By Saul Molobi
If the morning sessions of the China–Africa Forum were about institutions and global governance, the second panel of day one shifted the focus decisively to something more intimate and arguably more powerful: people, stories and shared values.
Under the broad theme of China–Africa cultural exchange and mutual learning among civilizations, speakers from Uganda, China, Ghana and South Africa mapped out what a truly people-centred partnership between Africa and China could look like — and what still stands in the way.
What emerged was not a neat communiqué, but a compelling editorial message: without people-to-people connectivity, narrative sovereignty and ethical leadership, no amount of infrastructure or summits will transform the Global South’s place in the world.
From Voyages of Zheng He to Visas in Johannesburg: People First, or Not at All
Ugandan civil society leader Ms. Alawi Samantha grounded the discussion in history and lived experience.
She reminded delegates that China–Africa interaction predates modern diplomacy, going back to the voyages of Chinese admiral Zheng He to Africa in the early 15th century — a relationship, she pointedly noted, “not built on colonisation or slavery, but on exchange and service.” That historical memory, she argued, is one reason the two civilizations have never fundamentally clashed.
But Samantha’s most powerful intervention was not about the 1400s. It was about a chance encounter in 2018: struggling with luggage and language at a Chinese border station, she was helped by a 16-year-old boy who bought her train ticket, carried her suitcase and became a friend she still speaks to today.
That small story carried a big point: people-to-people cooperation is not only about elites, summits and MOUs. Sometimes it is about a teenager at a train station who quietly builds a bridge between continents.
At the same time, Samantha did not romanticise the present. She spoke bluntly about the difficulty of getting a visa from Uganda to South Africa — a process she described as “very, very unfair” compared to some European countries. How, she asked, can Africa preach unity and deeper cooperation with China when Africans themselves struggle to move freely between African states?
Her message was sharp: until Africans fix intra-African barriers — from restrictive visas to fragmented crisis responses, such as during COVID-19 — talk of a united African front in global affairs will ring hollow. Unity on paper, without freedom of movement for people, is just rhetoric.
Digital Payments, Design Weeks and the Battle for the Narrative
Samantha’s presentation also widened the definition of “civilization exchange” beyond the usual cultural diplomacy clichés.
She called for:
- Digital financial integration: scaling up cross-border payment systems so an African in Kampala can transact as easily with partners in China as a Beijinger pays via WeChat.
- Media pluralism: noting that in crises such as the war in Gaza, relying only on Western outlets like BBC and CNN would have left the world “in darkness”. Channels like CGTN and Al Jazeera, she argued, have been crucial in broadening perspectives.
- Pan-African media consolidation: urging African countries to consider backing the SABC as a continental voice that could match the scale and seriousness of Xinhua’s footprint in Africa.
- Cultural fusion: from African youth flocking to events like Shanghai Design Week to African fashion brands gaining traction in China, she argued that design and fashion are fast becoming key fronts of China–Africa civilizational exchange.
- Literary translation: if Chinese classics can be translated into African languages and English, why are only a handful of African literary giants like Chinua Achebe available in Chinese? Mutual respect, she suggested, requires two-way translation, not one-way admiration.
Running through her remarks was a constant refrain: put people at the centre, or we will betray the very idea of a “community with a shared future.” Here she quoted President Xi Jinping’s line that “the country is its people, and the people are the country”, challenging African leaders to adopt the same principle. If benefits go only to leaders, she warned, citizens will see continental cooperation as elite self-enrichment, not liberation.
“Understanding Africa”: A Chinese Journalist’s Answer to Stereotypes
A Chinese member of the China–Africa Fashion Association and the China Foundation for Human Rights Development followed with a very different but complementary lens: that of a Chinese journalist who has spent years living and working on the continent.
His personal project is literally called “Understanding Africa” — the name of his WeChat account — and his speech revolved around three virtues he believes define African civilization:
- Mutual Assistance – illustrated by the story of “Daniel”, a poor young man who, with the help of a local councillor, applied for and obtained a Chinese government scholarship that changed his life. This everyday solidarity, he argued, functions as a kind of informal social safety net and was also visible in the cross-border support shown during Africa’s anti-colonial struggles.
- Forgiveness and Tolerance – from Rwanda’s post-genocide reconciliation to South Africa’s transition from apartheid through a policy of national reconciliation, he described a continent that repeatedly chooses unity over vengeance.
- Pan-African Unity – tracing a line from the creation of the Organization of African Unity in 1963 to the African Union in 2002, he praised African leaders’ sustained commitment to integration and self-determination.
He echoed a phrase increasingly heard at conferences from Cairo to Addis Ababa: “The story of Africa should be told by Africans themselves.” But he argued that Chinese and African media have a shared responsibility: to resist anti-globalisation trends, break cultural barriers and combine “ancient wisdom” from both civilizations into a new, shared narrative for the 21st century.
