Is the CCP Losing Africa? The Wheels Are Coming Off Xi’s ‘Belt and Road’

Friday, Feb 21, 2025
11:00 am – 12:15 pm ET

WASHINGTON, D.C.— Chinese dictator Xi Jinping has made a signature of his regime an ambitious, global empire-building project known as the “Belt and Road Initiative.” It has poured hundreds of billions of dollars into infrastructure buildouts, mostly in developing countries, usually financed by pay-day loans made possible by funding the Chinese Communist Party and its companies have gotten from Western investors.

A prime focus of this CCP effort to colonize and exploit the planet’s poorer nations has been the continent of Africa. Nearly every one of its countries has joined in some form or fashion Xi’s BRI. Not a few corrupt African politicians, like counterparts in Central, South and Southeast Asia, Latin America and the Pacific, have enriched themselves immensely. But, in the process, they have betrayed their people and national interests. They have also given rise to threats to ours.

Indeed, thanks to these arrangements, the Chinese Communists have extended immensely their influence, presence and ability to project power. The infrastructure projects, for whose construction they have imported large numbers of China’s workers, are generally inherently dual-use and designed to accommodate use by the People’s Liberation Army. As a result, a shooting war with China is very unlikely to be confined to the Western Pacific and East Asia. It would truly be World War Xi.

There is evidence, however, that the PRC’s mounting economic and other domestic woes are creating problems for the BRI. The next Committee on the Present Danger: China (CPDC) webinar today from 11:00 a.m.-12:15 p.m. ET will explore: indications that the wheels are coming off the program in Africa; the strategic implications of such setbacks in that critical region; and the opportunity thus created for the United States and its private sector to make up for lost time by filling the power vacuum now spreading across the continent.

Register at PresentDangerChina.org.

WHAT: A CPDC Webinar |
“Is the CCP Losing Africa? The Wheels Are Coming Off Xi’s 'Belt and Road'?”

WHEN: 11:00 – 12:15 p.m. ET, Friday, January 21, 2025

WHO:

Moderator: Frank Gaffney, President, Institute for the American Future; Vice Chairman, Committee on the Present Danger: China

Participants:

Hon. Dave Brat, PhD, former Member of Congress; author, “American Underdog: Proof that Principles Matter;” Dean, School of Business and Vice Provost, Liberty University
• Topic: “What is the Belt and Road Initiative, and Why is It Failing in Africa?”

Col. Grant Newsham, U.S. Marine Corps (Ret.), Former Military Attaché in Embassy Tokyo; former Foreign Service Officer; longtime business executive in the Western Pacific; Author, “When China Attacks: A Warning to America”
• Topic: “The Military Dimension: The CCP’s Efforts to Project Power In and From Africa” (Invited)

Hon. Dr. Abdillahi Hashi Abib, Member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, House of the People of the Federal Republic of Somalia
• Topic: “Countering the Chinese Communist Party’s Belt and Road Initiative in Somalia and East Africa: An Opportunity for Strategic Investment and Enhanced U.S. Influence in the Horn of Africa”

Capt. Jay Bolton, U.S. Merchant Marine (Ret.), Maritime Consultant, Tanker & Tall Ships' Master, Founder of the United States Maritime Foundation
• Topic: “China’s Belt and Road Initiative: The Takeover of the African Continent – and What the United States Can and Should Do About It”

HOW: Register at PresentDangerChina.org.

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CONTACTS:

To interview representatives of the Committee on the Present Danger: China, contact Dede Laugesen at info@PresentDangerChina.org

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