Source:  https://africachinapresscentre.org/focac-25-nigerian-chinese-experts-appraise-body-as-huge-success/

By Ikenna Emewu

From Left: Consul General Yan Yuqing, Ikenna Emewu, and Mr. Wole Adeniyi

International experts from Nigeria and China, including the diplomatic corps, gave a positive appraisal of the Forum on China Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) in Lagos on Tuesday at the summit to celebrate the 25 years of the multilateral diplomatic framework.

The experts drawn from diplomats, journalists, academia, policymakers, and others agreed that FOCAC has been a symbol of success in diplomatic engagement, especially for the Global South.

In all its areas of focus – education, economy, culture, security, IT rave, and others, the summit that focused on: Towards a Sustainability of the Fruitful Diplomacy Between China and Africa, agreed that FOCAC has beaten the odds and exceeded the projected mileage.

The summit hosted at Lilygate Hotel, Lekki, Lagos was declared open through a speech by the Chinese Consul General, Ms. Yan Yuqing, and followed by the speech by the Director General of the Institute of African Studies, Zhejiang Normal University, China, Prof. Liu Hongwu.

Ikenna Emewu, Editor-in-Chief of Africa China Economy Magazine, one of the host agencies, also spoke glowingly of the FOCAC strides, especially in creating and facilitating intra-African connectivities and growth.

It was one of the Lagos Forum series of discourses on China-Nigeria and China-Africa strategic partnerships on the FOCAC and Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) arrangements.

At this summit, it was an elite dialogue to celebrate the 25 years of successful diplomacy and also to chart a course for the future.

In addition to the opening session that had two major speeches, the discourse session featured six thematic papers by speakers.

Yan Yuqing

“Over the past 25 years, FOCAC has grown rapidly and vigorously, driving China-Africa cooperation to its best period in history and becoming a model of solidarity and collaboration among the Global South.

During these 25 years, the trade volume between China and Africa has increased 27 times, while China’s direct investment stock in Africa has expanded more than 80-fold. China has helped Africa build or upgrade nearly 100,000 (One hundred thousands)  kilometers of roads and more than 10,000 (Ten thousands) kilometers of railways. In just the past three years, Chinese enterprises have created over 1.1 million jobs across the continent.

The 2024 FOCAC Beijing Summit set a new milestone for China-Africa relations. China and Africa have embarked on a new journey toward building a China-Africa community with a shared future in the new era, while China-Nigeria relations have reached a new height as a comprehensive strategic partnership. At the Summit, President Xi Jinping proposed Six Principles for China and Africa to Pursue Modernization Together and the “Ten Partnership Actions,” which have drawn a new blueprint and provided new momentum for high-quality China-Africa cooperation.

Since the Summit, China’s new investment in Africa has exceeded 13.3 billion yuan, and the total amount of financial support has surpassed 150 billion yuan. The zero-tariff policy covering 100% of taxable items from the least developed countries having diplomatic ties with China has been fully implemented. In 2024, China-Africa trade reached a historic high of nearly 300 billion US dollars. These facts once again demonstrate that China-Africa cooperation holds enormous potential and an even brighter future.”

Her speech also focused on China’s 15th five-year development plan that was heralded in the third week of October. And on this new growth era, she noted that: “From October 20 to 23, 2025, the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) was successfully convened. The most important outcome of this session was the adoption of the Proposals of the CPC Central Committee on Formulating the 15th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development, which provides the top-level design and strategic blueprint for China’s development over the next five years.

The session set seven major goals for the coming period: first, to achieve notable progress in high-quality development; second, to significantly enhance technological self-reliance and innovation capacity; third, to make new breakthroughs in comprehensively deepen reform; fourth, to elevate the level of social and cultural advancement; fifth, to continuously improve the quality of people’s lives; sixth, to make new and major progress in building a Beautiful China; and seventh, to further consolidate the national security framework.

To accomplish these goals, the session laid out twelve strategic tasks, including building a modern industrial system, accelerating technological self-reliance, expanding the domestic market, and promoting high-level opening-up.

The scientific formulation and continuous implementation of the Five-Year Plans have been an important governance practice and a unique political advantage of the Communist Party of China. From the first plan in 1953 to the upcoming 15th Five-Year Plan in 2025, these plans have guided China in achieving development miracles rarely seen in human history—transforming the country from a poor agricultural nation into the world’s largest manufacturing powerhouse and the second-largest economy.”

L-R (front row), Prof Efem Ubi, Prof. Wu Shuang, CG Yan, and Emewu

Ikenna Emewu

Taking a look at how FOCAC has made Africa interconnect and know each other better, he listed the various areas of the intra-connectivity to include transportation infrastructure, digital economy, trade, aviation, human capital, and others that have been contributing enormously in moving Africa fast in the growth tracks.

