Chinese Mission on Jamestown fishing port

E. Ablorh-Odjidja

May 24, 2020

A mission that comes with a Chinese gift package or shall we say, baggage?

These gifts that end up freezing our initiatives are becoming too much.

And the importations of Chinese expertise for everything we build is becoming obscene, if not detrimental to our development.

Are we not at this late stage of our history in a position to build a small fishing port like James Fort’s on our own?

I must assume that we lack the pride and the adventurous spirit to invest in our own potential. 

Soon enough, we will be sorry for the education we are wasting on our kids. 

Our youth graduate from our universities and the potentials in them are locked down because we have nothing in our development plans for them, but everything for the Chinese to employ their surplus labor.

Need we wonder why our youth flee from our land to seek greener pastures elsewhere?

The James Fort fishing port is an engineering venture.  I am confident that our civil engineers from KNUST, could do it, if given the chance.  And if not, there are more Ghanaians in the Diaspora who could do it.

The just finished South Sea Port development project in New York City had a component part that was supervised by a builder of Ghanaian descent.

I am told the Fishing Port project got underway after a donation of $60 mil grant from the Chinese.  And with that came the chance to build it for us.

To the credit of the Chinese, they set the conditions for the gifts we receive.

But at the rate we are going we are establishing a very onerous paradigm for generations to come.

What is it about these loans and grants for projects, that only the Chinese get to manage them?

 Their surplus labor and expertise get to ride on the backs of these projects, only to vacuum in return the direct financial gains back to China.

Americans give grants.  But not for the purpose of killing local enterprises.  They allow the currency to percolate within the local economy.  So do many western nations.

But not the Chinese.  Once they bring the loans and the grants, expert their surplus labor and expertise to follow.

America has so far given us billions under the MCA. 

Half a billion alone gained under the Kufuor administration.  Good job done.  But the Americans didn't reserve to themselves the rights to provide hired managerial expertise for the jobs that resulted.

Rather, it was the Chinese to whom we gave the American procured contracts.

We allowed Chinese expertise and surplus labor to soak up the immediate profit from the American largesse!

A lot is wrong with this paradigm, I would say.

The Chinese have every right to promote foreign aid with their largesse.  It is up to us to note that there is a huge cost to the presumed charity.

And in every instance so far, the Chinese have gained.

They bring the money.  They export their surplus labor and experts to us.  And as they do, they chase our own experts from jobs that should have been created for Ghanaians.

Again, the direct monetary gains do not go into Ghanaian pockets.  They end up in China.

And after the projects, our nation is left with debt; the hidden ones being the worst.  

As we attempt to accommodate these Chinese in our midst, they leave us feeling like aliens in our own land.

The port is not even completed but the economic and social costs are already due.

I still hear the anguish in the crying voice of a Ga woman, standing at the construction site. 

And the furlong complaint of the lady operator of the orphanage, which dwelling has been completely demolished on the orders of the Chinese contractors.

The demolishing was total and swift, apparently without timely warning to those whose dwellings have so far been impacted. 

The team of AMA workers and the Chinese contractors showed no mercy or compassion.  The faces of the Chinese silent.  They spoke none of our languages or dialects.

Immediately thereafter, came a Ghanaian municipal official, a spokesperson for the project, to explain to the public what had happened, in an attempt to shift public perception to a point more favorable.

The victims, the official said, had a compensation package coming to them.

Also, it should be remembered that the project was being done for the public good; a real “sommum bonum” at work to benefit us all.

His statement got me thinking.

Again, the cost, this time the opportunity to preserve someting that is old, to make it more economically productive, without destroying the character of the place.

But as written by Conversation, the web magazine, "It will drastically change not only the tangible fabric of this historic town, but also impact the fishing methods, market traders and community that’s reliant on the sea." 

This Jamestown port project has a history; and in this history, a more tragic lesson.

First proposed in 1965, along with a scheme that sought to dredge the Korle Lagoon and to turn the surroundings into a holiday resort and an industrial complex. 

The plan was jettisoned immediately after the February 24, 1966 coup.

So, for 50 years plus, the intended project sat there – moribund. 

And in the 50 years, there has been no time for retrospection. No room to reframe the need for a fishing port, to think of a more creative way for self-assertion, initiative building and empowerment - until the Chinese $60 mil largesse showed up!

In the interim, a lot of resources and riches have come our way, since 1966.

Not known by many is the Saltpond Oil Field, by AMOCO, which was the first major field in Ghana to begin production in 1975.

By 2007, major discoveries have been made by companies like Tullow Oil, Kosmos Energy and others. 

All these discoveries, with some extras and substantial sums of cash, have fattened our coffers.

Yet, we couldn’t salt away a paltry $60 mil to fund the Jamestown project we deem as a priority now, except to wait for a Chinese gift package?

How long do we expect to abuse our sovereignty in this manner? 

Unless somebody starts thinking of what such obtuse abuse does to our national psyche, we will be in trouble with ourselves sooner than we think we have ever been.

If China has sought development this way, Ghana will be building their global “Beltway and Road Initiative” for them.  

The fact that they are doing this for themselves is a lesson that we have to learn.  All we need to do is to show we are capable.  We are not lower than them in anything, least of all in our humanity.

Small projects like the Jamestown port ought to be done by us.  Unless, our officials have a demand behind it that we don’t usually know.

E. Ablorh-Odjidja, Publisher www.ghanadot.com, Washington, DC, May 24, 2020
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