Capitalist West and the Communist East. This was why many countries in this group embraced the policy of non-alignment. This was a policy based on self-interest. It was, of course, not a policy of neutrality in the traditional sense of steering clear at all times of political engagement. Non-alignment meant that decision of which side to take would be based ideally on sovereign assessment and high moral principles and not on political expediency or ideological preference. This was the theory. But in practice many of the non-aligned countries took pro-soviet positions in international politics. There were reasons for this. The stridently anti-colonial propaganda of the socialist countries was very alluring and attractive. In practical terms, the socialist countries demonstrated their support by supplying weapons and instructors for the various liberation movements particularly in southern Africa. The socialist countries were also more prepared to offer financial and technical aid to independent African countries. The apparently great industrial strides made by the socialist countries, particularly the Soviet Union through the five-year development plans easily recommended itself to the African countries. Capitalist mode of development with emphasis on individual capital was regarded as inappropriate since indigenous individual capitalists were few and far between and the foreign capitalists were only interested in extractive industries rather than investing in consumer oriented labour intensive industries. Because the problem of youth unemployment was one of the greatest problems that the newly independent countries had to face, they found the ‘full employment’, characteristic of the commandist and centrally planned economies attractive. The example of India’s embrace of centralized planning based on five year programmes was copied by most African countries during their first decades of independence. Furthermore, the will to be different from the brutal collectivisation of agriculture in the Soviet Union and the free-for-all land alienation by a few in western countries underpinned the economic basis of non-alignment. Non-alignment was a policy based on high moral ground. Its founders Jawaharlal Nehru (1889-1964) of India, Ahmed Sukarno (1901-1970) of Indonesia, Marshall Josip bros Tito (1892-1980) of Yugoslavia, General Abdel Nasser (1918-1970) of Egypt, Kwame Nkrumah (1909-1972) of Ghana, cleverly assessed the international situation and decided that it would be unwise of them to allow their countries to get sucked into the life and death struggle for mastery of the world. Non-alignment gave these leaders the feeling of some relevance. Their friendship and support were courted and sought by the leaders of the West and the East. In reality, all the great events of the 20th century have been resolved without the input of the non-aligned nations. We can recall, for example, the Berlin blockade of 1948, the Hungarian rebellion of 1956, the Berlin air lift of 1961 and, most importantly, the Cuban crisis of 1962. For the first time, since the advent of nuclear weapons, the United States and Soviet Russia faced each other over the America’s blockade of Cuba over Soviet Russia’s missiles in Cuba. The world stood at standstill until Soviet Russia’s premier Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (1894- 1971) blinked, when he realised his policy of adventurism and brinkmanship, left the young president John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1917-1963) no alternative than to risk nuclear war. Other events in which the non-aligned nations were marginal include the spring revolution of Czchekoslovakia of 1968, the resolution of the Vietnam war, the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe, the coming down of the Berlin wall, the collapse of communism in Russia itself, the disintegration of Yugoslavia, and the collapse of the apartheid regime in South Africa. In terms of Realpolitik the non-aligned movement has been rather tangential in the politics of the modern world.
Tag: Relations
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Nigeria’s growing economic relations with China
President Jonathan has just concluded a five-day official visit to China. The highlight of his visit was the signing of a Chinese loan of $1.5 billion for the development of infrastructure in Nigeria, including the expansion of four airports at Lagos, Kano, Abuja, and Port Harcourt. The official visit was reportedly marked by a lot of conviviality and cordiality on both sides with the large Nigerian official delegation been treated to the fabled Chinese hospitality and excellent cuisine.
Sino-Nigerian relations have developed rather slowly over the years. It is now gathering some momentum. It was General Gowon who, as military head of state, first paid an official visit to China in 1972 shortly after the Nigerian civil war. When his brutal military regime faced international criticism and isolation General Abacha also decided to go to China for support. This was in the wake of the crackdown in Tiananmen Square in Beijing that led to China’s international isolation as well. In 1997, the Chinese premier, Li Peng, visited Nigeria too to boost China’s renewed interest in Africa, aimed at reversing the decline in China’s trade with Africa. Nigeria’s trade with China actually fell from $57 million in 1980 to only $7 million in 1985, recovering somewhat to $35 million in 1989. Thereafter, Nigeria-China trade grew from $35 million to $97 million in 1993, and reached $327 million by 1997. It is currently estimated at $13 billion.
