Tiny Djibouti thinks big with China-backed infrastructure splurge | Daily Mail Online

The tiny Horn of Africa nation of Djibouti, which votes Friday in presidential elections, is hitching its wagon to the star of neighbouring Ethiopia with a series of cross-border projects funded mainly by China, the new power-broker in the region.

Djibouti's President Ismael Omar Guelleh, in power since 1999, is seeking a fourth term as head of the former French colony that sits at the entrance to the Red Sea and Suez Canal.

The vote, which the opposition has already branded a sham, will test support for a series of infrastructure projects that aim to increase the already outsized influence of the country of around 800,000 people, home to America's biggest -- and only permanent -- military base in Africa.

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Djibouti's President Ismael Omar Guelleh, in power since 1999, is seeking a fourth term as head of the former French colony that sits at the entrance to the Red Sea and Suez Canal ©Simon Maina (AFP/File)

Djibouti has been in the lucrative position of offering landlocked Ethiopia its only access to the sea since Ethiopia went to war with Eritrea next door in 1998.

During the two-year conflict, Addis Ababa relied on Djibouti's main port to import weapons.

Since then Ethiopia's economy has grown exponentially, and with it the tide of imports flowing through Djibouti to the country of 97 million people, which accounts for 86 percent of all goods transiting through Djiboutian ports.

Not content to rely on passing trade and playing host to the military bases of several world powers, Djibouti is now looking to play a bigger role in east Africa, in tandem with fast-growing Ethiopia.

"Even if the country has a very good strategic location, small economies like ours need to be integrated into regional development efforts," Foreign Minister Mahamoud Ali Youssouf told AFP.

- A 'model' for east Africa -

In 2011, Djibouti was hooked up to Ethiopia's electricity grid. Two further interconnectors are planned, one of which could transport Ethiopian power across the Red Sea to Yemen.

A 752-kilometre railway line linking the city of Djibouti to Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa is scheduled to open soon, with another line for exporting potassium from the northern Ethiopian city of Mekele through the Djiboutian port of Tadjourah set to soon follow.

In the past year the neighbours have also announced two major energy projects.

A multi-billion-dollar pipeline will transport natural gas from Ethiopia to a liquefaction plant and export terminal at Damerjog in Djibouti, while in the other direction, a planned 550-kilometre pipeline will carry diesel, gasoline and jet fuel from Djibouti's ports to central Ethiopia.

Completing the list of cross-border projects is a water pipeline to channel drinking water from Ethiopia to Djibouti, which like Ethiopia is prone to droughts.

"Our relationship is gaining momentum", said Tewolde Mulugeta, spokesman for the Ethiopian foreign ministry, who sees the deepening ties between the two countries as "a model" for the region.

It is a view shared in Djibouti.

"The main thing is that the development benefits not only the two countries but also other countries in the region," Energy Minister Ali Yacoub Mahamoud told AFP.

"That is why we must combine our resources, our efforts and our ideas".

- Chinese money -

The two countries see themselves as the engine of closer cooperation within the regional IGAD grouping, which also includes Kenya, Uganda, Somalia, Sudan and South Sudan.

Ethiopia and Djibouti's special relationship has been welcomed by China, a major investor in the region.

Most of Djibouti's 14 major infrastructure projects, which have been valued at a total 14.4 billion dollars, are being funded by Chinese banks, including the railway line that will halve transit times from Djibouti to Addis Ababa.

"These are very big investments," Djibouti's foreign minister said, explaining that China was "the only partner that accompanied us along this path."

China is also funding the pipeline that will transport natural gas to the port in Djibouti for export to the Asian powerhouse, and recently signed an accord with the Red Sea state on the construction of a free trade zone around 50 kilometres from Djibouti city.

Economists warn that Djibouti is becoming too reliant on Chinese credit. The country's public debt burden is forecast to rise from 60 per cent in 2015 to around 80 percent in 2017, according to the International Monetary Fund.

