China is responsible for the Covid-19 pandemic and should cancel Africa's debt

The responsibility, at least moral, of China in the propagation of the Covid-19 pandemic is not in doubt as I already demonstrated in April 2020 in my article for the French newspaper Le Figaro: "We will have to demand from China a reparation of the damage suffered” The Chinese regime has hidden the truth and allowed the spread of a coronavirus that could have been eradicated before it left the city of Wuhan and China. According to journalist Josephine Ma of the Hong Kong newspaper South China Morning Post, who was able to access confidential government documents: "The first confirmed case of Covid-19 in China was on November 17. Then 9 patients were identified at the end of November 2019 and 27 in mid-December 2019. But the Chinese dictatorship preferred to muzzle the press and medical speech. In the article " Widespread Outcry in China Over Death of Coronavirus Doctor” published on February 7, 2020 in the New York Times, the journalist Li Yuan described the protest in China after the death of Dr. Wenliang, arrested by the Chinese power for having launched the alert at the end of December. In addition, CNN unveiled on December 1, 2020 a 117-page confidential document from the Hubei Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention that further damns Beijing.     

The Beijing government was certainly aware of the risk of a global pandemic 

It is unlikely that Xi Jinping has forgotten the SARS-CoV epidemic that killed 800 people in 2002/2003. Its mode of human-to-human transmission, animal origin and type of pulmonary complication were similar. Although Beijing was well aware of the highly contagious nature of the coronavirus and the risk of a global pandemic, it maintained preparations for the Chinese New Year celebration, which was scheduled for January 25 but was eventually cancelled. These activities were very crowded, and an interactive map of travel in the Wuhan epicenter region published by the New York Times "How the Virus Got Out" showed that 7 million travelers left the city before the January 23, 2020 containment order. It is not known how many of them then spread the Chinese virus mainly by train across China and by plane to the four corners of the world. But now, the official number of deaths worldwide directly caused by Covid-19, reaches 2 million to which should be added the millions of patients who succumb to pathologies that cannot be treated because of the saturation of hospitals. However, the Chinese government prefers to take refuge in denial and only accepts, more than one year after the appearance of the virus, to welcome a WHO investigation mission.   

When the culprit distributes alms 

The distribution in Africa of masks, medical products or body bags and the alms, here and there, of a few million euros, which glorify the alleged Chinese generosity, are not equal to the dramas and the degradation of the African economy. According to the report "Africa's Pulse", the situation will get worse: "The pandemic risks pushing 40 million Africans into extreme poverty, erasing at least five years of progress in the fight against poverty. ". The opinion of the president of the African Development Bank (AfDB) Akinwumi Adesina may also worry "Africa has lost more than a decade of gains in economic growth.

Significant assistance from international financial institutions could prove indispensable, but the significant indebtedness of some African countries to China and their dependence on Beijing could sometimes compromise this recourse. It is therefore essential that China assume its responsibility and at least erase the debt it holds with Africa, which, according to experts, constitutes 40% of the total African debt, i.e. approximately 150 billion dollars, even if this gesture would only partially compensate for the damage suffered by the African continent.  

Francis JOURNOT is a consultant, entrepreneur and former publisher of professional press (economics and social). He is doing research in economics for the International Convention for a Global Minimum Wage. He leads Plan de régionalisation de production Europe or Africa Atlantic Axis and runs the site Collectivité Nationale .