Interview: FOCAC "permanent affirmation" of unwavering China-Africa cooperation, says expert

The celebration of the 20th anniversary of the founding of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) is a "permanent affirmation" of the unwavering momentum in the partnership, a Senegalese expert has said recently.

The 20th anniversary of FOCAC marks "a solemn moment when we should recall the tradition, the force and renew this cooperation which will not cease to surprise us," said Mamadou Fall, executive director of the Confucius Institute at Cheikh Anta Diop University (UCAD).

"FOCAC is consolidating relations. Relations between China and Africa are growing stronger in different areas," he said.

He added the COVID-19 pandemic has again highlighted "the reality of a fraternal and united relationship that has never faded" between China and Africa.

As a historian at the Faculty of Letters and Human Sciences at the UCAD, Fall said he has always had "an attitude of reserve and distance" with regards to the heritage of European colonialism.

European colonialism could not be "a horizon for the economic and social development" of the African continent and it was necessary to "renegotiate" the relations between Africa and Europe and find alternatives, which African leaders understood well early on, he said.

Fall said African leaders knew from history that "Africans have everything to gain" by strengthening cooperation with China and making it a privileged partner.

The Senegalese expert has encouraged African heads of state to continue trusting the sincerity and magnanimity in China-Africa bilateral cooperation.

"China has always put forward the need to cooperate with Africa on an egalitarian basis and mutual respect," he said.

Fall said China and Senegal are in the "same cadence" as China's economic and social development by 2035 can be aligned well with the Plan for an Emerging Senegal, calling on the two countries to continue working for the common good of the two peoples.

He said that the outcome of China-Africa cooperation over the past 20 years has been positive, and "it is reassuring to know that we have here an instrument of cooperation which, after this period of pandemic, will allow us to restart on new bases," he said.

"In harmony and in synergy, the two peoples are working to achieve the same objectives and at the same pace," said the expert.