"It's a dilemma," admits Youssouf, the foreign minister. "The more indebted we are, the more we depend on our creditor. But what alternative is there? Countries can only develop if they have infrastructure."

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Not content to rely on passing port trade and playing host to the military bases of several world powers, Djibouti is now looking to play a bigger role in east Africa, in tandem with fast-growing Ethiopia ©Simon Maina (AFP/File)

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Workers seal packages in the port of Djibouti, which is in the lucrative position of offering landlocked Ethiopia its only access to the sea ©Simon Maina (AFP/File)

Ethiopia welcomes the Queen: archive, 2 February 1965 | World news | The Guardian

 Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip with Emperor Haile Selassie I, 1965. Photograph: Keystone/Hulton/Getty Images
The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh came here tonight to a leonine welcome at the start of a week’s state visit to Ethiopia.

Waiting for her at the airport was the Emperor of Ethiopia in field-marshal’s uniform and a lion’s mane helmet. As she drove the two miles to the Jubilee Palace she passed two huge gilded aluminium lions erected in her honour.

Halfway on the journey they changed from a car to a state coach drawn by six white horses. Surrounded by a 100 horsemen of the imperial bodyguard, jogging under heavy lion’s mane helmets, it took more than an hour to drive the two miles through crowd clapping a rhythmic welcome and drums thumping. Horsemen cantered among the crowd with even longer lions’ manes stuck to their hair.

State banquetLater the Queen was guest of honour at a state banquet in the old palace, where in the gardens the Emperor keeps his pet lions. By then she could be in no doubt that she had come to the land of the Lion of Judah, King of Kings.

The welcome, all the same, was gay and unforced. The traffic jams began two hours before her plane arrived, and it was noticeable how pedestrians who had armed themselves with spears made the best progress.

Her palace looks out upon the handsome African Hall where many times in the past 18 months African leaders have met to denounce the colonial Powers and to plan the liberation of Southern Africa. But a banner strung across the road proclaims “Long live the friendship between Great Britain and Ethiopia.” And behind her palace are roads named after three British generals - Wavell, Wingate, and Cunningham - who helped to liberate Ethiopia from the Italians.

Tonight, Britain was in Ethiopian eyes the great country and a liberator rather than a colonialist. Many of the soldiers at the airport wore the British Africa Star.

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The state visit is being made in return for one paid to London by the Emperor when Sir Winston Churchill was Prime Minister ten years ago. Britain was also host to the Emperor and his family while he fretted out four years of exile in a country house near Bath.

Ancient gloriesFor a week, Ethiopia is prepared to be unashamedly imperial. Today’s Issue of the “Ethiopian Gazette” carefully notes that the six white horses drawing the state coach were bred from the stable of the Emperor Maximilian, famous 300 years ago.

During the week the accent will be mainly on the country’s ancient glories, with a night spent camping above the old capital of Gondar. But the Queen is also to see new glories, such as the huge Tendaho cotton estates, one of the few pieces of British enterprise in Ethiopia. It is the successful vision of Mitchell Cotts, and that company’s 10,000 British shareholders.

The Queen’s arrival has inspired the capital’s only daily newspaper to inaugurate a women’s page, and in this the Queen is praised as a monarch who has shown interest in industry and patronised the arts. There is little doubt that the Queen, who added to today’s brightness by wearing a buttercup yellow coat and petal hat, will wipe out the somewhat frosty memory most Ethiopians have of the British monarchy.

No one in public speeches is likely to mention the unhappy events of a century ago, when the Emperor Theodore felt himself slighted in correspondence with Queen Victoria, and the incident ended with a British punitive expedition and the Emperor dying after battle. Today’s horsemen looked as if they had galloped out of the last century, but their welcome belonged to this happier age.

The Queen has invested Emperor Haile Selassie with the honorary rank of field-marshal in the British Army. The only other monarch in the world to hold this British rank is the King of Nepal.