•Ready to invest in the country
From Ikenna Emewu in Beijing
On May 6, there was a very insightful interaction between eight Nigerian journalists and the top officials of the Foreign Affairs Ministry of China in Beijing.
The only Nigerian in the group that was not a journalist was a diplomat like the hosts. He is the Charge De Affairs of the Nigerian Embassy in China, Mr. Olusola Orevba.
Orevba had come with the six journalists that visited China at the invitation of the China Association of Journalists. And the other journalists are Beijing-based Nigerians – yours sincerely and the NTA Beijing Bureau Chief, Julietta Aina.
At last, the forum was more than an ample opportunity for the journalists to get so many issues clarified about Nigeria and China relationship and also the China Africa friendship. Honestly, there are many gaps in information, regarding the diplomatic relationship of China and Nigeria, one of the oldest of such relationships in the continent. It was 45 years old last February.
The interactive sessiom with the Chinese diplomats led by Mr. Zhou Pingjian for over three hours of non-stop discussion provided a good opportunity for clarification and rare information on the two.
When Daily Sun raised some key issues on the seeming cold or distant matters in the accord between the two countries, one the largest in the world, the other, the largest in Africa; it provided ample time for the diplomat from the foreign ministry to get to the basics.
First, in his explanations, Zhou was warm and open and explained why China buys just one per cent of Nigeria’s crude. He also noted that the huge trade imbalance between the two in favour of China wasn’t China’s making or a deliberate policy. The explanation was factual that the reason is from Nigeria’s end for being a low manufacturer, therefore, having few options on what China should buy from it. Yet, from what Daily Sun found in middle of April during the China Africa Think Tank Forum in Yiwu, Zhejian Province, Nigeria still has controlling quota in the improved Africa exports to China that has grown 30 times in the past 10 years. Yet, the volume is nothing encouraging, as the country also challenges Africa and Nigeria to up its game.
Oil is Nigeria’s major export and China indicated its unwillingness to increase their stakes on Nigerian crude import. The reason is simple – competitive advantage and the profit-driven slant of every market. China knows that Nigeria crude is one of the best qualities in the world, and is not ready on economic reasons to stick so much to the best quality when it can get the same service from ones of less quality and at cheaper price.
This sounded like the whole truth from his mind and made every other excuse he adduced for the low patronage by his country as surplus addendum, such as alleging that Nigeria prefers to sell her oil to USA and later India instead of China.
But one heartwarming thing from China was the repeated assurance of China’s readiness to assist and work with Nigeria. Zhou noted that “whatever Nigeria is going through now, we also did. We really had it rough at a time we hadn’t the money or the human resource years back. But we had the market. So, that was the attraction that brought us investors and helped strengthen our economy. Today, we are strong and what Nigeria would learn from us is the large market it has. It might not have the money, but the market is enough incentive to bring Nigeria the right investors and help her grow. Already, China is ready to go to Nigeria and assist. So, it is left to Nigeria to leverage on that advantage and take off.”
He noted that China did not see it as coincidence that President Muhammadu Buhari was the first African president to visit China after the Forum for China Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) in South Africa last December and President Xi Jinping sees him as a great ally that should be worked with and a serious partner too.
He also revealed that when Buhari was in China, he and the chairman of China Peoples Political Consultative Committee were in Africa on official visit and what they discovered was that Africa was a great market potential and a ripe place for investment that could not be ignored. He tasked Nigeria to act fast and tap into this potential and develop itself into a world economic force.
He also clarified that the reason the FOCAC head office was domiciled in Johannesburg right now is because South Africa accepted to host it. The Chinese diplomat narrated that the head office was rotated between Beijing and an African country and it is any one that accepts that takes it, and challenged Nigeria to take up that task of hosting FOCAC after Johannesburg, as a way of demonstrating her importance in Africa and in the relationship between the continent and China. “Nigeria in the past and today plays great role in African peace, liberation and economic advancement and should not stop. China considers Nigeria the giant and accords it that status. I must reveal to you that China looks up to Nigeria for a very successful friendship between the continent and her because we understand the role a big and influential country could play. That is why we have chosen 30 Nigerian youths for an upcoming culture and youth festival in China. While Nigeria has that number, other African countries have 10 slots each.”
Concerning the non-inclusion of Nigeria in the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) that came into being last year December in Beijing, Zhou explained that the membership was open and China wants more countries to join and asked Nigeria to consider that body a group to identify with and do its best to be part of it.
However, he admitted that with the blossoming relationship between the two countries, that China would consider the possibility of raising her stakes in the Africa Development Bank (AfDB) where it is a nominal member without voting powers because of her low financial stake there. Nigeria has the controlling votes in the AfDB after the EU.
Daily Sun had pointed out to the Chinese diplomat that China raising her stakes there means giving more support to Nigeria international economic interest. Zhou would also not accept responsibility on the side of China for not including Nigeria in the BRICS and stated that China does not decide for the whole body, and if Nigeria means to up her stakes in the international circles, it could champion the formation of a new body among some other countries in the world for her economic benefits while still not ruling out the possibility of Nigeria being part of the BRICS if the conditions are right.
In his response on behalf of the government of Nigeria, the head of the Nigeria mission, Orevba assured that his office was working on bringing to implementation the discussions held by Buhari and President Xi during the visit in April. He said he just returned from Nigeria as part of the meetings and efforts to bring to fruition the essence of the visit. According to him, when the implementations start, the country would appreciate the benefits of the visit and that would also help strengthen the diplomatic ties of the two large countries.
Orevba is so sure the meetings, deliberations and visits had concrete intentions and beneficial outcomes and the two sides are working hard to make sure that the discussions didn’t end at the roundtable.
While Daily Sun pushed most of the agenda and raised most of the issues at the meeting of the journalists and the Chinese Foreign Affairs officials, it would be recalled that the medium has over the months strongly championed such responsible diplomatic advocacies for the country in pursuit of responsible journalism for the interest of the country in China.
In history, China’s readiness was what made it benefit from the outsourcing by the US and some European countries in search of a place to invest. Like Zhou pointed out to the Nigerian journalists, China hadn’t the money but the large market and that was enough incentive that also included cheap labour.
Nigeria has similar potential and a further benefit of a good or average pool of experts. What is left is the fast action to capture China’s floating cash it wants to take somewhere and buy goodwill in addition to better economy.
Five days after the meeting with Zhou, in another chat Daily Sun had with another senior official of the China foreign ministry, Mr. Zhong Jianhua, Chinese Government Special Envoy on African Affairs, he pushed the challenge back to Nigeria or any African country in terms of readiness to grab the opportunity.
He illustrated his point with the unequal industrial and economic development of the provinces of China and attributed it to their readiness rates after the initial opening up.
In March, China depleted a little of its enormous $3.6tr foreign reserve in the World Bank and is taking it somewhere for investment.
Nigeria, therefore, stands in the threshold of history to grab the Chinese investment largesse, Daily Sun can authoritatively report. With a genuine resolve by China to invest somewhere to beat the growing problem of overcapacity, rebalance the trade surpluses and reduce economic tension on her side in the WTO watch, China wants a place to go. The economy of China has grown so large that it also has developed a large pool of middle class who are no longer willing to take peanuts as wages as they did during their opening up over 30 years ago.
Therefore, what China wants today is a place to outsource to in order to create balance and assist such country grow. It is left to Nigeria to act faster with the right business environment, with the labour and market and convince China that she is the right destination before another does. Doing so means exploiting the possibility if using China as platform to grow like China did using US and implementing it with precision.