The EconomistJune 29th 2019 Middle East & Africa 492
1out to be unusual,” says Mutula Kilonzo, a
prominent Kenyan senator. “It is going to
happen to African countries, too. The con-
ditions of many loans are...a debt trap.”
Deborah Brautigam at Johns Hopkins
argues that Hambantota is an exception.
She looked at more than 3,000 projects
overseas financed by China, and found that
it was the only example of such an asset be-
ing seized to cover a debt.
Nonetheless, African leaders are
spooked. Dialogue with the Chinese is be-
coming edgier. On June 7th Mr Magufuli in-
definitely suspended construction at Baga-
moyo, balking at demands from the
project’s Chinese partner for a 99-year lease
and a ban on port development elsewhere
in Tanzania. Moving smoothly from cheer-
leader to critic, he accused the firm of set-
ting “tough conditions that can only be ac-
cepted by mad people”. Last year Sierra
Leone scrapped a Chinese-funded project
to build a new international airport for fear
that it would involve too much debt.
The perception of a plot to turn the Indi-
an Ocean into a Chinese lake endangers the
political capital China has amassed in Afri-
ca. Since Mr Kenyatta came to power in
2013, public debt has nearly tripled. Last
year the imf raised the country’s risk of
debt distress from low to moderate. If Ken-
ya defaults, China risks being blamed.
China’s hesitation also reflects the un-
even performance of past projects. A rail-
way between Djibouti and Addis Ababa,
completed in 2017, cost China’s state-
owned insurer Sinosure $1bn in losses, its
chief economist said last year. Corruption
and mismanagement drive up costs. Some-
times plans smack of unreasonable opti-
mism. Bagamoyo’s port was expected to
handle more containers than Rotterdam,
Europe’s biggest freight terminal.
Kenya’s railway has had its critics from
the outset. Corruption made it a ludicrous-
ly expensive venture, costing twice the in-
ternational average per kilometre of track.
The railway’s freight-carrying capacity was
miscalculated and has proved to be only
40% of what was predicted. It was meant to
be cheaper to ship goods up the line than
send them by road. Even though the oppo-
site has proved true, Mr Kenyatta’s govern-
ment has forced all containers coming out
of the port onto the railway. Hapless traders
in Mombasa have to pay for goods arriving
by sea to be sent to Nairobi and back again
as a result. China seems to have belatedly
realised that throwing good money after
bad would be an error.
So it is embracing caution instead.
When Mr Kenyatta and his delegation ar-
rived in Beijing in May, they were treated to
an unfamiliar experience, according to a
presidential adviser. The Kenyans were
questioned not only about their sums, but
about corruption. Mr Kenyatta was asked
how he would afford a census and a refer-endumonconstitutionalchange.TheChi-
neseevenwantedtoknowifheplannedto
standforofficeagain(heisobligedtostand
downin2022).“Itwasliketalkingtothe
WorldBank,”grumbledanotheraide.
MrKenyattadidnotreturnfromBeijing
empty-handed.Heagreedtoexportavoca-
dostoChinaandwonfundsfora datacen-
treandaroadconnectingNairobi’ssub-
urbstoitsairport.Suchlaudablymodest
dealsshouldbecelebrated.MrXimightnot
beabouttochampionhumanrights,but
China’s shift closer to Western lending
standardsisa stepintherightdirection. 7O
n june23rd 2018 Abiy Ahmed, Ethio-
pia’s newly inaugurated prime minis-
ter, took to the podium wearing a bright
green t-shirt. Smiling and waving, he of-
fered hope of democratic change to tens of
thousands of supporters at a rally in the
capital, Addis Ababa.
A year later, almost to the day, he again
addressed the nation, this time in army
uniform, to declare, stony-faced, that his
government had thwarted a coup. It was a
sharp reminder of the fragility of his demo-
cratic revolution.
Abiy said the putsch had originated in
the northern region of Amhara, Ethiopia’s
second-most populous, and was the work
of General Asamnew Tsige, Amhara’s head
of security. The prime minister’s office
claimed that General Asamnew’s men at-tacked government offices in the regional
capital, Bahir Dar, on June 22nd, killing the
Amhara region’s president, Ambachew Me-
konnen, and other officials.
In a separate attack in Addis Ababa, the
army’s chief of staff, Seare Mekonnen, was
killed in his home by a bodyguard. (Also
murdered was a retired general who had
been visiting.) The government said the at-
tacks in Addis Ababa and Bahir Dar were
linked. Since then, it has shut down the in-
ternet and released few details of the plot.
But from what little information has
emerged, the incidents look more like an
unplanned outbreak of violence than a cal-
culated attempt to seize power.
General Asamnew was a former politi-
cal prisoner sentenced in 2009 for his al-
leged role in another failed coup. Abiy re-
leased him last year and gave him a
powerful job as part of a campaign to em-
brace former opposition leaders. But Gen-
eral Asamnew provoked alarm with his
strident talk of defending Amhara territory
against other Ethiopians.
Ethnicity has been a central feature of
Ethiopian politics since 1995, when the cur-
rent constitution came into force. It carved
up the country into nine ethnically based
semi-autonomous regions. The Ethiopian
People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front,
which has run the country with a heavy
hand for almost four decades, kept a lid on
tensions between ethnic groups for most
of that time. But they are on the rise as Abiy
has liberalised politics. Last year intercom-
munal fighting forced almost 3m people
from their homes.
The Tigrayans, who are around a tenth
of Ethiopia’s population, have largely run
things since the toppling of a Marxist dicta-
torship, the Derg, in 1991. The Oromo, Abiy’s
group, who are a third of the population,
resented Tigrayan domination, which in
part accounts for Abiy’s rise. The Amhara,ADDIS ABABA
Claims of a failed putsch highlight the
risks of ethnic conflictEthiopia’s fragile revolutionCoups and
contradictions
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