TANZANIA and other AFRICA nation in danger of surrendering its sovereignty to CHINA.

It is very interesting to follow developments in the present day Western world especially in the USA. Just last week we had its Secretary of State on a tour of Africa.

But waking up in the middle of this week that Secretary of State, Mr Rex Tillerson had been abruptly sacked for reasons best known by his employer, US President Donald Trump.

This seems to be the unpredictable trend of the Trump Administration since assuming power. A notable number of senior officials of this Administration have either resigned or been sacked by their boss abruptly.

For us, people in the developing world, our nervousness of what is up next on the agenda on this new Republican Administration is heightened because of the unpredictability of the man at the helm of this unipolar power.

But this is beside the point of the thrust of this perspective, although factors are inter-related and connected as we reflect on what the sacked US Secretary of State said in regard to Africa and its relations with other nations of this mutual world we share.

What must have startled most people following the news last week on their television sets was an apparent alert to Africa by the former US Secretary of State, Mr Tillerson to Africa to avert the possibility of “forfeiting its sovereignty” to China if Africa continued its economic relations with that Asian country.

Knowing China and its admirable economic relations with my country, Tanzania, I immediately made a follow up of the news-break I followed on television. This is the result of what I goggled subsequently: Headline: Africa should avoid forfeiting sovereignty to China over loans: Tillerson.

Follow the news item in brief: Addis Ababa, Reuters –US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on Thursday that African countries should be careful not to forfeit their sovereignty when they accept loans from China, the continent’s biggest trading partner.

“We are not in anyway attempting to keep Chinese dollars from Africa,” Tillerson told a news conference in the Ethiopian capital. “It is important that African countries carefully consider the terms of those agreements and not forfeit their sovereignty.”

Kenya, for example, inaugurated a $3.2 billion railway funded by China last year. For the last three years, Kenya has received more than $100 million annually in US “security assistance”. Asked about Tillerson’s criticism of China’s approach on the continent, Kenyan Foreign Minister, Monica Juma said:

“This country is engaging with partners from across the world, driven by our own interests and for our own values.” End item. As you have just read the comments of the Kenyan Foreign Minister, which to my mind, are appropriate, I am sure the response of the Tanzanian leadership would be the same, and I believe even stronger given Tanzania’s principled foreign policy carried over the years since the early leadership of founder President, Dr Julius Nyerere.

Over the years, no foreign power has ever dared to choose friends or enemies for this country and this continues to be the country’s principle in foreign relations today. Those around in the early years of this country’s independence, Tanzania, was ready to severe diplomatic relations with Britain over the unilateral declaration of independence of its former colony of Rhodesia.

Ever since, Tanzania has pursued a principled foreign policy anchored on national sovereignty. It was on this principle, that Tanzania welcomed and embraced the People’s Republic of China and made available its resources to build a railway line between Tanzania and Zambia– a railway line adored today as the ‘Great Uhuru Railway’. That railway line linking Tanzania and the then landlocked Zambia bordering minority ruled countries was a huge contribution to the liberation process in Southern Africa.

Up to this day, nobody has ever heard China dictating anything to this country in terms of its foreign policy or using its aid to this country as a quid pro quo for Chinese aid or support. It would appear and it can be proved that this country’s relations with China are based on a win-win agenda and nothing else.

As the quotation at the launch of this perspective by the third retired Tanzanian President Benjamin Mkapa, those saying that Africa should stay away from China are only trying to scare the continent from diversifying its trade allies so that Africa remains pegged to the West.

For, there is empirical evidence between Africa and western powers; including the US that the African continent is still the producer of primary products, which the West siphons off and resells back dearly as finished products! The recent example is what befell us here in Tanzania where mining multinationals were literally shipping away our minerals with wanton abandon.

Thanks to the current President, John Magufuli, this has now been brought to a halt although the country is still landed with “royalties” in lieu of harvested minerals by those western multinationals.

Among those multinationals around, none is Chinese owned. What we see with our naked eyes are
 Chinese workers, working on our infrastructural development– building roads and so forth.

They are here as development partners-on a win-win agenda. Like before-as partners in the liberation struggle against minority rule - the Chinese would be the last not to know and appreciate the meaning of a given country’s genuine independence and full sovereignty because it is the foundation stone of their own sovereign state.