President Cyril Ramaphosa of the Republic of South Africa hosted President Xi Jinping of the Republic of China at the Union Buildings earlier on Tuesday. Picture: Fikile Marakalla / GCIS
President of the People’s Republic of China Xi Jinping skipped the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) Business Forum in Sandton, Johannesburg, on Tuesday, but the Head of State’s words were not lost on those in attendance.
Reading out a speech by Jinping, China’s Minister of Commerce Wang Wentao delivered the message clearly - talks of domination was not in China’s plan. Instead, the Republic wants to see an expansion of the BRICS nations.
Jinping’s speech, read by Wentao, said that the changes that were happening right now in the world had never happened before.
He said that no matter the resistance, China was dedicated to making the international order more just and equitable.
He said that this BRICS Summit was not an exercise to ask countries to take sides or to create confrontation in the bloc, but rather to share best practices, ideas, and resources to serve the greater world.
He said people wanted an open, inclusive, and clean world.
And while many emerging markets have come to where they are today by "shaking off the yolk of colonialism", he said some countries were still concerned with protecting their hegemony and bullying out any other emerging country.
"Every country has a right to better its land and economies," he said, adding that the collective rise of emerging markets and developing countries were changing the global landscape.
"No mountains can stop the surging flow of the rivers. China breathes the same air as other countries in BRICS. China stands firmly on the right side of history," Jinping said.
kailene.pillay@inl.co.za
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