Coronavirus: the anger of Africans victims of discrimination in China

Text by: Stéphane Lagarde Follow

Pushed back from hotels, kicked out of their homes, many Africans say they have been victims of abusive discrimination and arrest in recent days in Canton as part of the fight against the coronavirus. Incidents which have provoked strong reactions from African diplomats. This Saturday, the State Department in the United States advises African-Americans to avoid the city.

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From our correspondent in Beijing,

三名 尼日利亚人 被 广州 防疫 部门 从 酒店 公寓 强行 带走 隔离 ， 护照 也 被 收缴！ 尼日利亚 驻 广州 总 领事 闻 迅 赶来 ， 毫不 客气 地 从 官员 手中 夺下 3 本 护照 ， 还给 自己 国民 ... pic.twitter.com/mDtN6LyM5A

" Give us back these passports immediately." The altercation between a Nigerian diplomat and the white coveralls of the fight against viral pneumonia in Canton is a reflection of the irritation, not to mention the anger felt in many African capitals.

Summons of Chinese Ambassadors in Lagos and Accra, calls for help from the Kenyan community in front of the Daily Nation in Nairobi this Saturday, and this call from the US consulate advising African Americans to come to the most African of Chinese cities .

In the space of a week, we went from headlines celebrating China's donations of masks and other materials to help stop the spread of COVID-19 in Kenya to this.

It's safe to say that China's "donation diplomacy" message is now entirely lost amid all that's going on in Guangzhou. pic.twitter.com/1F9EElr4os

The images of these Africans, most of them businessmen forced to sleep on the streets of the Yuexiu and Baiyun districts of Canton, quickly replaced those of Chinese health diplomacy in Africa. Avalanches of comments on twitter: " We no longer want your masks if our nationals are victims of racism in China ", " we are treated like the virus " or " do not use the African community as a scapegoat ".

These evictions from accommodation or hotels follow a statement from the municipality stating that five Nigerians had tested positive and had gone to several restaurants and hotels in the city without respecting their fortnight, leading the health authorities to find and test 2 000 people potentially in contact with them.

The embers of suspicion and the fear of the foreigner being already fueled by the fears of the authorities, widely relayed by the state media, of a rebound of the coronavirus in China linked to the imported cases. Beijing this Friday announced 10 years of banishment from Chinese soil for foreigners not respecting their quarantine, many abuses of racist languages ​​and drawings have flourished on social networks.

Rising xenophobia is being tolerated on the Chinese internet.

In this comic strip cartoon, foreigners are depicted being dragged across the ground, thrown into garbage bins, attacked with a disinfectant spray and kicked around. (1/8) https://t.co/iGqWeLDijT pic.twitter.com/9YFIt10rXI

Overflows already noted at the beginning of the year, when Beijing proposed an amendment to the law on permanent residence for immigrants. The various testimonies relate the case of owner cutting the electricity to dislodge the tenants, of massive campaign of detection of the Covid-19 and of quarantines targeting the African community, some of which have not left the country in recent months .

Others less numerous report the gestures of solidarity of local residents, sometimes other foreign communities who came to support them by giving them clothes and food. " Since the beginning of the epidemic, China and African countries have always supported each other and have always fought jointly against the coronavirus, " said Zhao Lijian during his daily press briefing Thursday afternoon. “ The Chinese government treats all foreigners in China in the same way, insisted the spokesperson for Chinese diplomacy, (…) and has no tolerance for discriminatory words and gestures. "

The same day, the city of Canton reported 114 cases of imported contamination, a large majority of Chinese diaspora and 16 Africans.

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