President Jonathan’s visit to China is significant as it underlines Nigeria’s growing economic relations with China. From the Nigerian perspective, closer economic ties with China have become imperative. The new Chinese loan of $1.5billion brings to a total of nearly $15 billion China’s investments and loans to Nigeria in recent years, including the $2.5billion investment in the newly refurbished Lagos-Kano rail line. Nigeria’s share of Chinese investment in Africa has increased to over 30 per cent. In 2012, total Chinese investment in Nigeria was $13.3 billion. In contrast total US FDI in Nigeria was $8 billion. To counter the growing economic relations between China and Africa, President Obama announced during his recent hurried visit to Africa an offer of $7 billion infrastructure loan to Africa. Some cynics will consider this offer as too late and too little. Financial commitments by the World Bank and the IMF are far less than Chinese loans to Nigeria. African countries are turning increasingly to China as an alternative source for infrastructure loans badly needed.
Both countries now realise the importance of economic cooperation between them. China, the most populous country in the world, with the fastest global economic growth in the last three decades, averaging 10 percent annually, has emerged a leading player in the global economy. Its national economy is now bigger than that of Japan, or the EU countries combined. Within a few decades, China has lifted some 300 million of its people from abject poverty, a feat without any precedent in the annals of economic development. Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa, with vast reserves of oil and gas, needs China’s financial and technical assistance in the development of its decaying infrastructure. China too needs Nigeria’s oil and gas to fuel its growing industry. In addition, Nigeria is, potentially, the largest market for China’s industrial products in Africa. Nigeria’s imports from China account for over a third of its total trade with West Africa.
As President Jonathan was reported as saying in Beijing, the increasing exploitation of shale gas and other energy alternatives by the US and other Western states has made the need for the diversification of the Nigerian economy away from oil more urgent. Increasing Chinese oil imports will make up for the slack in oil exports to the US. In 2005, China accounted for 40 per cent of the global demand for oil. Over 30 per cent of China’s oil supply is imported, with the country becoming the world’s second largest consumer of oil after the US. So, closer economic co-operation is in the mutual interest of both countries. But there is a pitfall here which Nigeria has to watch very closely. There is a chronic and growing trade imbalance between the two countries in favour of China. Nigeria should seek to reduce this vast trade imbalance by increasing its non-oil exports to China. China’s exports to Nigeria are currently estimated at $3 billion, while Nigeria’s exports are estimated at only $1 billion, a trade gap of $2 billion. This trade deficit, a concern to Nigerian leaders and its private sector, is being discussed by the Nigeria-China Joint Planning Commission. Nigeria should be wary of being used by China as a dumping ground for cheap Chinese exports, particularly textiles, as this will increase the existing trade imbalance between the two countries in favour of China and lead to more job losses for Nigeria. For instance, in 2006, South Africa imposed two-year import restrictions on some Chinese textiles. In this regard, the Nigerian authorities are beginning to take some limited action against cheap and fake Chinese exports. In 2006, NAFDAC banned pharmaceutical imports from some Chinese and Indian companies.
China has the largest foreign exchange reserves in the world some of which is being invested in Africa where growth prospects are becoming increasingly attractive. Nigeria is eager to diversify its trade relations by reducing its trade dependence on the Western industrial countries. China, with its horde of foreign reserves, is one of the few countries in the world today that can assist Nigeria with its huge financing gap, particularly for infrastructure development, in such critical sectors as roads, the railways, bridges, airports, and public transportation in which Nigeria is hugely deficient. Nigeria will not achieve its huge economic potential unless it modernises its infrastructure. China can offer Nigeria such assistance with loans and investments in the critical sectors of the Nigerian economy. In April 2006, President Obasanjo observed, while addressing the visiting Chinese President, Hu Jintao, in Lagos, that “This 21st century is the century for China to lead the world. And when you are leading the world, we (meaning Nigeria) want to be close behind you.” It was the most effusive compliment to China by a Nigerian leader and demonstrated Nigeria’s eagerness to expand its economic relations with China.
Until recently, relations between the two countries were tepid and took some time to develop. At its independence in 1960, Nigerian leaders knew very little about Communist China, a remote country, with its turbulent political history and frequent upheavals. Western influence in Nigeria was very strong and the Western media gave Communist China a bad press all over Africa, decrying its lack of respect for human rights and its authoritarian -style of government. Culturally, the Communist style of government had little or no appeal for African leaders. In fact, like many other states in Africa, Nigeria refused to even recognise the existence of China and did not enter into diplomatic relations with her until after the Nigerian civil war in 1970. At the UN Nigeria voted routinely along with the Western powers to deny China admission to the UN. Instead, Taiwan, which the Chinese regard as a ‘renegade’ province of China, was given China’s seat at the UN. China was badly isolated globally. During the years of the Cultural Revolution China turned its back on the rest of the world, including Africa. Before then, during the cold war era, it had tried unsuccessfully to get a foothold in Africa but it encountered strong opposition from the West as well as the Soviet Union with which it had fallen out. Its interests then in Africa were basically strategic and consisted mainly of challenging both Soviet and Western dominance in Africa during the cold war.
