How Japan is countering China in race for Africa

‘Growing together’. President Museveni (in white shirt) and Japanese state minister for foreign affairs Masahisa Sato (3rd right) commission the New Nile Bridge on Wednesday. PHOTO BY DENIS EDEMA

What you need to know:

  • Strategy. Turning to Africa is seen as part of Japan’s recovery strategy from the long-term stagnation of its economy since the 1990s, but also in light of the fact all other world powers are outwitting each other for a pie of the continent, Frederic Musisi writes.

For the fifth year running, Tateno Elementary School tucked away deep inside Yokohama—Japan’s second largest city—has been implementing the “One School, One Country” policy where students of twelfth grade are taught about an African country. When I visited the school early this month, Ghana was the country of study.

Uganda is yet to be taught, but some students who had watched the hit superhero movie Black Panther could not hold back both their excitement and curiosity whether Uganda had a connection with Wakanda, the fictional country sited in sub-Saharan Africa where Marvel/Disney’s hit movie was set.

For every country introduced every year, the school’s principal, Mr Ishibashi Takashi, explains, the school invites embassy officials of the 35 African countries that have diplomatic presence in Japan to speak to the twelfth graders (primary seven in Ugandan standards).

The talks by embassy officials are complimented by other literature, to prepare students and widen their understanding and recognition of Africa which is touted as the next frontier, from resources, markets to destination of foreign direct investments.

The policy, one of the packages in the Japan-Africa charm offensive, was conceived in 2008 during the fourth Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD) held in Japan. In 2016, with consensus of the African Union, the TICAD summit was convened in Nairobi, Kenya, and attended by some 30 African heads of states, during which the Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe announced a $30b (Shs132b) investment package for Africa.

“This is an investment that has faith in Africa’s future, an investment for Japan and Africa to grow together,” Mr Abe remarked in 2016. The $30b, for investment in ‘quality’ infrastructure, promoting resilient health systems and stability around the continent, was spread out over a period of five years.

The decision to hold TICAD VI in Kenya—the first time since the TICAD was conceived 25 years ago— was a watershed in Japanese–African relations, but undoubtedly on the back of multiple geopolitical factors, chief among others, China’s expanding footprint.
During the 2013 TICAD V Tokyo committed $32 billion to fund a six-pillar Action Plan for 2013-2018.

Senior Japanese diplomats in the various interviews preceding this month’s summit told this newspaper that African ministers will “review progress on disbursement of the last commitment and lay agenda for the next summit in 2019”.

In a separate interview, the director general of the African Affairs department in the ministry, Mr Shigeru Ushio, said “that philosophy is borne out of the fact that Japan is a country without significant natural resources but with only efforts of its people managed to transform from an aid receiver to a giver”.

Besides the $30b, prime minister Abe also announced training for some 18,000 Africans to improve the continent’s human resource at Japanese universities through scholarships, while another 20,000 would be trained to tackle infectious diseases.
Japan’s overall development assistance to Uganda since bilateral cooperation between the two countries was established has reached Shs4.4 trillion ($1.2b) in form of loans, grants and technical assistance.

While certainly Tokyo has capacity to offer more, both the ministry of Foreign Affairs and government overseas development agency, JICA officials reinforced that the swelling debt burden—particularly to China—by nearly all African governments is the major stumbling block.

“We would like to invest more and more but because of your government’s debt burden you find that many interested recipient countries cannot guarantee payback,” said Mr Takashi Chikayo, JICA’s deputy director for Africa. “For us we think our approach should be different.”

Enter the Indo-Pacific strategy
Just like China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), launched by president Xi Jinping in 2013 to enhance connectivity through some 65 countries and gathering 62 per cent of the world population from mainland China through Asia, Europe and Africa, Japan is likewise armed to the teeth with the ‘Free and Open Indo-Pacific strategy’.

The strategy, officials indicated, was flagged during the TICAD summit in Nairobi as “key for stability and prosperity of the international community” created by linking Asia and Africa through the Pacific-Indian Oceans pathway.

There is divisive debate on the motives behind Beijing’s BRI strategy: some scholars argue it is network of interlinked infrastructure (roads and railway) while others say it is a “smart power strategy”—a mishmash of cultural power and economic power through which China envisions to become the next big power, by first enmeshing in the emerging economies of Eurasia, Africa and South America. The proposed investments in BRI is about $4 trillion.

Japanese diplomats said “it is not a competition per se” and as such they neither have a proposed investment figure nor timeline for solidifying the Indo-Pacific strategy “but theirs is, and Tokyo has always been and will be committed to promoting peace, stability and prosperity in the indo-pacific region.”

Shift. Since TICAD III in 2003, Japan has shifted increasingly from diplomacy based on the extraction of resources to infrastructure building and more market-oriented investments, with the support of public funding. The race for Africa will only get interesting to watch with time.