China seeks to enhance ties with Kenya as the west pulls back

China and Kenya enjoy a long history of profound traditional friendship. Our friendship began over 600 years ago when the famous Chinese navigator Zheng He came to Kenya four times during his seven voyages to the western seas. He visited the Kenyan coast of Malindi and made friends with the local people. Soon after Kenyan got independence, China was also one of the first countries to establish diplomatic relations with Kenya, only two days after Kenya won its Independence. For the last 48 years, this friendship has remained cordial and has now entered a new era.

Traditionally, the United Kingdom, the United States and other European countries were Kenya’s main development partners and source of Investment and aid. However, financial crisis in the west and the re-emergence of China has pushed Kenya’s traditional development partners to the periphery. Under these circumstances, Kenya like many other African countries turned its eye to the east, strategically seeking to enhance ties with emerging China.

In the last decade, China and Kenya friendship and cooperation has grown steadily and attained historic heights. Our mutual social, economic and political trust has been greatly enhanced. We have made great achievements in the fields of economy, trade, investment and many other pragmatic cooperation fields. The complementary nature of our economic ties offers us broad prospects for cooperation. China continues to break new ground and is constantly looking for new areas to boost our cooperation.

The Influence of China in project development, especially in the Infrastructure sector is worth commendation. A lot has changed since China became Kenya’s Number one and de facto development partner particularly in the infrastructure sector. Compared with assistance from western countries, which often came with political strings attached, assistance from China has been received with open arms.

China’s aid and investment has been directed towards ensuring Kenya can pursue development on its own. China has paid more attention to assisting Kenya’s infrastructure and implemented projects that have a direct impact on the livelihoods of the people. In the last decade Chinese companies have been involved in numerous livelihood projects across Kenya. They have built roads, schools, hospitals, airports, dams, bridges and so on. However, in all those projects it is in infrastructure that China has stood head and shoulders above others. In this respect, the 50.4 kilometer-long, eight-lane Thika super-highway is the ultimate emblem of China-Kenyan development partnership.

As Kenya and China embark on a transition to new leadership in both countries, the new Chinese leadership has already expressed its intention to maintain and enhance our relations to achieve further success in our cooperative development. There are many potential areas of substantial cooperation that can be exploited. For Instance, our agricultural cooperation has a lot of potential and a promising future.

We expect that the pace of comprehensive cooperation with China will be strengthened and accelerated as we embark on a new period of cooperative development under a new set of leadership.