China's Stroke of Genius!

Over the past few days we've been reading about South Africa (SA) being invited to be part of the BRIC economic formation. The invitation into the BRIC family was been made by the formation's biggest and most influential partner, China. By all accounts, the invitation is due more to South Africa's influence on the African continent than the country's economic strength.

China's is one of South Africa's biggest trading partners and South Africa is Africa's largest economy. The size of SA's economy, no doubt gives the country great influence over decisions taken by the African Union (AU) and  the regional organization, the SADC. It is now emerging that one of the reasons China may have invited SA to be part of  BRIC (the acronym may be changed to BRICS should SA accept this invitation), is to leverage South Africa's influence on the African continent. It is an open secret that China is looking for opportunities to invest its accumulated cash stockpiles and Africa is as great an investment candidate for China as any other region in the world. What better way to understand the goings on in Africa than to bring South Africa to the BRIC table to share on the African agenda. China's invitation of SA to be part of BRIC can only be described as a stroke of genius. Previously I wrote about how China's may one day becomes Africa's new colonizer, and one day we may look back at China's invitation of SA to be part of BRIC as the event which accelerated this neo-colonization attempt.  

Now the question is whether or not South Africa should accept this invitation. In my view, President Jacob Zuma should accept the invitiation to sit at this auspicious table, if only for selfish reasons for the benefit the economy of South Africa and perhaps those of other countries on the African continent.