Chinese investments in Africa are now spreading their tentacles to media industry. The country's aggressive expansion, with the launching of a Chinese Pan-African news channel, CCTV Africa, highlights a change in Chinese media policy. But the question remains: what does this imply?
It looks very much like Al-Jazeera English or BBC World News, with an African-American anchorman. But the truth is quite different.
Mark Masai, who presents Africa Live, is Kenyan and the company employing him is Chinese. Since January 12 the show has been airing daily at 17:00 hours GMT on CCTV Africa, Chinese Central Television's new subsidiary on the African continent.
For the time being the channel does not broadcast more than its one hour of African-targeted TV-shows a day, but the plan is to become a fully fledged news channel.
CCTV Africa's headquarters are based in Nairobi, and the channel enjoys its own news-production unit (the first of its kind outside China).
All shows are produced in Nairobi, and the image archive is put together by virtue of a network of correspondents dotted around the continent. Since December last year, an entire team has been on standby in Dakar, ready to be deployed throughout the whole of West Africa, hoping their missions are not given to their colleagues in Ghana or Nigeria.
On more long term basis, the company is planning to open no less than fourteen subsidiaries in Africa, including North Africa.
Already, Africa Live shows thirty minutes of general news broadcasting, twenty minutes of business news and the remaining last ten minutes are dedicated to sports.
Just like other big media groups, it transmits from several different geographical positions, stretching from Cairo to Lagos and on to Johannesburg.
On weekends, there is less emphasis on general news, and more time is given to weekly shows and magazine programmes like 'Talk Africa' and 'Faces of Africa'.
Break
According to one of the Kenyan managers, CCTV Africa is expected to be increased from a one hour show to two hours a day in the next three to four months.
Transmission will be a 24/7 affair by 2015. China has embarked on the media battle at a time when BBC is reducing its worldwide coverage and when France24 is joining forces with RFI, in order to cut costs.
The message is crystal clear: China is not restricting its African policy to the economic sphere. And the message becomes even clearer with Chinese ambassador Liu Guangyuan's inaugurational speech of the news channel: "many news channels do not present China in all its forms.
CCTV Africa's mission will be to present the good truth of China [...] and to show the good experiences of its economic development."
Renaud de Spens, former Press secretary at the French embassy in Beijing and Chinese media specialist, says that this entails a break in the country's tradition.
Just until recently, the country did not wish to export its culture, but in 2008 things changed. The following year President Hu Jintao used the concept of soft power for the very first time, connecting it to the diffusion of Chinese culture and influence around the world.
But it is, above all, the calamitous route of the Olympic torch that triggered the U-turn.
"Images of pushed torch-carriers that slipped through the censor filter, was a shock for many Chinese, who were not aware of the hate towards them abroad," Renaud reminisces. So in reality it is rather out of fear of foreign images influencing nationals that the regime has chosen to react."
After this awakening, the regime has spent an incredible CNY 45bn (more than US$7bn) towards the development of its international media expansion.
Besides CCTV, these funds also benefit Xinhua (New China), the state-run news agency that is recruiting, especially Africans, and is proposing more attractive salaries than its Western counterparts.
Thanks to the subsidies, it can propose news-feed subscriptions that defy any competitor, if they are not simply just given away.
However with CCTV Africa the 'leap forward' has taken a different aspect. Most evidently, African media, potentially, have neither the resources nor is it aggressive enough to counter balance the Chinese move.
And yet, the aim is not to just to sensitize journalists about the Chinese vision of the world, but it is to directly target an African audience with a more 'local' look.
In fact, 90 per cent of journalists that CCTV Africa employs are Kenyans. Some of them, such as Beatrice Marshall, are already well known in Africa.
Nevertheless, they cannot escape the rules that are imposed on everyone, African or Chinese. Besides Chinese censorship, they will have to adapt to the practice of "positive reporting".
"We all have a list of words and expressions that we are not allowed to use," explains one recently employed journalist. "We recently received an e-mail saying that we 'should avoid the word regime when speaking of a government.'"
Lack of subtlety
Just like the Chinese non-intervention policy, the "Chinese way of journalism" will not overthrow any government in place. A policy that could upset Africa's vibrant and growing opposition parties.
For one thing, the Chinese way of covering world events surprisingly lacks subtlety in comparison to other international media.
During the UN Security Council resolution for an intervention against repression in Syria, Africa Live from January 5 only showed the appearance of the Chinese diplomat.
Nothing was said about the votes of the African countries that were participating. Was it different for the Libyan intervention? Not really. The channel only reported on contracts that had been signed between China and Gaddafi, and how much money China might have lost since the revolution.
Despite the multiplication of news channels, this might not be enough without any real change of 'tone'. Even though tremendous sums have been invested a single Chinese media have yet to achieve any international acclaim.
This article previously appeared in the 12-18 February issue of our sister magazine Jeune Afrique
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