A recent article in the Zimbabwe Independent titled ‘China’s soft power instruments in Zim’ by Ronald Chipaike was intriguing and provoked me into responding.
The learning and teaching of Chinese is not being done exclusively in Zimbabwe or Africa alone; neither is it being driven by China as a dominant foreign power. Chinese is the language with the most native speakers in the world with about 1,4 billion; and a further 200 million non-native Chinese people speaking the Chinese language.
In Europe and America, several high-profile individuals who have taken up the learning of Chinese language provide an example of people consciously deciding to learn Chinese as a desirable tool of communication and the future of their children.
According to Business Insider, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and his wife MacKenzie have four kids whom they took for Mandarin lessons. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg learned Mandarin and introduced it to his daughter. Former United State's President Donald Trump's daughter, Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner who at the time had three children, hired a Mandarin-speaking nanny to help bring the language to their home. In 2017, British royal couple, Prince William and Kate Middleton enrolled their child, Prince George, for Mandarin at Thomas' Battersea in London, at the age of four.
That these powerful, prominent figures recognised the importance of learning Chinese language and actively introduced it to their families, means that learning the language is as desirable as it is a pragmatic step in furthering social and business goals.
It is thus despicable and misleading to claim that it is an instrument of domination that is being shoved down people's throats — because it is not. Studies have shown that learning a second language has numerous advantages, too, with the World Economic Forum citing that among other things it can "improve your all round cognitive ability".
In Zimbabwe, people who have taken the language from primary schools to tertiary institutions and abroad have done so because they recognise its importance. Recently, at the Chinese Bridge Competition, a signature global contest for non-native Chinese speakers, the majority learners were from private schools and none from Government institutions except at tertiary levels.
Chinese is not mandatory in Zimbabwe. Enrolling at the Confucius Institute is voluntary — and people pay for the learning — and that cannot be said to be evidence of new colonialism.
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Confucius Institutes (CIs) are public educational and cultural promotion programmes funded by the Chinese government but are in themselves non-governmental organisations. They began in 2004 with the first CI opening in South Korea. By the end of 2023, there were 498 Confucius Institutes and 773 Confucius classrooms in primary and secondary schools globally, according to information.
The institutes aim to spread knowledge of the Chinese language and culture around the world. Their expansion globally is at the request of institutions in host countries and are governed by local education standards, which also determine what they teach (course content).
In Zimbabwe, for example, a learning institution like a university is approved by the Higher and Tertiary Education ministry to teach Chinese and establish such an institute, and the course and learning points are determined by the Ministry, whose supervision the university is under.
Zimbabwe has one Chinese Institute at the University of Zimbabwe (and would have more if any universities sought the co-operation) but in Britain which formerly colonised China itself, there are 35 Confucius Institutes while in the United States, there are 19. France has 19, while in Germany there are 21. Statistics readily available on the internet reveal that there are 187 CIs in the whole of Europe.
The Confucius Institute at the University of Zimbabwe falls under the Faculty of Arts and Humanities Department of Languages Literature and Culture, and from an academic perspective, nothing is amiss in the learning of Chinese, like any other language which the university has the capacity and mission to teach.
In the 21st century, learning a second language is empowering — and everyone, including those in former colonial powers, recognise that, especially the young who seek to explore new frontiers of the world.
China is the biggest investor and source of FDI in Zimbabwe — beating almost threefold the next biggest competition in new investments according to the Zimbabwe Investment Development Agency. This means that becoming skilled in the Chinese language is as much an advantage as at any time in history.
A pragmatic jobseeker or future employee would take the opportunity to learn the language if, and when, they can to increase their competitiveness on the market.
Many Chinese people who have been in Zimbabwe for a long time because of their favourable immigration status have taken time to learn and understand local languages and have given themselves local names such as Zivanai, Tanaka, Tinashe, etc and even totems like Shumba and Murehwa.
At the same time, Chinese people have undertaken cultural exchanges and philanthropic activities, making them some of the most generous individual donors to social causes in health and education.
It is a gross misrepresentation to claim that Chinese people are a "secluded" community, even when minorities and foreign communities tend to have a reasonable degree of seeking group identity.
For foreigners to learn a local language — any of the 16 official languages of Zimbabwe — would be an added advantage, but entirely non-core. On the balance of analysis, while individual workers including specialists who come for either managerial or technical services, come and go, local workers are at home and will likely receive a more constant stream of different batches of foreign colleagues with whom they will communicate.
