H.E Sun Baohong, China’s ambassador to Ghana has been at post in Accra only a few months but she is already digging in deep with her sincere desire of making China-Ghana relations a model of China-Africa relations. Perhaps a tall order that the soft-spoken diplomat may have handed herself but she believes her 18 years of engagement in African affairs will prove useful.
A hint of her experience is displayed “I wish to ask our Ghanaian friends to do more to understand China, take more initiatives and input more wisdom to further deepen our cooperation and consolidate our traditional friendship,” since to her, any achievements registered so far in China-Ghana cooperation has rested on the two people’s joint efforts.
That’s the underlying philosophy of her tenure. All achievements in cooperation between the two countries, so far, don’t mark the full potential of friendship – and those are remarkable by many counts – but the stepping stone to greater things.
One swallow, she sums up, doesn’t make the summer.
Economic cooperation, Ms. Sun notes, is the biggest hit in the two countries’ bilateral cooperation, offering the potential to speedily elevate the relations to higher heights.
“When I paid courtesy calls on high-level officials of Ghana, they are concerned about Ghana’s trade deficit with China,” she says.
Her solution; China has a lot of advantageous manufacturing capacity and it will be a win-win choice to channel excess capacity to Ghana so that those transferred industries could generate revenue, as well as create badly needed jobs.
“I will spare no efforts to further tap the potential of China-Ghana economic cooperation and to encourage more Chinese entrepreneurs to invest in Ghana,” Ms. Sun assures
And economic cooperation between the two has witnessed explosive developments in recent years. China Customs statistics show that trade volumes between the two reached US$5.15 billion in 2013, a whopping 150.5% increase in only three years from 2010 when bilateral trade volume was US$2.056 billion (incidentally that was when their trade volumes, for the first time, broke through US$2 billion).
With this development, Ghana now ranks third among 24 Mid- and West-African countries and seventh in Africa in trade with China. Ghana’s export volume to China has seen a year-on-year increase of 86.7%, reaching US$1.2 billion in 2013, while its imports were US$3.2 billion from the latter. China also has become one of the major investment source countries for Ghana with non-financial FDI hitting US$1.5 billion.
Ms. Sun explains that China is the largest commodity trading country in the world and “Made in China” sells well globally for high quality and low price but the world’s manufacturing hub is not deliberately seeking a trade surplus; knowing very well that is unsustainable and that although trade between China and Ghana is mainly decided by the market, China has, in recent years, been making great efforts to promote more imports from Ghana and encourage more Chinese enterprises to invest in the manufacturing sector of the African country. A number of these investments are the power plants – which, in addition to those contracted by the Chinese side, account for nearly 30% of the installed electricity generation capacity of Ghana – as well as the pharmaceutical, steel and wig factories, and a farm.
While cooperation on the economic front is evidently on the high, there have been obvious downsides to it. Ghana’s authorities have been apprehensive of foreign nationals intruding into the country’s retail sector, which by law is the preserve of Ghanaian nationals. Chinese nationals have been fingered as culprits. They have aslo been fingered among foreign nationals engaged in illegal and environmentally destructive mining activities. There have also been concerns about slow disbursement of the US$3 billion China Development Bank (CDB) loan facility, which has led to delays of over two years in the completion of the Atuabo gas factory that would utilise indigenous Ghanaian gas in electricity generation.
Ms. Sun notes that the Atuabo Gas Project is the first and biggest project under CDB loan, which is being undertaken by one of China’s largest oil companies, SINOPEC, and because it is a grand project “it is only natural that some issues may arise…(w)hen we meet with difficulties, we seek solution through friendly consultation with the Ghanaian side.”
To the Chinese, their relations with Ghana and the rest of Africa, generally, will continue to grow speedily in strength. Although, along the way, some disharmony will inevitably be encountered but as Chinese President Xi Jinping said during his visit to Africa in 2013, opportunities always overweigh challenges and methods always overweigh difficulties.
