Last Wednesday I also met Zhengli Huang , one of the people behind the Chinese Urbanism in Africa publication by Go West Project, probably the most informative and up-to-date material on the subject. Zhengli told me about the land ownership difficulties in Kenya and how she addressed these to organise construction of a prefabricated steel frame/pvc school, which was shipped from China and put up in Nairobi’s second largest slum. Zhengli also mentioned about oil transactions between some African governments and China making it possible for new Chinese-built infrastructure to spring up Free of charge in such places. We discussed the numbers of Chinese construction workers in Africa (western press is usually critical about this without clearly understanding the picture). Zhengli and I also talked about some parallels between China and Africa of how urban zones ‘swallow’ indigenous villages. In such cases the Chinese urban village with its traditions and irregularities becomes the future cultural centre of the otherwise faceless and rigidly-planned new urban fabric. Shenzhen is a Chinese city very keen to protect its urban villages and make them the venues for the cultural biennales (with one coming up before Christmas). Could the 3- centuries old Ajah with has its traditions and festivals become the cultural centre of the future surrounding area consisting of copy-and-paste estates, business and shopping centers?
no.balsa 