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Chinese President Xi Jinping (1st L) and his wife Peng Liyuan (2nd R) are welcomed by Tanzanian President Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete (2nd L) and his wife Salma Kikwete (1st R) upon their arrival in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, March 24, 2013. [Photo/Xinhua]

Chinese President Xi Jinping (1st L) and his wife Peng Liyuan (2nd R) are welcomed by Tanzanian President Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete (2nd L) and his wife Salma Kikwete (1st R) upon their arrival in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, March 24, 2013. [Xinhua]

Obviously China is on no humanitarian mission (unlike its western counterparts…), but the vivid memories of colonialism impressed on the African psyche won’t be beneficial to eager western businessmen or humanitarian armies. Though China is likely to exert growing influence on Africa as their trade relationship tightens, literal comparisons with western colonialism might be a bit precipitous.

Chinese President Xi Jinping (L, front) and Denis Sassou Nguesso (R, front), the president of the Republic of Congo, attend the completion ceremony of the China-Republic of Congo Friendship Hospital project in Brazzaville, capital of the Republic of Congo, March 30, 2013. [Xinhua]

That Xi Jinping’s third stop, before heading to Tanzania, was the BRICS summit in South Africa, is the only too logical extension of what his diplomatic journey delineates in geopolitical terms. The economic crisis paining Europe and the U.S. is surely one of the factors that has pushed China in new directions in its search for trade partners. Especially if thinking of the long term, China has to expand its network beyond the struggling American and European markets.

Chinese President Xi Jinping (2nd L) poses for a group photo with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh (1st L), South African President Jacob Zuma (C), Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff (2nd R) and Russian President Vladimir Putin (1st R) during the 5th BRICS Summit in Durban, South Africa, March 27, 2013. [Xinhua photo]

Chinese President Xi Jinping (2nd L) poses for a group photo with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh (1st L), South African President Jacob Zuma (C), Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff (2nd R) and Russian President Vladimir Putin (1st R) during the 5th BRICS Summit in Durban, South Africa, March 27, 2013. [Xinhua]

That said, and to return to the opening suggestion, the emerging economies’ sentiments are not to be underestimated. In the face of ongoing, patronising BRICS-bashing campaigns by western journalists diligently plying their countries’ crumbling narratives, the hopes that the emerging world order will kindly include its waning rulers are perhaps misplaced.

Even in the most cynical of all marketplaces, the global economy, human feelings (and grudges) will once again prove crucial. Crucially profitable for the long-scorned global South, which is likely to replace the North in the long term as the leading economic hemisphere. One has to hope that with the geographical shift in global power will also come a shift in policies concerned with social justice and the general wellbeing of the planet.

Giovanni Vimercati is a freelance journalist and media analyst as well as a member of the Celluloid Liberation Front. @CLF_Project

Opinion articles reflect the views of their authors, not necessarily those of China.org.cn.

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