“Chinese and Africa’s people have enough wisdom to resolve certain issues arising during cooperation and continue to deepen our fraternal friendship and pursue our respective dreams,” Ms. Sun assures, noting that on many project sites Ghanaian workers can be seen pouring off sweat with their Chinese friends; working shoulder to shoulder in building up landmarks of friendship, one after another.
“Facts speak louder than words,” she says.
And it is the fact that, on the political front, Ghana is one of the first sub-Sahara African countries to establish diplomatic relations with China. Ms. Sun notes that this year marks the 50th anniversary of Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai’s successful visit to Africa, which he kick started in Ghana, despite the deteriorating security situation pervading in the country at the time.
Having, over the past 50 years and more, endeavored to sincerely support and closely cooperate with each other in pursuing national independence and liberation and building their economies based on the traditional friendship forged jointly by their elder generation of leaders including Chairman Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai and Kwame Nkrumah, a solid foundation has been laid for the outburst of further cooperation.
“Now the Chinese side is making positive preparations for President H.E John Dramani Mahama to go to China to grace the Second Forum on China-Africa Local Government Cooperation in late August,” says Ms. Sun as evidence of deepening political cooperation.
She observes that, in recent years and for the future, China will continue to deepen their support for Ghana in military and other means to suport Ghana’s demonstrated commitment to maintaining regional peace and security as it contributes enormously to both regional and world peace by participating in peace-keeping missions.
Political and military support for Ghana will also focus on Ghana’s commitment to the fight against terrorism as well as its unswerving obligation to pan-Africanism and regional integration.
Ambassador Sun says China always follows an independent foreign policy of peace and is committed to advancing friendship and cooperation in all fields with other countries on the basis of the five principles of peaceful coexistence, which still enjoys strong vitality today.
Under the guidance of this concept “China and Africa established a new type of strategic partnership featuring political equality and mutual trust, economic win-win cooperation and cultural exchanges at the 2006 Beijing Summit of Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC).
“In 2013, President Xi Jinping on his three-nation tour of Africa, defined China’s policy towards Africa as sincerity, emphasis on real results, affinity, and good faith,” Sun discloses, adding that in 2014 Chinese Premier Li Keqiang also, on a four-nation African tour, unveiled the “461” China-Africa Cooperation Framework.
The “4” signifies four principles to uphold in deepening China-Africa cooperation, which are equality, solidarity and mutual trust, inclusive development, and innovation while the “6” stands for areas where the two should upgrade their cooperation, namely industry, finance, poverty reduction, ecological and environmental protection, cultural and people-to-people exchanges, as well as, peace and security; and the “1” means the further improvement of FOCAC.
While China is in the driving seat, because it has emerged as the world’s second largest economy, after over 30 years of what the country’s leaders refer to as its reform and opening-up, Ambassador Sun is quick to point out that it is still the biggest country of the developing world.
She says China holds it firmly that in international relations “no big countries should coerce the small, no strong countries should humiliate the weak and no rich countries should bully the poor.”
In line with its focus on cultural relations, especially in paying attention to people-to-people exchanges, human resource development and education, China has granted a total of 503 scholarships to Ghanaian students to pursue higher education in China as of 2013.
Ms. Sun notes that by the end of 2013, 2,897 Ghanaian students would have either completed their studies or still studying in China, with the number of self-financed Ghanaian students in China topping that of Africa. The Chinese side offers about 360 short or medium-term training opportunities for Ghana each year.
“The newly-established Confucius Institute located in the University of Ghana operates well and plays an important role as a bridge connecting our two peoples,” says Ambassador Sun, who adds warmheartedly that wherever she travels in Ghana, she finds herself immersed in the sea of China-Ghana friendship.
“Many Ghanaian people greet me with ‘nihao’,” she says.
For Ambassador Sun, the summer of China-Ghana relationship has just begun.