Chinese Beaten Up in Zambia Mines
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A Chinese manager at a copper smelter in northern Zambia has been admitted to hospital after being assaulted by workers demanding better conditions.
An estimated 500 workers at the Chinese-owned Chambishi mine site started throwing stones at the managers as they attempted to hold talks.
Police came in to restore order and rescue the Chinese who had taken refuge by locking themselves in their offices. Several buildings were burned in the violence and a protester was injured.
Last year, China’s president cancelled a visit to Chambishi fearing protests.
A blast at the copper mine killed 50 people in 2005.
Holiday rumours
Chambishi Smelter, which is under construction, is part of a huge multi-million dollar Chinese investment in the area.
The BBC’s Boyd Chibale in Kitwe says a kitchen for Chinese workers and a guard’s house were set alight and hostel windows smashed in the violence.
Our correspondent says the workers have now gone home, and the Chinese management are in talks with the unions.
The protest was sparked by rumours that members of the Chinese management team were about to go on holiday, which workers feared would delay negotiations to improve their conditions of service.
“The Chinese are not respecting Zambian labour laws,” workers’ representative Teddy Chisala told the AFP news agency.
In recent years, China has emerged as one of the biggest buyers of Zambian copper.
But correspondents say Chinese investment in mining and manufacturing has not been without controversy—with constant industrial disputes amidst allegations of poor working conditions.
In elections in 2006, opposition candidate Michael Sata ran on an anti-China ticket, calling for “Zambia for Zambians”.
(Posted on April 7, 2008)
Comments
Whites attack immigrants in Russia and are called Neo-Nazis. Blacks attack a Chinese man and are made out to be heroes. What a world we live in.
Posted by Howard in Las Vegas at 6:48 PM on April 7
“In elections in 2006, Michael Sata ran on an anti-China ticket, calling for “Zambia for Zambians”.”
This old card is like the Energizer Bunny.
Mugabe lost the recent election and won’t step down becuase he says the opposition is bringing a “white invasion.”
This ploy works even when the Zimbabweans should be welcoming a white invasion, to keep them from starving.
Posted by Nordic at 6:51 PM on April 7
Hooray for the Zambians.The chinese thought they could treat the Zambians the way they treat their own people.Autocracy does not work well in Africa.They should try brutal dictatorship like Robert Mugabe.Too bad brutal dictaorship is not very good for profits.Look at what an economic shambles Zimbawe is in.
Posted by Tony Soprano at 6:53 PM on April 7
I imagine some old timers (a very few, since current life expectancy is only about 43 years) in Zambia are nostalgic for pre-1964 British rule. It will indeed be interesting to see how the Chinese deal with Africa over the next 5-10 years.
Posted by underdog at 7:20 PM on April 7
Here’s what’s really happening between China and Africa:
- China is building infrastructure in certain African nations in order to gain access to resources, mostly minerals and oil.
- China tries to use as many Chinese workers as possible, and declines to share technologies — they’re just trying to pillage the continent. It’s neo-mercantilism more than neo-colonialism.
- Africans resent Chinese presence, especially b/c part of the deal in some countries is the importation of cheap Chinese goods, which undersell textiles in some very poor countries. So, the Africans lose jobs & market share.
- The US won’t get involved b/c then we would have to highlight China’s human rights abuses… and it would also highlight China’s perspective on Africans’ quality of work, which no one wants to acknowledge (i.e. can’t be trusted).
Posted by at 7:27 PM on April 7
You have to respect Africans, they sure stand up for their race, white people could learn from that!
Posted by AF at 8:03 PM on April 7
This is happening sooner than I expected. It was only a matter of time before the Chinese discovered that any attempt to invest in and develop Africa will only result in their efforts being unappreciated and called exploitative and racist. They will then be kicked out and everything they built will be allowed to fall into ruins.
Posted by Cliff Yablonski at 8:12 PM on April 7
Lol….this can’t end well. Likely, the Chinese will simply pull their investment and abandon these people to starve for daring to bite the hand that feeds them.
But, China is not the US. THOSE people are crazy. They are just as likely to show up with a bunch of heavy artillery, blow them all to hell, and THEN pull their investment and leave anyone who survives (if any) to starve for daring to bite the hand that feeds them.
Posted by at 8:47 PM on April 7
China as a labor manager outside China was sure to be a hit!
Who IS the president of China??
Posted by Whiteplight at 8:51 PM on April 7
Youre kidding???
Blacks are rioting all the way in Zambia? Without the legacy of slavery???
Posted by at 9:09 PM on April 7
“This is happening sooner than I expected.”
That was my take as well.