China, which has a longstanding and acknowledged non-interference policy, sets up projects and assist only at the request of the countries and does not impose itself.
All projects undertaken by China in Zimbabwe and other African and non-African countries across the world are on a needs basis and actively courted by the host governments.
In the case of Zimbabwe, various projects such as the New Parliament Building, National Pharmaceutical Warehouse, expansion projects of power, transport, and telecoms infrastructure like Robert Mugabe International Airport, Hwange, Kariba South Hydro, and NetOne broadband expansion, all emanated from Zimbabwe. As far back as the post-independence infrastructure like the National Sports Stadium or military and technical assistance during the liberation war that won Independence in 1980, China was responding to requests by Zimbabweans.
The same applies to aid such as food and medical teams. China responds to the requests of the Zimbabwe government, as was the case during the Covid-19 pandemic, Cyclone Idai disaster recovery and other emergencies like drought. China has given Zimbabwe food aid and disaster relief in response to a call for assistance by Zimbabwe, doing so by donating rice and wheat - which it grows and mobilised for assistance. It does not on its volition dump these products here. Other assistance such as sending medical teams and agricultural experts is also done at the behest and need of Zimbabwe, which determines the size and operations of these technical experts.
It is thus critical to mention in the same vein for the sake of clarity and completeness that Zimbabwe requested the building of the New Parliament building, first mooted under President Robert Mugabe.
In 2018, when President Mnangagwa visited China and met President Xi Jinping, he requested the assistance of the Asian giant to consummate the project, and China obliged. In essence, if Zimbabwe had not requested it and Zimbabweans had not needed it, the New Parliament would not have been built by China at a massive cost of US$200 million.
Today, the New Parliament building has proven to be a key infrastructure project that Zimbabwe is proud of, and serving democracy well, by accommodating our ever-expanding legislature, which was being squeezed within the old building left by colonial masters.
Apart from this, the New Parliament building is a multifunctional facility to be used for a wide array of activities including international conferences. In August, Zimbabwe will use the Mt Hampden Parliament building to host the SADC Summit, a grouping of Southern African countries.
On the other hand, the Chinese construction of the New Parliament has had a revolutionary impact in citing the designated new capital city, which has already attracted more foreign investment and new settlements and businesses, which will benefit Zimbabwe economically and socially. It is narrow and myopic to look at the purported political interference of China while ignoring the bigger picture of massive benefits and spin-offs worth billions of dollars and other developments, including futuristic projects such as the setting up of a "cyber city" proposed by Arab investors.
China has built similar facilities in Africa, including a conference centre in Zambia and the African Union headquarters in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia - at the request of relevant authorities.
Zimbabwe stands to benefit from advances in agriculture, its economic bedrock, while Africa needs more technologies and innovations to stave off hunger and starvation that have stalked the continent, especially in light of climate change.
A point also has to be clarified that while China contracts its companies to construct bilateral or technical projects, it does so based on assuring quality and delivery - and a lot of donor countries, including the US channel significant work and responsibilities to their home countries for these and other reasons, some of which have not been explored or criticised in the manner that China has been criticised.
However, these companies do not do the majority of the work when there is local expertise and opportunities to subcontract local companies. According to information on the costs of labour, bringing Chinese workers is way expensive, and it would be useful to have locals work in the majority, while Chinese work as specialists and engineers. Those who have been to sites built by Chinese companies will testify that Chinese workers are often in the minority and do a lot to transfer skills, especially to unskilled and semi-skilled local workers, who do most of the job.
At the same time, China uses local materials when they can be sourced more cheaply, rather than importing materials from China when they are more expensive and take a long time to ship. These points are key to understanding how China operates, and dispelling myths and misconceptions, and it is critical for informed debate and public knowledge.
The negative framing through amplifying purported wrongs of China and downplaying positives and salience of good developments is the stuff of crude propaganda meant to besmirch China and it is grossly irresponsible and reflects poorly on media, academia, and think tanks that ought to do much better than that, through balanced views, factual analyses, perspectives and opinions if they are to be taken seriously.
Tichaona Zindoga is the director of Ruzivo Media & Resource Centre, and he is also a publisher, author and strategic communications consultant.
