The 2024 Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) opens in Beijing, capital of China, Sept. 5, 2024. (Xinhua/Zhai Jianlan)
By Tom Pauken II.
BEJING, Sept.10 (Xinhuanet) -- The 2024 Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) was successfully held last week. Many African reporters attended and eagerly discussed how China has helped achieve greater peace and prosperity in their respective native countries.
“China's involvement in Africa has been very positive,” said Francis Pelenah, a journalist from Liberia. “Because if you look at the development initiatives down in (Eastern Africa), such as Uganda, Ethiopia, there are a lot of large projects that China has implemented in those countries.”
A good number of Liberian public infrastructure projects in recent years were built with assistance or direct involvement from China, according to the Liberian journalist.
Pelenah added, "the cooperation has reached a level where China is not looking to take anything from Africa. China isn't imposing its will on African countries to benefit from development assistance."
"Development assistance doesn't come with strings, doesn't come with preconditions like other countries in the West will do. So China comes in and they give you the assistance based on the agreement, based on the development cooperation with your country," he continued.
Fortune Egbeji Abang, a reporter with News Agency of Nigeria, believed that China can play a vital role in boosting Nigeria’s development and supporting his country’s technological advancements, while upgrading individual capacity building, integrating IT networks, and promoting media exchanges.
"One aspect of the benefits is the people-to-people exchange in terms of integrating the people, encouraging people to have access to best practices, intellectual aspects of technology, and even the new world of artificial intelligence, which lies a big challenge for developing nations like Nigeria and across Africa,"Abang told Xinhuanet.
"Nigeria now has more leverage to understand global events, especially as both share common participation in South-South cooperation. This has helped Nigeria a great deal," noted Abang. "Also, looking at it from the aspect of China helping Nigeria access loans, it has enabled Nigeria to deal with issues like poverty, food insecurity, and slow fiscal growth."
Many Nigerian journalists at FOCAC this year praised China for its substantial impact on Nigeria’s professional training and education programs, as well as major infrastructure projects.
"There is a lot to count on what China has done to help Nigeria, especially in infrastructure building, which has created job opportunities for Nigerians," said Raphael Bamidele Oni, a senior reporter writing on Nigeria’s diplomatic affairs.
Oni explained that the Chinese are great educators and good at setting up systems to keep governance mechanisms and businesses more sustainable. He hoped that China can transfer its systems to support Nigeria’s development in the long run.
Joseph Clement Emmanuel Omgba, a journalist from Cameroon, said, “we need cooperation in education because our education system needs to be reinforced.”
Omgba added that China has already provided scholarship to many young Cameroonians to study in Chinese universities. Enditem
