Zambia wins Chinese investment, opposition snubbed
03 Feb 2007 18:15:47 GMT Source: Reuters
(Adds China to invest in Zambia, economic zone) By Shapi Shacinda LUSAKA, Feb 3 (Reuters) - The Zambian government said on Saturday it had won $800 million in new investment from China, and barred the main opposition party from events marking the visit of President Hu Jintao because of its anti-China stance. Zambia has seen unrest over China's growing power in Africa, including a riot at a Chinese-owned mine over pay. The opposition Patriotic Front has accused the government of selling out to Beijing. Zambia's President Levy Mwanawasa emerged from a meeting with China's Hu and said China would invest $800 million in the Zambian economy and create a special economic zone for Chinese firms to operate in. The Chinese cash would flow into mining, manufacturing and farms this year. Zambia would create the economic zone in the copper belt town of Chambishi, north of the capital Lusaka, and exempt Chinese firms from import and value added taxes, he said. "The establishment of a special economic zone in Chambishi will see China injecting $800 million into our economy. This will go a long way in boosting economic development in our country," Mwanawasa told a news conference. China would also write off 61.3 million yen ($508,900) and a further $3 million dollars of debt which matured in Dec. 2005, build schools and a stadium, train agricultural experts and give Zambia a further loan to buy road-making equipment. Hu said his country would support progressive African governments in economic and trade matters. "China is looking for strategic and mutual friendship of a win-win situation in Africa," he said. ZAMBIA A HUB FOR CHINA Finance minister Ng'andu Magande told Reuters on Saturday that Zambia aimed to strengthen its bilateral ties with China. "These relations will help us to find winning ways because China was an (economic) underdog just a few years ago, but they are now performing well," Magande said. Zambian officials say Hu's visit will help make copper-rich Zambia a hub for Chinese economic expansion on the world's poorest continent. But he faces a delicate task. The Copperbelt region where the special economic zone is to be created was dropped from Hu's itinerary, apparently out of fears that there might be protests by families of workers who died in a 2005 explosion at a Chinese-owned mine. "They are out to colonise Africa economically and also to get Africa's solidarity at the United Nations," Patriotic Front general secretary Guy Scott told Reuters this week. The opposition said during last year's presidential race it wanted to switch diplomatic recognition to Taiwan and expel mainland Chinese people from Zambia. Mwanawasa's government re-affirmed its recognition of Beijing. The Patriotic Front was barred from meetings with Hu. "We have invited opposition party leaders to attend public functions like the state banquet for the Chinese president," chief government spokesman Vernon Mwaanga told reporters. "But ... we have not invited any leader of the Patriotic Front because they do not recognise the Chinese people."
