03 Oct 2023

Botswana and China continue to enjoy sound bilateral relations, says the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Dr Lemogang Kwape.

Speaking at the 74^th anniversary of the founding of China held in Gaborone on Thursday, Dr Kwape noted that as the two countries approached five decades of friendship and partnership, there was a lot they achieved together.

He however said there were still many more opportunities to enhance the countries’ bilateral relations, stating that Botswana and China had many exchanges from heads of state, to ministerial and expert levels. Dr Kwape said the exchanges were meant to enhance political, economic and technical cooperation for mutual benefit of the two countries.

He said the government of China had supported Botswana’s development in many respects and in a profound manner. 

Dr Kwape pointed out that the scope of cooperation encompasses social, economic, technical and technological fields, as well as human resource development.

He said the construction of the Kazungula Primary School, which was being built with with grant from China, was progressing well and was expected to be completed next year, while the negotiations for access of Botswana beef into the Chinese market were also ongoing and expected to provide an opportunity to grow the country’s beef sector and its value chain.

Dr Kwape described Botswana and China as strategic partners that continued to engage through the Forum on China Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) and said Botswana was determined to take advantage of the vast opportunities under both the FOCAC and Belt and Road Initiative.

Chinese Ambassador to Botswana, Mr Wang Xuefeng said over the past 74 years, the Chinese under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, had persistently pursued the path of Chinese modernisation, and created two miracles of rapid economic development and long term social stability.

He said in the past decade, the Chinese economy had grown at an average annual rate of 6.2 per cent  and in the past three years it grew at 4.5 per cent against the backdrop of COVID-19, which was 2.5 higher than the global average then.

Mr Wang said China was now acting on the new development philosophy, fostering a new development paradigm at a faster pace and working hard to achieve high quality development.

He pointed out that China’s economy showed a clear momentum of rebound and improvement with GDP growing by 5.5 per cent in the first half of this year.

Mr Wang stated that Botswana had always been a true friend of China, stating that the Chinese had always been appreciating Botswana’s adherence to the one-China principle and cherished support from Botswana at the 26^th session of the UN General Assembly in 1971 for restoring the lawful seat of China in the United Nations despite the fact that the two countries then were yet to establish diplomatic relations. ends