To counter Western influence China encouraged wars of liberation in Africa and was supporting armed anti-colonial struggles in some 24 African countries, including South Africa. China’s main aim was to reduce Africa’s economic dependence on the West by offering long-term low interest loans to Africa and promoting the so-called ‘benevolent trade’ such as by buying up large coffee and tobacco surpluses from Tanzania. By 1976, China was already giving Africa more aid than the Soviet Union. It achieved a major breakthrough in Africa by financing and constructing the Tanzam railway that gave it access and some limited political influence in central Africa. Beijing’s involvement in the African liberation wars paid off when many African governments, including Nigeria, provided critical support on the UN General Assembly resolution admitting China as a member in October, 1971, and replacing Taiwan. Relations between Nigeria and China also began to improve dramatically. China had supported the secessionists during the Nigerian civil war and is believed to have sent Biafra some limited arms through Tanzania. The secessionist leader, Ojukwu, actually wrote Chairman Mao, seeking Chinese assistance ‘in our struggle against Anglo-American imperialism and Soviet revisionism to achieve a socialist revolution in Biafra’ and Africa. But China secured Nigeria’s recognition in October 1971, after which the two states began building modest bilateral ties based on terms of co-operation agreed between them in 1972 during Gowon’s official visit to Beijing.
Predictably, the growing economic relations between China and Africa have caused some concerns in the Western countries, particularly in the US. In 2005, during a Congressional hearing in Washington, the chairman of the Africa sub-committee warned that ‘China is playing an increasingly influential role in Africa, and that the Chinese intend to aid and abet African dictators, gain a stranglehold on precious African natural resources, and undo much of the progress that has been made on democracy and governance in the last 15 years’. There were complaints from the US as well when a satellite launch deal was signed in 2005 by Nigeria and the China Great Wall Industry Corporation. But Africa needs to develop rapidly and, if necessary, will engage other powers to achieve its economic and technological goals. Africa cannot remain the economic preserve of the Western powers alone. It must diversify its economic relations in line with the process of economic globalisation. It is not China that is responsible for dictatorships in Africa, but the Western powers that, for long, supported African dictators, and refused to support liberation wars in Africa. There is no real danger of the Chinese exporting Communism to Africa. The Soviets did not succeed in doing so. If they tried, it is less likely that the Chinese would succeed where the Soviets failed.
The Chinese have no interest in exporting their Communist ideology to Africa. Like Africa, China was, for centuries, the victim of invasion and colonialism by the Western countries. It has no colonial past or imperialist ambitions in Africa that can stand in the way of increasing economic co-operation between the two. China has no military bases in Africa or anywhere else outside its own territory. It is unlikely to use force to advance its economic interests in Africa What China wants, like any other foreign power, is access to Africa’s huge natural resources, particularly its oil, and new markets for its industrial products. Africa is more mature now and should ignore unjustified foreign concerns about its new economic relations with China. In its economic engagement with China, it should, collectively, be able to protect its own economic interests.
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D-8 agreements will boost relations among members – Jonathan
The agreements and decisions taken at the recent D-8 summit in Pakistan would strengthen existing relations among member states, President Goodluck Jonathan has said.
He made this remark on Tuesday while speaking to the new Pakistani High Commissioner to Nigeria, Lt. General Mohamad Ashraf Saleem, who was one of the three new ambassadors that presented letters of credence to the Presidency at the State House.
According to a statement issued by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Dr. Reuben Abati, the President said: “I am glad that you are coming soon after the D-8 Summit, because we plan to take advantage of the decisions of the group to strengthen our relations.”
He said that Nigeria aims to leverage on the long history of bilateral and multilateral cooperation with Pakistan in order to improve agriculture, create more jobs, and increase food supply in the country.
The new High Commissioner said that he is looking forward to work with the President to improve relations between the two nations.
During a separate audience with Mr. David Jonathan Richardson of Australia, President Jonathan said that he is looking forward to more cooperation and investment from Australia, especially in the solid minerals sector.
The President also expressed appreciation for Australia’s pledge of $50m to support Nigeria’s polio eradication programme, and restated the administration’s commitment to eradicate polio from Nigeria by 2015.
Also speaking to Mr. Joao Andre Pinto Dias Lima of Brazil, President Jonathan said the forthcoming visit of the Brazilian President to Abuja will encourage closer relations between Nigeria and Brazil.
The new ambassadors pledged to do their best to strengthen relations with Nigeria during their tenures in the country.