When it was announced that the Chinese were going to run African projects and the Africans were thrilled at the prospect, I pressed ‘go’ on the stop watch.
I can’t imagine that the Chinese ever believed that they could work as equals with Africans or that their work ethics would translate at all.
Did the Chinese believe they could make of go of it when the west failed countless times? Did they believe that the west did everything wrong and that they would do everything right?
The question now is how bad is it going to get. Will the Chinese walk away like European colonial powers or will they take a stand and demand African submission? Will they be condemned as the new racist imperialist plunderers?
The fact is no one can work well with Africans. Not even other Africans. Dealing with Africans anywhere they live is a lose-lose proposition doomed to failure.
Posted by sbuffalonative at 11:18 PM on April 7
I have no idea how bad conditions are at the mine, so the workers may have valid complaints. And I would not be at all surprised that management from the People’s Republic of China proves to be no friend to labor. Our own history of coal mining has involved some very bitter disputes between labor and management. Of course I have no doubt that there’s an element of ethnic conflict as well.
Posted by WR the elder at 1:33 AM on April 8
The Chinese will soon have these blacks pining for the days of white rule. The Chinese have such advanced productivity concepts as bunkhouses next to the factories, timed bathroom breaks and workers locked down during their shifts.
Posted by ODDL at 6:05 AM on April 8
I encourage Americans to call and email advertisers during the Olympics stating they will boycott their products if they don’t pull their ads. The Olympics began in Greece (Cradle of Democracy) and to allow oppressive totalitarian communist China to host it is a travesty against the free world…
Posted by at 1:03 PM on April 8
If the several Chinese people that I work with are anything to go by, the Chinese do not regard the blacks very highly - and that is if I put it EXTREMELY mildly. As China’s needs for energy and materials are only going to increase with time, Africa must seem to them like one place where they can actually achieve control over resources.
It wouldn’t be a far-fetched idea to imagine that right at this moment somewhere in the Central Committee there are groups of people drawing plans not just for trade, but for outright colonization of sections of Africa.
Whatever we can say about China, they are certainly capable of it and are not bound by racial guilt and political correctness. It probably does not mean anything good for the Africans themselves, but such is the nature of conquest.
Posted by at 1:31 PM on April 8
Once the Chinese get a firm economic foothold in African countries, eventually any resistence will resemble the Tibetan scenario each and EVERY time.
The natural minerals of the African continent are much too essential to let go off and the Chinese will continue to charm their way into the confidence of the various African governments whom we know won’t be able to resist the financial spin offs that will end up fattening their corrupt Swiss bank accounts for the next handful of decades or as long as they still manage to remain in charge of their own countries, that is.
It’s probably what Africans deserve more than anything else, ie, a good dose of Chinese colonisation along with Chinese flouting of international human rights laws, numerous atrocities and the denial of liberty that’s going to accompany it all in the future, considering the hate Africans harbor against all white nations worldwide.
Who knows, many of us might yet see the day dawn when the Africans end up literally offering their countries back to whitey if he will only come back in and rescue them from Chinese terror rule.
Posted by A Swain at 5:56 PM on April 8
African leaders turn to Chinese, because the West investments have too many strings attached. West demands sustainability, various eco-nonsenses, sticks its collective nose into the African book-keeping. Then saintly NGOs come, preaching to Blacks about sticking to hoe-and-machete and forgetting about anything more advanced as this may upset the climatic balance.
And then Chinese come and offer money and infrastructure for mining rights or oil. And what the Africans agree to, they get. Of course, the Blacks don’t get many jobs - they are needed only in road building and that only under the eagle eye of the Chinese foremen. Chinese bring thousands of their own more qualified workers, build barracks for them, import cooks and food. Chinese don’t feel the “White man burden”. They don’t want to have the African countries, to move there, to rule them, let alone to send missionaries or educate the indigenous people. They just want the raw materials and they’ll get it.
That’s behind all that hypocritical noise about Darfur as if Chinese themselves kill the people. Their only sin is, that they buy oil from Sudan and pay for it, without playing the “ethical boycott” games.
Posted by EW at 9:13 AM on April 9
The Chinese know Africa is totally rich in natural resources - aside from the people.
The Chinese are not nice like us. They will just tighten the grip until the blacks submit. The black will really miss whitey one day soon.
Posted by at 11:00 PM on April 9
This was a no-brainer to predict. The expense of doing business in Africa generally outweighs its benefits. The Chinese are quite sensible about money, and will eventually realize this and pull out.
Even during the colonial days, African colonies of European powers generally cost more to govern and police than they produced in revenues for the occupying powers. They were maintained mainly for national prestige, much the reason space exploration is done today.
Posted by Michael C. Scott at 5:43 PM on April 10