South African academic says piggybacking on China and others gives his country leverage it might otherwise not have

South African academic David Monyae insists there would have been no need for either the BRICS bank or the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank if Washington institutions had created more space for China and other major emerging economies.

The co-director of the University of Johannesburg Confucius Institute says the new financial institutions emerged because the developing world just wants a fairer deal from the global financial system.

David Monyae insists China does not preach to Africa, as Europe or the US do, but respects African autonomy and decision making. Tenzin Shiden / For China Daily

The BRICS Development Bank, which is based in Shanghai and has initial startup capital of $50 billion, started operations this year. The AIIB, which is based in Beijing, was launched late last year.

"China does not want to smash the global system as it is. It wants to be incorporated in it and somehow renegotiate it," he says.

Monyae, an international relations specialist who was speaking at the Intercontinental Hotel in Lhasa during a break in the recent Forum on the Development of Tibet, says China was playing a "smart game" by also remaining part of the post-World War II Bretton Woods system that created both the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

"China is playing the BRICS game and the infrastructure bank game while at the same time retaining a foothold in the IMF and the World Bank. It is being very smart."

Monyae, who was making his sixth visit to China after first visiting in 2011, was appointed co-director of the University of Johannesburg Confucius Institute last year.

Established in 2014 but operational only this year, it is the fifth such institute in South Africa. It is co-founded by Hanban, the Chinese body linked to the Chinese Education Ministry that promotes Confucius Institutes, and the University of Johannesburg, a relatively new university, having been set up 11 years ago.

He hopes the institute will be rigorously academic as well as a place to study Chinese language and culture.

"We want to work in a more scholarly way. I am keen to employ one or two China-Africa specialists," he says.

"It is important to build Confucius institutes in Africa. There are around 36 in Africa compared with more than 100 in the United States, with Britain and Japan also having strong representation."

Monyae says as an academic it is difficult often to keep pace with the China-Africa relationship, which since the turn of the century has developed a momentum of its own.

Trade between China and Africa is set to hit $400 billion by 2020, according to China official forecasts.

At the Forum on China Africa Cooperation summit in Johannesburg in December, Chinese President Xi Jinping tripled Beijing's financial commitment to the relationship to $60 billion.

"When you look at the China-Africa relationship, it has been a phenomenon in such a short space of time. There has been so much that has happened that we in academia do not fully understand it or we are behind in catching up," he says.

Monyae says there are many aspects to the relationship and it is far from the resources grab it is often painted as in the West.

"China has actually gained global credibility from the scale of its infrastructure building, putting it in a position to work on similar projects now in the West.

"At a bilateral level, of course, it can be an unequal relationship. Some of the smaller countries lack negotiating skills as well as capital, and leaders are sometimes in a rush to build major projects because they are going for re-election. We should not lose sight that overall, however, that it has been a successful relationship."

Monyae insists China does not preach to Africa like Europe or the US, which also hold their own partner summits with the continent.

"With both the EU-Africa and US-Africa summits, they did not want (Zimbabwe president) Robert Mugabe there. Africa has its own issues with Mugabe, but it is humiliating to tell African leaders that. He is, after all, the leader of his people. China's approach is to respect African autonomy and decision-making."

Monyae, 46, whose father was a gardener and mother a domestic worker, was born and initially brought up in Soweto.

After living also in Zimbabwe and Mozambique, he went to the University of the Witwatersrand where he studied international relations up to doctorate level.

Apart from an academic career, he has also been a policy analyst at the Development Bank of Southern Africa and worked on policy in the South African parliament.

He says that although South Africa has failed to live up to some of the expectations raised by Nelson Mandela, its institutions remain robust.

"The Constitutional Court will tell the president where to get off. Our institutions, as small and young as they are, are able to withstand pressure," he says.

Monyae says despite the South-South rhetoric in South Africa, the republic and much of the rest of the continent is still steeped in Western attitudes.

"The perception has been created that we are now leaving the Western world and that we are now emphasizing just South-South, but we cannot afford to do that. We have well-established relationships. Our economy is Western and we remain Western."

He also says establishing close ties with China and others gives South Africa leverage it might otherwise not have. "If we piggyback on other bigger players in the world such as Russia and China, it gives us advantages in key areas."

Monyae, who was a participant at the forum in the Tibet autonomous region, said there were lessons he could take back from the experiences of the region to Africa.

"Tibet is so unique, but at the same time its is not unique. It is a common story everywhere else of minorities whose culture and traditional has to be preserved while at the same time there is also a need to modernize.

"What I observe here is a vibrant society, but there is a need for infrastructure and economic development. If Tibetans grab the opportunity presented to them, their future is much brighter than other minorities, even some in Western countries, by far."

Monyae remains confident about Africa despite the resources recession disrupting the "Africa Rising" narrative of the previous decade.

"The mineral boom has come to an end. Africa is sometimes moving in very awkward ways, forwards and backwards, but you have countries like Ethiopia, which has been following China's development model, doing well," he says.

"Our greatest asset, however, is not our minerals but our people. The day we actually figure that out, we are going to reap the benefit. Africa will definitely rise. It will be the next big thing after China."

andrewmoody@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 07/29/2016 page32)