“China’s cooperation with Africa, mainly through the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) and later the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) since 2017, and direct bilateral agreements have delivered some of the biggest international infrastructure projects on the African continent.

These projects go beyond national borders and play a strategic role in regional integration, trade, economic and educational interaction, and connectivity. However, beyond the physical projects, there are so many intangible ways that FOCAC has played prominent roles in introducing and linking Africa with Africa much more than what was obtained intra-Africa before FOCAC.

In most of the discourses about this framework of strategic partnerships between 54 countries and the African Union Commission, this aspect of intra-African relations is scarcely remembered as also important.

Having been a participant in the FOCAC agenda in so many ways – at the research, journalistic, conference, academic, diplomatic levels, etc, I have witnessed these intra-Africa connectivities so well. Surprisingly, they are hardly spoken about, even though they have played key roles in Africa’s growth and advancement among the different countries. The impacts have facilitated the agglutinating and cohesive growth of Africa in the past 25 years.

 For the transportation infrastructure, Emewu listed railways, roads, bridges, etc, with major instances such as the Addis Ababa – Djibouti railway link that connects landlocked Ethiopia to the sea and eases its maritime business with the railway handling the country’s 95% maritime concerns.

“In the energy and power sector, there have been projects financed and constructed by China that today unify and grow Africa, especially the Zambia-Tanzania-Kenya Power Interconnector, which is supported by Chinese financing and built by companies from China. The project links the Southern African Power Pool (SAPP) with the Eastern Africa Power Pool (EAPP).

It has greatly enhanced cross-border electricity trade, just like the Inga Dam Projects (DRC), with regional grid extensions. Chinese companies such as Sinohydro, China Three Gorges, involved in feasibility and construction, played outstanding roles in creating the reality.”

He also noted that in the aviation sector, China has handled or is handling a total of 78 airports in Africa, and most of them are funded by the China Eximbank.

China’s digital and tech infrastructure has been a major support to the African Union’s digital integration goals.

“China’s support for AU digital integration is multi-faceted, involving infrastructure, technology transfer, capacity building, and strategic partnerships, including:

Core infrastructure development, the most visible form of support. Chinese tech giants, primarily Huawei, ZTE, and China Telecom, have played a crucial role in developing critical digital infrastructure across the continent. The project is designed to supply power not only to the DRC but also to South Africa, Zambia, and other Southern African states.”

Wole Adeniyi

L-R: Mr. Yang of CCECC Lagos office and other dignitaries

The Chief Executive Officer of Stanbic IBTC Bank, a partner of Standard Chartered Bank that also has a shareholding with the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC), spoke glowingly about the possibilities the bank has created in financing businesses and digital infrastructure that encourage growth between China and Africa on the FOCAC framework.

He spoke mainly on how the digital economy has been adopted to make business easier and encourage investments.

He said, “Reflecting on the past 25 years, we see a narrative of success: infrastructure rising from the ground, trade volumes soaring, and diplomatic ties strengthening. But as we stand on this 25-year milestone, our gaze must be fixed firmly on the future—on a journey that will carry our partnership for the next 25 years and beyond. The critical question before us is: How do we make this fruitful partnership truly sustainable?

The answer, I believe, lies in strategically intertwining our economies with the threads of the Digital Revolution.
The traditional pillars of our cooperation—resources, infrastructure, and finance—have served us well. At Stanbic IBTC, backed by our shareholder ICBC, we have been proud to facilitate this progress, financing the projects that connect our nations and power our economies. This foundation is strong. But to build a skyscraper that reaches into the future, we must add new, dynamic floors.
Digitalization is not just a sector; it is the new ecosystem in which all other sectors—agriculture, healthcare, education, and manufacturing—will thrive. It is Africa’s trillion-dollar opportunity. It aligns perfectly with the development goals of African nations and China’s expertise in creating integrated digital societies.

We witnessed this first-hand during my team’s visit to Hangzhou last year. Beyond the beautiful West Lake, we saw a city powered by code and innovation. We saw how platforms like Alipay and WeChat Pay created a seamless economic fabric. We saw the birthplaces of tech giants and the “Digital Dragons” that are now leading in AI and robotics. This is not a foreign future; it is a blueprint for our own.”

Efem Ubi

Professor Ubi, the Director of Studies at, Nigerian Institute of African Studies, focused his discussion on how China, through FOCAC, has played a commendable role in mitigating insecurity in African countries.

“There is no gainsaying the fact that Africa has come to occupy a strategic position in China’s foreign policy. However, what sets China apart from other external actors in its dealings with the African continent is its special relationships with countries on the continent. The most interesting aspect of this relationship is the People’s Republic of China’s recent special role in Africa’s peace and security. The country is injecting new thinking and strategies for peace and security that require breaking away from historical and Western security constructs.

