Liberia's astute politician, Dr. Togba-Nah Tipoteh, said despite diplomatic propaganda that the People's Republic of China (PRC) was engaged with Africa to exploit its natural resources, the Asian nation was making strides in Liberia because it understood the needs of the Liberian people.
Essentially, according to him, the PRC has broken the colonial norms of engagement in which European powers used Africa as reservoirs for raw materials, the market prices of which they determined at the expense of the livelihoods of the citizens of countries involved.
The assertion was contained in a commentary Dr. Tipoteh released to coincide with the 63rd Independence Anniversary of Liberia on July 26 this year.
Unlike the industrialized world, which manipulated Third World economies into producing that which the citizens cannot consume in exchange for finished goods, which the nations cannot produce, the PRC was working with its African partners to tailor production to the needs of the people.
"It is the honesty in the China-Liberia marriage that has broken the bad precedence of dancing to the piper's tune and has introduced the good precedence of dancing to the people's tune," he said, quoting the Chinese Ambassador to Liberia as expressing the need for Liberia to turn some of its raw exports into finished goods.
Comments 1 to 1 of 1 Post a comment
The so-called 'marrige' between China and Liberia specifically and Africa and China generally is premature for anyone to start drawing conclusion. But if history is of any indication, the future looks bleak for Liberia and Africa: they lack the necessary prerequisits to benefit from this so-called 'marriage'. Some of the reasons that countries like China, India and Brazil were able to uplift themselves and their people through their marriages to the western or outside world is that their leaders had vision; they were able to see past their own egos and greed. They invested in their people by first building competitive learning institutions in their countries. Second, they sent a large numbers of their kids overseas to western academic institutions. That was about 30 years ago. Those kids came back and now they are orchestrating this so-called marriage. For nearly four generations now, our so called elites in the Liberia have used the state's resources to educate their children both in Liberia and overseas. But most of these children never returned home and those few who did, simply followed in their parents foot steps- the became the worst exploiters of their own country's people and resources with help of concessionists. For this and other reasons, Liberia and Africa lack both the labor force (manual and skilled laborers,technicians and middle managers) and visionary leaders (museum in remote Bella Yella)now to create those opportunities. Case in point, I read on this same site that GOL signed a concession with China written in Chinese!! So whatever China's intentions are in this marriage, good or bad, wouldn't matter- we lack the resources to take advantage of the former or recognize the latter.