‘Genuinely popular’: how Africa’s positive opinion of China goes beyond the elite

A gardener at work under a Belt and Road Forum installation in Beijing in late 2023. Years of funding and building megaprojects under its multibillion-dollar Belt and Road Initiative has also seen China build a positive view of itself among the African people. - Photo: AP

DOHA/BEIJING (SCMP): When Rwandan President Paul Kagame spoke at this month’s Doha Forum, he sang China’s praises.

“We have been benefiting from the cooperation and the attitude of bringing everybody to the table where everyone feels they are winning in the process,” he said. “That is, to my understanding, what China presents.”