In the second China-Africa whitepaper Policy (2015). The fundamental elements of the second China-Africa policy were three critical dimensions: safeguarding Africa’s peace and security.

China will support Africa in realizing peace and security by promoting African solutions to African problems, while maintaining its principles of non-interference and non-intervention in the internal affairs of African countries.

The Chinese government will strengthen and deepen military exchanges and cooperation with African countries through military-related technological cooperation, joint military training and exercises, and training of African military personnel according to the needs of the recipient country.

China will support Africa in confronting non-traditional security threats by strengthening cooperation with Africa through intelligence gathering, sharing, and capacity building, as well as through a multilateral framework.”

Misty Uba

The communication engineer took his focus on how China, through FOCAC, migrated and adjusted its gaze in relationship with Africa from a physical backbone to a digital brain, which is a shift from raw infrastructure to the digital growth of Africa and Nigeria.

He cited a lot of instances where Chinese technology and equipment have been facilitators of the digital rave on the continent.

“Since around 2015, there has been a deliberate and strategic pivot towards the digital and knowledge economy.

This topic allows for a critical stocktaking of this fundamental shift—from building Africa’s physical backbone to aspiring to build its digital brain.

From 2015 to 2025, Chinese companies significantly bolstered Nigeria’s digital sector through projects that expanded telecommunications infrastructure, digital television access, E-Commerce, Fintech, and ICT capacity. These initiatives are often linked to China’s Digital Silk Road and Belt and Road Initiative, demonstrating a strategic expansion of China’s technological influence in Africa.

L-R Mr. Sam Obasi and Mr. Cyril Ironsi, dignitaries in attendance

The “Digital Silk Road”: Explicitly linking FOCAC goals with China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) tech dimension. E-Commerce and Fintech: Promotion of platforms like OPay,

PalmPay, and Temu, are primarily backed by Chinese technology and investment.

Jumia: Though Jumia is a pan-African company without Chinese ownership, it has heavily incorporated Chinese tech and business models. A significant increase in training programs for Nigerian, African engineers, tech entrepreneurs, and government officials in areas like AI, big data, and cloud computing.

Numerous Chinese technology companies, government initiatives, and academic programs have provided training for Nigerian and other African professionals in areas like AI, big data, and cloud computing.

Key examples include Huawei’s extensive ICT academy network and the Chinese government’s official training seminars. ICT Academies: Huawei has partnered with many Nigerian universities, such as Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), to create Huawei

ICT Academies (HIAs).”

Nik Ogbulie

The seasoned economic journalist and World Bank expert took his discussion from the standpoint of eroding biases and entrenched stereotypes about Chinese products, which he argued had already left the domain of the substandard to the manufacturer for the whole world.

“Over the last 25 years, China has become one of Africa’s largest trading partners and investors. However, this growth has also raised concerns about debt sustainability, environmental impact, and cultural exchange. As Africans it’s time to reevaluate our relationship with China and work towards a more equitable and sustainable partnership. It could be fine if Africa, in the course of this relationship, can use the new closeness and seize this opportunity to redefine our cooperation, prioritize our shared interests, and build a brighter future for generations to come. This becomes imperative based on the fact that there is a lot to gain from a country that has been everything to the world to the extent that its ingenuity has belied the insignia which it has earned for itself some thirty years ago. Biases notwithstanding, the story of the China-African relationship is gradually shifting from that of the blind man and the elephant. This story is now more like what the blind man touches is exactly what it is.

Buttressing his points on how the biases of old have been overtaken by today’s realities, he noted that “The quality of manufactured goods exported to Africa from China has likely improved in certain areas, particularly in green technologies and renewable energy products. Chinese exports to Africa have surged, with a 25% year-on-year increase to $122 billion, driven by demand for infrastructure projects, machinery, and clean energy solutions. Some key trends in Chinese exports to Africa include renewable Energy: Solar panel exports to Africa jumped 60% in the 12 months through June, indicating improved technology and competitiveness in the green sector. Electric Vehicles: Sales of electric vehicles and related components are growing, reflecting China’s advancements in green technology. Construction Machinery: Exports of construction machinery surged 63% year-on-year, suggesting improvements in manufacturing and engineering capabilities.”

Prof. Wu Shuang,

The Chinese Director of the Confucius Institute, University of Lagos, appreciated the growth of the education and human capital partnership of China and Africa, especially through the Confucius Institutes all over Africa. She analysed how the Institute has awarded scholarships to African scholars, not just in Chinese language and culture, but also in other areas and disciplines of interest.

She vowed that the Institute would do more and better in sustaining the ideals of encouraging education partnerships, as such relationships would make the two worlds know each other better and relate better also at the people-to-people level.