China Afflicted Sub-Sahara Africa

In the rich-men 's club it 's fashionable, and time 's expedient, to mollycoddle with the wealthy and the crème-de-la-crème and the top-class even if you do not particularly like them but with China comes something very different; a relish for the humble, the unsung, the disadvantaged. It is as if China really understands and practices the best Christianity has to offer without labelling it by that excellent name.

No rational person accuses China of arrogance.

Nobody accuses China of imperialism and colonialism motivation.

Nowhere is China accused of subverting governments for financial, political or military advantage.

A careful examination of China over the recent decades has shown that she does not follow the western model on anything

That gave rise to the immoral and scandalous scramble for Africa when the so-called great powers met and carved up that continent for exploitation and grand larceny.

2. That afflicted that continent with mass slavery, the Atlantic slave trade and the ravages that followed and remain to this day.

3. That afflicted sub-Sahara Africa with Colonialism and dragged them into foreign wars between competing European countries.

4. That ruthlessly suppressed African nationalism and relentlessly pillaged and raped those countries of their wealth and natural resources.

China repudiates this European/Western model since she herself was a victim to its ruthless implementation and knows first-hand the horrors of the slave trade and rampant racism. China will not forget anytime soon the insults heaped on her people when, in a tsunami of xenophobia and bigotry, it was trendy, commonplace and taken for granted that the Chinese were a sub-human species.

I wrote elsewhere on this

Most countries in the West regard Africa as a lost cause and that is seen in their derision of anything African, but China is different and takes a diametrically opposite stance. This stance was recently underpinned when China 's new president Xi Jinping announced that his first overseas visit after taking office will be to Africa. How delightful that after his elevation to the presidency, and with all the world leaders wanting to be the first to shake his hand, arguably the most powerful man in the world chose to go to Africa.

When a sceptical media, no doubt still mired in the mores of the old Western model, inquired why the new president would choose to go first to Africa the reply was most illuminating: "China and Africa are good brothers, good friends and good partners. The visit by China 's new national chairman to Africa fully shows the importance we attach to Sino-African ties," China 's Foreign Minister Jiechi Yang told a news conference at China 's annual parliament meeting.

So here is China boldly, unapologetically and in the glare of the mass-media publicly asserting her courageous, principled stance towards the most despised continent on