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There is a country in Africa that signed a contract of 10 billion yuan with China in 2013, but in 2019 it directly tore up the agreement and stopped the project engineering of Chinese-funded enterprises.
Moreover, all Chinese engineers were repatriated, resulting in tens of billions of dollars in losses for the mainland.
However, two years later, the country ran back to China with an old face.
Hopefully, China will once again come to the aid of interrupted infrastructure projects.
In other words, which country is so skinless and faceless? What did the mainland do in the end?
The origin of China-Tanzania relations
The country mentioned at the beginning is called Tanzania, which is a tropical country in East Africa.
Before 1963, Tanzania was a dependency of others, such as the United Kingdom.
In World War II, the German army came to Africa, defeated the British army in one fell swoop, and occupied the British colonies, including Tanzania.
After Germany's defeat, Britain continued to take over Tanzania, a colonial relationship that lasted nearly 20 years.
In the 60s of the last century, Tanzania saw that many countries in Africa began to fight for independence, so it also had the idea of independence.
It just so happened that President Nyerere was a political strongman, so he took control of the army himself and drove the British colonists out.
Tanzania was then declared independent.
Of course, if Tanzania declares its independence on its own, it is pure "self-hi".
After all, in that international environment, if a small country wanted to become independent, it had to seek the support of a large country.
Otherwise, sooner or later it will be annexed by other countries.
At this time, China stood up and announced its support for Tanzania's independence, which gave Tanzania a firm foothold in the international arena.
In this way, Tanzania and China became acquainted for the first time.
After the establishment of the country, the next step is to consider the issue of development.
At that time, Tanzania had nothing to offer, the economy was in ruins, the people were destitute, and many people were struggling below the poverty line.
President Nyerere looked around the country and found that Tanzania had few industries other than resources.
Nyerere thought to himself that it would be a good thing if Tanzania could make a fortune selling resources, as the Soviet Union did.
So he set his sights on resources.
However, although Tanzania is rich in mineral resources, it does not have the mining equipment of the Soviet Union, let alone an extensive transportation system.
In this case, it is simply a fool's dream to dig up resources and sell them for money.
In desperation, Nyerere could only ask for help from European and American countries at that time.
After all, in terms of mining, European and American countries are well-known veterans, and all kinds of pits in the world are basically blown up by Europe and the United States.
Moreover, at that time, European and American countries not only provided mining technology, but also provided project loans to resource countries.
It can be said that when you are sleepy, you will send pillows, and directly make Nyerere hungry.
Under the influence of this psychology, Nyerere happily approached the Western countries and hoped that they would help him mine.
Nyerere originally thought that Western countries would help themselves like Saudi Arabia, but unexpectedly, this time directly ate a closed door.
The main reason why Western countries do not want to see Nyerere is because they find it not cost-effective to invest in Tanzania.
After all, the strategic value of the Middle East is much greater than that of Africa, and instead of spending energy to reclaim Africa, it is better to make money directly lying in the Middle East oil countries.
In this way, Nyerere's first investment did not get.
China's strong assistance
It was at this time that Nyerere remembered his old friend in the East, China.
However, when Nyerere thinks that China is also in the development stage, and the infrastructure in all aspects of the country is not perfect, how can he help a foreign country to build infrastructure?
So he has been in an ambivalent state of mind.
In the end, after careful consideration, Nyerere decided to pluck up the courage to seek China to support him.
In 1970, Nyerere came to China and met Chairman Mao and Premier Zhou.
After explaining his intentions to Chairman Mao, he thought Chairman Mao would reject the proposal. Unexpectedly, Chairman Mao directly agreed to this aid plan with a wave of his pen.
At the same time, Premier Zhou also said that the mainland is willing to fund Tanzania's construction.
After hearing this, Nyerere was overjoyed and almost regarded China as a food and clothing parent. In this way, the construction of a railway across Tanzania officially began.
During this period, Zambia also approached China in the hope that China could help them build a railway.
So the mainland engineers simply built a 1,860-kilometer railway connecting Zambia and Tanzania.
In this way, won't the economies of the two countries be revitalized?
After 5 years of construction, the Tanzania-Zambia Railway was finally completed.
With this railway, the economic development of the people of East and West Africa has achieved a qualitative leap.
It can be said that in terms of assistance to Africa, the continent says second, and no one dares to say first.
Construction of the Port of Bagamoyo
By 2013, Tanzania's leaders saw how fast the mainland Shenzhen was growing and wanted to learn from the Shenzhen model.
However, a port is essential to run a special economic zone.
Because only the port can carry such a large cargo volume, if you rely on some green cars, it is estimated that it will take the year of the monkey to develop into the model of Shenzhen.
As a result, Tanzania began to put port construction on the agenda.
According to the old rules, this time I am still looking for China, after all, the Tanzania-Zambia railway brought great benefits to Tanzania.
To this day, the Tanzania-Zambia Railway is still in full swing in the territory of Tanzania and Zambia, bringing countless wealth to the people of the two countries.
Therefore, it is inevitable that this port construction will find China.
According to the signed agreement, the project, called Port Bagamoyo, has a total investment of $10 billion.
In the early stage, the Chinese side will provide financial and technical support, and after the completion of the project, the mainland can have the right to use the port for 99 years.
