Watch out for the stealthy investor from the East

Ken Kamoche

About a week ago, Kenya police officers arrested 41 foreigners (22 Chinese and 19 Taiwanese) who were found setting up communication equipment in a house in Runda. In December 2014, a group of 37 Chinese were arrested from another house in Runda while trying to set up similar communications equipment.

In the recent incident, it was indicated that the foreigners were in the country courtesy of a Kenyan agent who is suspected to be involved in a multi-million shilling crime syndicate.

In Kenya, the Chinese have become an accepted “tribe” as they are seen in several sectors like the construction of roads, bridges, railway and buildings.

What we do not seem to realise is that while some are involved in honest work, others sneak into the country to carry out dubious activities.

These incidents ought to jolt us to think about the consequences of the ever increasing population of the Chinese  not only in Kenya but also in other African countries.

How do they get into the country? What is their motive? Who protects them?

This relationship between Africa and China is the subject of Ken Kamoche’s novel, Black Ghosts (EAEP, 2013) which tells the story of Dan Chiponda, a young Zimbabwean who travels to China to pursue an engineering degree and ends up living there for 15 years.

Set in China in the 80s, 90s and the early part of the 21st century, the novel narrates Dan’s experiences as a foreigner living in Communist China.

He and other African students face racial prejudice from the locals who refer to them as “black devils” or “black ghosts.”

At some point they are attacked by local students who accuse them of receiving preferential treatment from the Chinese government.

Dan marries a Chinese girl and they have a daughter. They move to Hong Kong where he has a stable life running his own company and things are looking up. Unfortunately, he falls into the trap of gambling and drinking which in turn lead to loans and incurs debts from loan sharks.

His wife cannot stand the threats from the loan sharks and she leaves with their daughter. At around the same time, there is increasing violence in Zimbabwe as Mugabe’s so-called war veterans take over parcels of lands force. Dan’s father is one of those who take over the veterans.

Although he is able to eventually clear his debts, Dan’s business collapses and he has to find ways of making a living in Hong Kong as he attempts to get his family back. He teams up with an old Chinese acquaintance, Wang, who has a lot of money and is interested in doing business in Africa.

The old Chinese man needs someone who can introduce him to the big shots in Africa and Dan believes that this is his opportunity to make a clean start and make enough money to sustain him and his family.

The novel is concerned with the interest that China seems to have in Africa in recent years. China seems to have fully embraced Africa as its newest business venture, exporting their goods, services, and culture at an unimaginable speed.

In trying to explain their interest in Zimbabwe, Dan’s Chinese “partners” present themselves as friends of Zimbabwe unlike the West who abandoned Zimbabwe when the Mugabe government became difficult to deal with.

through new lenses

They explain: “The West always insists on self-serving conditions. They stop aid and investment when you have misunderstandings with politicians. We Chinese never abandon our friends. When the West walks away, that’s when we walk in.”

The writer paints the Chinese “investors” as dishonest and highlights the irony of their character by calling on the values of Confucious — ethics, respect, wisdom, and related virtues.

China had for a long time closed itself from interacting with foreigners but their realisation that Africa would provide cheap raw materials, sound business ventures, and high returns has made them look to Africa through new lenses.

The Chinese started trickling into Africa in small numbers but today they are found in so many sectors of our economy. Truly, they are quietly taking over every sector and before Africa fully realises what is going on, they will have completely entrenched themselves in our midst.

The novel paints the Chinese as a patient and calculating people — they will pretend to be innocent and harmless as they seek investment ventures in Africa but turn around to possess that which they can when the natives are not paying attention.

Indeed, one of the Chinese characters in the novel tells his business partners that, “...at the start of the war, you should be shy like a maiden in order to lower the enemy’s defences. Then you have to be as swift as a hare to catch him unprepared.”

Such statements, though uttered in fiction, should make us worry about the huge loans that African countries are receiving from China. China’s shift from a purely communist to a capitalist-communist economy does not augur well for Africa.

In the novel, the Chinese investors are known crooks involved in smuggling, corruption, and other underhand deals in China. In Africa, they are interested in buying mines and farms as well as smuggling minerals and arms. They have contacts in Congo, Rwanda, South Africa and Zimbabwe. In all these places they partner with crooks and powerful government officers who will do anything to make money.

African middlemen, often well-connected individuals, get huge kickbacks from selling state resources such as mines and land, thus dispossessing the rightful owners — the citizens.

Narrated against the backdrop of the despondency in Zimbabwe under Mugabe, the novel chastises African leaders who are literally selling their countries to the highest bidder. These crooks are slowly mortgaging national assets and every citizen walks around with a percentage of a Chinese loan on their shoulders. The soul of the continent is dying right under the watch of the people who should be protecting citizens.

possible eviction

Those Chinese criminals did not just happen in Runda. Someone brought them into the country for a purpose. Wanjiku does not have the means to “import” and house dozens of foreign criminals in Runda.

Like Dan in the novel takes Wang to Zimbabwe, there are well-connected “agents” working very hard to introduce unscrupulous “investors” to Africa.

Africans have no problem nurturing this Sino-African love affair — we are just concerned that one partner is being short-changed.

The novel is a call to African leaders to protect their citizens from exploitation.

If these investment ventures from the East continue unchecked, we are staring at a possible “eviction” of the rightful owners of the continent.

At the end of the day, since China will not criticise the degenerate African leadership, we, the citizens, are the losers.

Dr Muchiri teaches Literature at the University of Nairobi. [email protected]