az. On Tuesday 15 August, Dr. Henning Melber (Nordic Africa Institute, Sweden) was invited by Hanns-Seidel-Foundation to speak about Chinas influence in Africa. Amongst the approximately 80 listeners, some members of the Namibian government and the new German ambassador, Arne Freiherr von Klittlitz und Ottendorf took part.

China, the "new kid on the block" in Africa, is one of the driving forces on the global market, especially in the IT and Telecommunications sector. With the new constellation in International Relations, caused by the end of the bipolar world after the collapse of the Soviet system, China raised up to an international superpower. For the last couple of years, African markets have inherited a significant role in Chinese interest, as Dr. Henning Melber notified. Besides the potential of African markets, strategic minerals and oil are the main interests of China in Africa, Dr. Henning Melber emphasized. He explained that at the moment Namibia isn’t an important Chinese trading partner in Africa, because of its less relevant natural resources in comparison to other African states, e. g. oil-producers like the Gulf of Guinea, Chad or Angola. In this context, it has to remain unanswered how some statistics about Chinese people in Namibia, which were mentioned by participants in the discussion after his speech, have to be rated. According to his explanations it will be an important question, if and how African Govern-ments will be able to treat China as a new economic factor in the interest of socie-ty. Melber said that there was nothing much desirable in China for an African Country and referred to bad working conditions. But the question arises if a strong economical growth year after year really is something undesirable for an African Country.