In Africa, China Trade Brings Growth, Unease
From the Washington Post:
Every time newspaper publisher Trevor Ncube visits his native Zimbabwe, he said, there seem to be more Chinese. He sees them shopping at boutiques, driving fancy cars, picking up their children from elite private schools.
And as in much of Africa, Ncube said, China’s reach into Zimbabwe’s economy is equally pervasive: The roads are filled with Chinese buses, the markets with Chinese goods, and Chinese-made planes are in the skies. Chinese companies are major investors in mining and telecommunications. The government in Beijing, meanwhile, is a crucial backer of Zimbabwe’s authoritarian president, Robert Mugabe.
“They are all over the place,” said Ncube, 43, who owns newspapers in Zimbabwe and South Africa. “If the British were our masters yesterday, the Chinese have come and taken their place.” [Full text]