His invitation to participate in the upcoming China–Africa Year of People-to-People Exchanges was more than ceremonial; it was a call for joint narrative construction — and a reminder that journalism and fashion are both powerful vehicles for civilizational exchange.
Ghana News Agency: If Algorithms Don’t Learn Us, They Will Erase Us
From there, the panel shifted to media infrastructure and narrative power.
The General Manager of the Ghana News Agency spoke not only as an executive, but as “a storyteller from Africa, standing with fellow voices of the Global South.” His remarks were a sharp editorial on the global information ecosystem.
He argued that:
- Reforming global governance is more than getting extra seats in international institutions; it is about resetting the norms of justice, inclusion and partnership.
- Western media dominance, misinformation and “algorithmic bias” routinely distort or erase Global South realities.
- As he put it: “If we do not tell our stories, others will — and they will not tell them well.”
Drawing inspiration from Kwame Nkrumah, who created the Ghana News Agency so that a newly independent Ghana could speak for itself, he proposed building a South–South news content exchange:
- Powered by AI tools that understand African languages,
- Able to span geographies and capture the continent’s diversity,
- And designed to ensure that African voices and cultures have a strong digital future, not just a nostalgic past.
His warning was stark and memorable:
“If algorithms do not understand us, they will erase us.”
He linked this media agenda to Africa’s growing political assertiveness, noting calls by leaders such as John Dramani Mahama and William Ruto for a permanent African seat on the UN Security Council. Political representation without narrative power, he suggested, is a half-revolution.
UNISA’s Dean: AfCFTA, Belt and Road, and the Leadership We Don’t Yet Have
The Executive Dean and CEO of the UNISA Graduate School of Business Leadership brought the conversation back to a hard economic question: Why does Africa still trade more with the rest of the world than with itself?
Despite the launch of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) and the removal of many tariffs, intra-African trade remains below 20%. The problem, she argued, is no longer primarily tariffs, but non-tariff barriers:
- Poor infrastructure,
- Colonial borders set at the Berlin Conference,
- Weak regional integration in parts of the continent.
Here, she credited China with confronting Africa’s most material constraint: infrastructure. Through the Belt and Road Initiative, Beijing has not just produced declarations but put “trillions” on the table to build hard and financial infrastructure that can knit African markets together.
But she flipped the question: What does Africa bring to this partnership?
Beyond natural resources, she highlighted:
- Over 41,000 kilometres of coastline,
- A critical role in the maritime and digital Silk Roads,
- And the potential to be a major connector of the Global South.
Yet she was frank that Africa often lacks the competencies and leadership to fully exploit these assets. The real crisis, in her view, is a crisis of leadership and “soft power capacity”:
- South Africa remains trapped in poverty, inequality and corruption,
- while China has lifted more than 600 million people out of poverty in three decades.
She suggested Africa should study:
- The ethical underpinnings of Confucianism, which leave little moral space for corruption;
- China’s strategic use of Special Economic Zones and rural–urban integration to tackle inequality.
Her call was not for blind imitation, but for serious, systematic learning. Academic institutions like UNISA, she argued, must build research partnerships with Chinese counterparts to derive concrete governance and leadership lessons, especially in sectors like maritime studies, where Africa’s coastline could be a transformative asset rather than a missed opportunity.
Media and Think Tanks as “Two Wings” of a Shared Future
The final speaker, representing an African professional journalists’ consortium, offered a neat conceptual frame: media and think tanks are the “two wings” of China–Africa civilizational exchange.
- Media tell the stories, record the history and shape public opinion.
- Think tanks research, analyse and offer policy guidance.
Without these two wings, he argued, the “bird” of China–Africa cooperation cannot fly far, nor can it carry the weight of reforming global governance.
His core question mirrored the tone of the entire panel:
How do we, as communicators and analysts, help the world see a true, three-dimensional picture of China–Africa cooperation, rather than caricatures and clichés?
His answer was clear: by identifying shared values, explaining the logic of cooperation, and insisting on win–win outcomes grounded in the real needs of ordinary people.
Conclusion: Infrastructure Alone Won’t Change the World
If there was one unifying editorial thread running through this second panel, it was this:
Bridges made of steel and fibre optics matter.
But bridges made of trust, stories, ethics and leadership will decide whether the Global South truly rises together.
From Samantha’s visa struggle and train-station encounter, to calls for AI-driven South–South media networks, to UNISA’s insistence on leadership and governance reform, the panel made a powerful case:
- China–Africa cooperation has moved beyond contracts and construction sites.
- The next frontier is civilizational and human:
- narrative control,
- cultural fusion,
- digital and financial interconnection,
- and above all, people-centred leadership.
If Africa can first unite its own people, open its own borders, and build its own narrative and leadership capacity — and if China continues to match words with infrastructure, respect and mutual learning — then the oft-repeated phrase “community with a shared future for mankind” may finally begin to take real, tangible shape in the daily lives of ordinary Africans and Chinese alike.