On Tuesday, South Africa’s ruling party, the African National Congress (ANC), brought its 55th National Conference to a close. The five-day event held political drama for the ANC’s Cyril Ramaphosa, who survived a vote to start an impeachment process, and won a second term as the party’s leader. Among the dignitaries was Chinese ambassador to South Africa Chen Xiaodong, who used an address to praise the strong diplomatic ties between the two countries. “It is my honour and privilege to attend and address [the 55th ANC National Conference],” Chen said. He also highlighted what he called a special friendship between China’s Communist Party and the ANC. “Let our two parties work together to advance China-South Africa comprehensive strategic partnership , and promote the China-Africa community.” China looked “forward to working with the ANC to develop closer relations between the two countries, and deepen the bond between the two peoples,” Chen said. The party has enjoyed a close relationship with the ANC for decades, an association that has included Chinese training and funding. ANC leaders were among the global dignitaries who sent congratulatory messages to Chinese President Xi Jinping after he secured a third term during the 20th party congress. China enlists European satellite for information campaign in Africa Days later, at the Chinese embassy, South African Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga expressed her appreciation for the party’s political and military support during South Africa’s struggle to dismantle Apartheid, dating back to 1961. “This was after the then Apartheid cruel minority regime had unleashed brutal repression and banned all forms of protests,” Motshekga said. “Some of our finest revolutionaries, such as Comrade Andrew Mlangeni and Comrade Raymond Mhlaba, were trained militarily, and in the strategy and tactics of the revolution in China.” While China has established relations with several political parties in Africa, the Communist Party’s closest ties are with South Africa’s ANC, according to observers. “[It] is somewhat surprising in that South Africa is relatively democratic and is following a different economic model than the one in China,” said David Shinn, an expert on China-Africa relations at George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs. “The [Communist Party] has made a major effort to establish ties with African ruling parties, and the ANC has been at the top of its list,” Shinn said, adding that the South African Communist Party is aligned with the ANC and contributes to the ANC’s links with China. “Unlike China, South Africa has competitive elections, but otherwise the organisation of the ANC seems to have much in common with the party.” Chinese relations with the ANC are strong and grounded in socialist-communist ideology, according to Mandira Bagwandeen, a senior researcher at the Nelson Mandela School of Public Governance at the University of Cape Town. Don’t make Africa a China-US battleground, Beijing says “Mao supported the ANC’s armed struggle to end Apartheid. Both the ANC and Communist Party have a common history of fighting to overthrow their domestic political systems and using socialism to justify their rebellion,” Bagwandeen said. In 2008, the party agreed to start training ANC members in China, she said. But while the ANC has been receiving training from China for several years, it does not necessarily mean ANC leaders accept the Communist Party’s political ideology, according to Yun Sun, head of the Stimson Centre’s China programme in Washington. “Party-to-party diplomacy is a key component of China’s diplomatic outreach. Given the importance of China for South Africa economically, and the fact that ANC is the ruling party, it should not be surprising that the Chinese ambassador is invited,” Sun said. The Communist Party also has close relations with the ruling parties of Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Tanzania, Namibia, and Angola, which along with the ANC, are all founding members of the Julius Nyerere Leadership School in Tanzania. China helped to create the political training school, which opened in February, by providing US$40 million in funding. “All six of these African parties have ruled uninterrupted in their respective countries since independence,” Shinn said. During the liberation struggles of some of those parties, such as the Mozambique Liberation Front and the Zimbabwe African National Union, China provided ideological and military training when Mao Zedong was in power. Zimbabwe’s current president, Emmerson Mnangagwa, attended a military academy in Nanjing in the 1960s. Shinn said the party had reached out to more ruling African political parties , but also begun engaging with opposition parties in countries such as Ghana and Zambia, where elections sometimes put different political parties in power. China now has relations with 81 African political parties, and had especially strong ties with the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front, the Zimbabwe African National Union – Patriotic Front, the Congolese Party of Labour (in the Republic of Congo) and Uganda’s National Resistance Movement, Bagwandeen said. African countries have also invited Chinese officials to visit and take part in exchange programmes and events. Bagwandeen said that in recent years, political parties from Djibouti, Burkina Faso, Chad, Egypt, Tunisia, Seychelles and Tanzania had invited party officials and delegations to visit their countries and attend political conferences. Beijing has used a mix of cadre training and exchanges, workshops, education initiatives and support to establish political party schools to strengthen ties with various African parties, without imposing Chinese-style governance, according to Bagwandeen. “China asserts that it does not attempt to force the Chinese model of governance and development on African countries … its training programmes and exchanges are only based on exchanges of opinions,” she said. “So, basically China invites African political party officials to study the Chinese way of governance and economic development, and it is entirely up to them if they choose to adopt aspects of the party’s development model and style of governance.”
