As Africans we look forward to expanding our cooperation with China in line with “Africa’s Agenda 2063 – The Africa we want” priorities, particularly in the areas of trade, investment, infrastructure, industrialisation, public health, education, green energy, agriculture, and human resource development.
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Chinese President Xi Jinping was met with a 21-gun salute as he arrived Tuesday in Zimbabwe, where there are high hopes that his country will help revive the struggling southern African economy.
Mugabe said he would discuss with Xi various cooperation projects aimed at accelerating his country’s socio-economic development. Beijing hosted a full China-Africa Summit in 2006.
This marks the first visit of a Chinese leader to the country since 1996.
Mugabe, for his part, extended a warm welcome to the Chinese president, and expressed deep appreciation for China’s sincerity in dealing with Zimbabwe and other African countries as well as profound gratitude for China’s long-running valuable support for his country in various fields.
Speaking after the tour, President Xi urged Zimbabweans and Chinese people not to forget the exploits of the two countries’ national heroes who made the two nations dynamic and what they were today. A press conference was expected to held later Tuesday.
While China is Africa’s biggest trading partner, with two- way flows exceeding $220 billion a year ago, the pace of investment has slowed.
Xi inspected a guard of honour mounted at Harare airport’s domestic terminal. The suffering and hardships they have shared help them understand each other and cooperate for development. Mainstream Zimbabwean newspapers lauded it as “historic”.
It will be the second summit in the 15-year history of FOCAC, and the first on the African continent.
“The visit of President Xi is going to consolidate and cement some of the agreements and in fact undertaking also to further co-operate with respect to those agreements which are not yet mature for signing at this moment”, Chinamasa said.
According to Zimbabwe Power Company (ZPC), the three stations would be located in three provinces of the country, with their contractors and costs being Chint Group, 202 million USA dollars, China No. 17 Metallurgical Construction Ltd., 163 million dollars and ZTE, 197 million dollars respectively.
Calling China Zimbabwe’s “best friend” on the global stage and describing Xi’s visit as a significant event in the development of bilateral ties, Mugabe told Xinhua in a recent interview that he will confer with Xi on bilateral cooperation in multiple areas.
China’s must weigh whether the risks of taking a bigger role in such danger zones are worth the benefits.
“China-Africa relations have maintained good momentum in the development of both high-level exchanges and cooperation under the structure of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation(FOCAC)”.
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Xi, Mugabe and Zuma attended the opening of the climate change summit in Paris on Monday. These agreements and contracts were signed during the China Inward Buying Mission event that took place in Sandton, Johannesburg.
