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In what has become an annual tradition, Chinese President Xi Jinping, has extended his heartfelt festive greetings to all Chinese people during video conversations with ordinary people ahead of the Spring Festival otherwise known as Chinese New Year on January 22, 2023.
During the conversations, Xi who is also the General Secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and Chairman of the Central Military Commission, after making video calls with people at various locations across the country on Wednesday, said: “I especially care about grassroots officials and members of the public as we ring in the New Year.”
On the other end of the video link were medical workers at a hospital, senior citizens in a welfare home, workers on an outlying oilfield, travelers and staff members at a high-speed railway station, vendors and customers at a wholesale market, and people in an ethnic minority village.
The Chinese New Year is an occasion for family reunions, which sees people travel across the country, with some even from abroad to celebrate with their families and friends. After three years of fight against COVID-19, this year’s festival is of particular significance for many.
Over the past decade, Xi has spent time with ordinary people ahead of this important festival. Sometimes he would help them with festive preparations, such as making dumplings, a must-have dish for many families on their banquet tables on the eve of the New Year.
Four years ago, Zhu Maojin’s family welcomed Xi into their home to make dumplings during his visit to the hutong neighborhoods of central Beijing. As Xi helped to fill and form the dumplings, he asked Zhu’s family about their living conditions. Thanks to a government-funded renovation project, the family’s access to running water, electricity, gas and heating had greatly improved.
“He is easy-going and chatted with us just like a family member,” Zhu said.
China’s GDP Hits 121.0207trn Yuan in 2022
China’s economy posted steady growth in 2022 despite pressures which included epidemic resurgences and a complicated external environment.
China’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) grew three percent year-on-year to a record high of 121.0207 trillion yuan (about 17.95 trillion U.S. dollars) in 2022, data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed. In the fourth quarter, the country’s GDP expanded 2.9 percent year on year.
Head of the NBS, Kang Yi, , at a press conference in Beijing, said: “The national economy continued to develop despite downward pressure, the economic output reached a new level, the employment and prices were generally stable, people’s lives were continuously improved, new achievements were secured in high-quality development, and the overall economic and social development was stable and healthy,”
Kang however said the foundation of domestic economic recovery was not solid as the international situation is still complicated and severe, while the domestic triple pressure of demand contraction, supply shock and weakening expectations is still looming.
“China will make economic stability its top priority and pursue progress while ensuring stability this year,” Kang also said.
Some of China’s main economic indicators of 2022 are a deeper resident pocket – per capita disposable income which is 36,883 yuan, up five percent over 2021 in nominal terms (1USD=6.7222RMB); a bumper grain harvest – grain output is 686.53 billion kg, up 0.5 percent over 2021, a record high; a clean energy boom – newly installed capacity of solar and wind energy is 120 million kW, a record high and a huge tax relief, while value-added tax credit refund is 2.4 trillion yuan, a record high.
Chinese People Enjoy Chinese Lunar New Year Holiday Across China
The Chinese Spring Festival or Lunar New Year, took place on 22 January 2023, across the length and breadth of China.
As the unleashed pent-up travel demand has brought back a Spring Festival travel rush unseen for three years, China’s transport sectors were making all-out efforts to ensure smooth and safe journeys amid optimized COVID-19 response.
The total number of passenger trips for the year’s travel rush, or “Chunyun,” is expected to reach 2.1 billion, almost twice as much as last year or 70.3 percent of the 2019 reading, according to the Ministry of Transport of the People’s Republic of China.
Of the total, about 55 percent of the trips will be driven by family reunions, 24 percent will involve migrating for work, and leisure and businesses will take up roughly 10 percent, respectively.
President Buhari Inaugurate Three China-Invested Projects
President Muhammadu Buhari, accompanied by Chinese Ambassador to Nigeria, Cui Jianchun, inaugurated three different China-invested Nigerian projects in Nigeria recently.
One of the projects, the Nigeria Lekki Deep Sea Port, a China-invested PPP project, was officially inaugurated on January 23, 2023, in Lagos. The project, an investment in excess of $1.5 billion, is a joint venture between the federal government, through the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA), Lagos State Government, Tolarams Group (owners of the Lagos Free Zone), and China Harbour Engineering Company.
On January 22, 2023, a few hours before the official inauguration by President Buhari, the first commercial ship, the container freighter CMA CGM MOZART, docked at the port. Ambassador Cui said during the inauguration that: “This project is a joint venture between China, Nigeria and Singapore, and is run by a French company. The model of ‘five parties from four countries’ is a way of taking advantage of the wisdom and strength of all parties.”
The other projects were the Blue Line of the Lagos Rail Mass Transit which was inaugurated in Marina, Lagos, on January 24, 2023, and the 41-terabyte national tier-4 Data Center which was commissioned in Kano on January 30, 2023 by President Buhari. The project was executed by Galaxy Backbone Limited Chinese Huawei Company.
Chinese Proverbs on Harmony:
A single flower does not make spring, while one hundred flowers in full blossom bring spring to the garden.
The Significance of Chinese Foreign Minister’s Visit to Africa at the Beginning of 2023
To deepen the China-Africa comprehensive strategic and cooperative partnership and boost friendly cooperation between China and Africa, Foreign Minister Qin Gang visited Ethiopia, Gabon, Angola, Benin, Egypt, the African Union Headquarters and the League of Arab States Headquarters upon invitation from January 9 to 16, 2023.
This is the 33rd consecutive year that Africa has been the destination of Chinese foreign ministers’ annual first overseas visit. Less than two weeks after his appointment, Qin visited Africa on his first official overseas trip with five countries and two regional organizations on his busy eight-day schedule.
Qin followed his predecessors’ footsteps. For the past 32 years, all Chinese foreign ministers started their New Year overseas tours in Africa, even during the COVID-19 pandemic, which testifies to the long-lasting friendship between China and Africa.
Speaking during the completion ceremony or the China-aided project of the Africa Center or Disease Control and Prevention Headquarters in Addis Ababa, Qin said like the African Union Conference Center, it is yet another landmark of China-Africa cooperation.
“At the outset, I wish to extend warm congratulations to the AU, and to the African countries and peoples. I also want to thank the AU Commission and the Ethiopian government for their strong support, and pay high tribute to the Chinese and African engineers and workers who have participated in the project,” Qin said.
Qin also said he learned from his colleagues about the many challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic to the project during construction, saying that the two sides have surmounted the difficulties and topped out the buildings ahead of schedule.
“I believe with the joint efforts of our two sides, the Africa CDC will make greater contribution to public health in Africa and the health and wellbeing of the African people. It will also write a new, splendid chapter in the history of China-Africa relations,” the Chinese Foreign Minister also said.
Qin further said China has remained Africa’s largest trading partner for 13 years in a row, adding that two-way trade in 2022 is expected to exceed 260 billion US dollars. China’s imports from Africa, he stated, grew faster than its exports to Africa.
“Fifty-two African countries and the AU Commission have signed Belt and Road cooperation documents with China. Landmark projects like the AU Conference Center, the Africa CDC headquarters, the Mombasa-Nairobi Railway and the Addis Ababa-Djibouti Railway keep emerging. Joint projects of highways, electricity, communications and ports span across Africa. Such cooperation has helped enhance Africa’s capacity for independent and sustainable development.
“As the new year begins, everything takes on a new look. China will embark on a new journey to build a modern socialist country on all fronts, and the AU and African countries will also embrace the celebratory moment of the 60th anniversary of the Organization of African Unity (OAU). At this new historical starting point, I wish to make a four-point proposal on the development of China-Africa relations,” Qin further said.