After the memorandum of cooperation was signed, both parties were happy.
Because this port will not only double Tanzania's domestic economy, but also serve as a freight hub, connecting the Middle East to Africa for Belt and Road projects.
No matter how you look at it, it is a win-win situation.
The project is abruptly interrupted
However, when the project was under construction in 2015, there was a moth on the Tanzanian side.
This year, a new president, Magufuli, came to power.
Since then, he has been critical of the mainland's construction progress, citing various engineering problems.
For example, the project does not meet the standards of African countries, and the materials used are unqualified.
Anyway, as long as he seized the opportunity, he "wholeheartedly" prevented our staff from carrying out construction.
Later, it was the mainland government personnel who personally came forward and held many negotiations with various departments in Tanzania, which solved these problems one by one.
Later, Magufuli refused to pay the project funds on the grounds that the lease period was too long.
After seeing this situation, our side realized that something seemed to be wrong with the Tanzanian side, so we investigated the details of various projects in Tanzania.
After some investigation, it was learned that it turned out that he had reached a cooperative relationship with Britain long before Magufuli came to power.
With the support of the United Kingdom, Magufuli successfully became president. That being the case, it makes sense to help Britain work.
As for why Magufuli is blocking the project of Chinese companies, it is mainly because the UK is also interested in the project.
Once the port of Bagamoyo is built, British ships will be able to travel directly to Africa through the Strait of Gibraltar.
This is extremely important for the extension of British political influence.
Moreover, Britain has been in decline for half a century.
If you can return to the top through this route, it will definitely go down in history.
So the British also covet three points for Port Bagamoyo.
In this case, Britain can only instruct Magufuli to obstruct the construction of Chinese projects in every way, so as to provide an opportunity for Britain to enter.
During this period, Britain pulled Japan in an attempt to take the port of Bagamoyo completely with Japanese technology and British funds.
In order to smoothly replace Chinese-funded enterprises, British Prime Minister Carmela even announced:
"If the UK undertakes to build this port, the project cost will be lower than China's, and the quality of the project will be better than China!"
After Magufuli was fooled by Carmela's rhetoric, he directly stopped the construction of Chinese-funded enterprises in 2019.
In Magufuli's view, as long as the British father makes a move, won't the port come to hand? Why do we need China at this time?
The British are unreliable
Unfortunately, Magufuli overestimated the infrastructure capacity of Britain and Japan.
After evaluating the project, engineers and technicians in the UK and Japan found that the technical difficulties were too great and the funding gap was too large.
Once the port is built, no $20 billion will basically cover the entire project expenditure.
In this case, Britain and Japan can only choose to withdraw.
After all, Haikou was boasted that the construction cost would be lower than China, but now the calculated cost is twice that of China? How else can this be profitable?
As a result, the UK began to withdraw investment from the project, and even some of the equipment that China had left there was taken away.
For Britain's sudden runaway, Tanzania dares to be angry and dare not speak.
After all, Britain used to be the suzerainty of Tanzania, and even if Britain is unreasonable, Tanzania does not dare to complain.
In this way, the construction progress of the port of Bagamoyo was directly cut off.
This break was directly interrupted for 2 years.
In the past two years, Tanzanian President Magufuli has repeatedly tried to seek help from China, but he has finally been unable to open his mouth.
After all, the things that were done back then were so desperate, and now you want to continue the frontier? Who gave you courage?
This situation continued until 2021, when Magufuli died and a new president took the throne, and Sino-Tanzanian relations returned to normal.
The new president did not be as unreasonable as Magufuli, but treated China as a guest of honor and kindly invited China back.
It was only then that the mainland re-engaged with the Port of Bagamoyo project and transferred the project back to the original construction process.
A big chess game for China
It is worth mentioning that during these two years, the mainland has not been idle, but has engaged in construction in a country called Djibouti in Africa.
Like Tanzania, the mainland helped Djibouti build a port.
The port is said to control the entire Bab el-Mandeb Strait and carries 14% of the world's cargo traffic.
Once completed, Djibouti's economic growth rate could increase tenfold, and the mainland's cargo volume on Belt and Road projects will increase considerably.
Most importantly, the port can be linked to the port of Bagamoyo in Tanzania.
As long as there is a cargo crisis in one of the ports, the other port can be called up at any time for emergency and carry a part of the cargo.
In this way, the continent is playing a big chess game in Africa.
It is a pity that some leaders in Tanzania could not understand the trend of this chess game, and thought that Chinese just wanted to make their money, and in the end they were fooled and misled by the British.
In this sense, everything China does in Africa is for the common interests of both China and Africa.
As long as the African people follow China's footsteps, they will surely move to the other side of victory.
After all, in this treacherous world, it seems that there is no second country more reliable than China.
end
In general, the reason why Tanzania broke the treaty was mainly taken to the pit by the British.
They thought that Britain, like China, would spare no effort to help them in economic construction. As everyone knows, the British just want to make their money and block China's One Belt, One Road initiative.
As for what Tanzania has developed, Britain does not care at all.
Fortunately, Tanzania finally lost its way and regained its friendship with China, which put the relationship between the two countries on the right track.
Otherwise, Tanzania is expected to remain below the poverty line forever and never see the light of day.