Courcy’s Intelligence Brief

In a week where China has been turning on the charm with Seoul and Tokyo (see above), we have been reminded of an important additional point about the US’s struggle to cope with the rise of China, namely that countries such as India are not prepared to be treated as a ‘card’ to be played in some grand geopolitical game of poker between the US and China.

This reminder was provided by a senior Indian official travelling with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh during his visit to Ethiopia for the Second Africa-India Summit, which was opened on 24 May and attended by 15 African countries.

In the lead-up to the summit much was written in the Western press about how India lags behind China in African investment.  India’s trade with Africa amounts to $40bn a year, but this is dwarfed by China which does about three times as much business with the continent, and it has been widely suggested that Singh’s 6-day tour is part of a concerted Indian attempt to catch up that is inspired by competition with China.

However, a senior Indian official accompanying Prime Minister Singh complained on 24 May that the West was trying to portray the engagement in Africa of both China and India in a negative light to protect its own vested interests.

He said: “The West is setting up Africa as a zone of contention.  They want to play India against China.  They want us to be at each other’s throat.”

Interestingly, and probably correctly, this senior Indian official also pointed out that China and India have very different approaches to investment in Africa that are complementary rather than conflicting.  He said that while China’s focus in Africa is mostly focused on major government-to-government projects in infrastructure, raw materials, and extractive industries, India was more interested in smaller scale private-sector projects scattered throughout the continent.

As the official put it: “We feel there is enough space for India and what it is good at, especially capacity-building, skills development and training.”