Juxtaposition: Chinese Media and Africa

Here are three stories I read about today. Not the most auspicious timing.

China Expands Media Reach in Africa - Deutsche Welle

In the first six months of 2012 alone, China invested $45 billion (34 billion euros) in Africa, while Sino-African trade has tripled in the last three years. Now, the Asian giant is seeking to make a name for itself in the African media sector by investing in modern technologies and giving scholarships to African journalists to work in China. 

Mary Harper, author and Africa expert with the BBC, said China's growing influence in the media sector is a "natural progression." 

"If you look at China in the past few years, it looks at Africa as a giant resource and it's now Africa's biggest trading partner - it's replaced the West," she told DW.

Face-Off in a Beijing Newsroom: An Insider’s Account - China Real Time Report - Wall Street Journal

Fallout from a high-profile conflict over censorship between Chinese propaganda officials and journalists at Southern Weekly, one of China’s most daring newspapers, has spread to sister newspaper Beijing News, which lost a dramatic stand-off with authorities late Tuesday night over the reprinting of an editorial that was harshly critical of Southern Weekly.  

The Beijing News’s publisher, Dai Zigeng, and editor-in-chief, Wang Yuechun, threatened to resign over authorities’ insistence that the paper publish an editorial from the nationalist-leaning tabloid Global Times that said supporters of Southern Weekly’s clash with censors were being actively supported by overseas human-rights activists.

China’s first institute for African media research established at the Communication University of China [TRANSLATION] - China Africa Project

People.com, December 10, Beijing — This morning, China’s first institute for African media research — the Africa Communication Research Center — was declared open in the lecture hall of the New Library at the Communication University of China. 

The President of the Communication University of China Su Zhiwu and the Ethiopian Ambassador to China Seyoum Mesfin jointly opened the center. Representatives from the embassies of South Africa, Egypt, Ethiopia, Kenya and Angola were also present at the ceremony.