African Entrepreneurship Record

Chapter 1123: Chapter 132: Central African Economic Cooperation Organization

However, building economic cooperation in Central Africa solely with East Africa and Southern German is obviously unworkable, as Southern German is a landlocked country and the sea outlets of Central Africa are controlled by East Africa, Belgium and Germans.

Although East Africa has its own sea outlet, it is still somewhat distant from the Northwest region of East Africa, so the best approach is to open up the sea routes of Belgium and Germany.

Maurice said, ”Both Belgium and Germany are strong economically, but neither country can effectively project their influence in their Central African colonies, so building Central Africa’s economy requires cooperation among us.”

”The first step is to establish interconnections for land transportation, including building railways, highways, and other infrastructures, and cooperatively developing mineral resources within the region, thereby bringing economic benefits to all nations.”

”The second step is to open up regional markets, unify tariffs, and build a Central Africa Economic Alliance to realize resource monetization and mutual trade exchange.”

”There is no doubt that once this Central Africa Economic Alliance is built, our East Africa can expand our influence within the region and strengthen economic exchanges with member countries, and you can also accelerate the development of your colonies through this regional economic alliance, enhancing the value of each other’s colonies or territories.”

The conditions offered by East Africa are quite sincere since the current era’s international community logic dictates that East Africa’s actions do not align with the typical imperialist country’s style.

Take the United States, for example; it wishes to expel all colonial powers from the entire America so that the United States can dominate America alone.

East Africa, as the most powerful country in Africa, could very well create an East Africa version of the ”Monroe Doctrine” if desired. If East Africa participates in the competition on the African continent, there would basically be no place for European countries.

The Central Africa Economic Alliance proposed by East Africa represents East Africa’s willingness to cooperate with Germany and Belgium on an equal footing, which in a certain sense signifies East Africa’s acknowledgment of German and Belgian interests existing in Central Africa.

To put it bluntly, for East Africa, the entire Central Africa is akin to how Mexico is to the United States. The United States could through various means expel Spain and France from Mexico, and East Africa wants to control Central Africa through military force even more easily.

After all, though Mexico’s performance is poor, it is considered a regional great power worldwide, but Belgium and Germany’s colonies in Central Africa cannot be compared to Mexico at all.

Xavier: ”We appreciate East Africa’s goodwill, but I still need to discuss this matter with the domestic authorities. Personally, I believe Germany and East Africa will reach a consensus to provide a stable environment for developing Central Africa’s economy.”

Governor Klein of the Belgian Congo Colony was more straightforward, saying to Maurice: ”Belgium is very interested in East Africa’s proposal.”

Maurice nodded in satisfaction and said, ”The communication in Bangui is very developed. You can entirely use telegrams here to communicate with your respective domestic authorities. If you’re willing to accept East Africa’s goodwill, we can finalize the agreement in Bangui.”

It’s not easy for the German and Belgian delegations to make it to Bangui due to the poor transportation conditions within their colonies. Therefore, having them settle all matters directly in Bangui could reduce many troubles.

Over the following days, the German and Belgian delegations used telegrams from Bangui to relay their situations back home, and the results were self-evident—the Central African Economic Cooperation Organization was formed, led by East Africa.

In fact, the German government had long wanted to leverage East Africa’s strength to develop the Cameroon Colony, but East Africa was focused on domestic construction back then and was not keen on the German government’s requests.

As times change, East Africa’s industrial strength has surged, and domestic transportation construction is quite complete, naturally needing to expand its economic frontier outward.

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Rhein City.

Looking at the email sent back by Maurice, the East African government officials were quite pleased.

Ernst said, ”With Germany settled, Central Africa is basically settled. Central Africa is the land and sea throat connecting our country with West Africa, so transportation construction there should follow East African standards, thereby building an economic broadcast area centered on East Africa.”

East Africa’s leading Central African Economic Cooperation Organization, many related standards must be based on East Africa’s domestic standards as well, such as railway and highway construction. East Africa assuming the construction of Central Africa’s railway is actually to resolve East African Northwest’s sea outlet issue. If the railway standards in Belgian Congo and German Cameroon can be unified with East Africa, it would reduce many intermediate links, realizing iron-sea intermodal transport in East African Northwest.

Germany and Belgium actually have the capability to build railroads, but the cost they would have to pay for colony construction is too high, so they have to accept East Africa’s offer.

East Africa is not a charity, and the proposal for a Central African Economic Alliance is essentially to incorporate this region culturally, linguistically, and ethnically close to East Africa into its sphere of influence.

Southern German and Germany need not be mentioned, Belgium is practically a semi-German country, with a significant number of German-speaking populace domestically, and this is more evident in Belgian Congo because the main trade partner for Belgian Congo is East Africa, making German speaking rate there even surpass domestic levels.

So in East African perspective, the whole Central Africa region is naturally suitable to become a subordinate force of East Africa, and East Africa’s only obstacle for assimilation is Germany, but when war erupts in Europe, Germany probably won’t have the mind to care about the Cameroon Colony thousands of miles away.

Sivert said, ”The Central African Economic Cooperation Organization is an important step for further expanding and deepening our country’s influence in Africa. Through infrastructure construction and trade interaction, we can bind this region with East Africa, and in the future, further expand into West Africa, North Africa, and even South Africa, thereby solidifying our base.”

Currently, the South African colony under British control is somewhat of an eyesore, but East Africa has no significant plans for South Africa at the moment.

South Africa isn’t culturally and linguistically close to East Africa like Central Africa, and there’s a significant number of Boers, many of whom were driven away by East Africa, harboring deep-seated enmity, so East Africa is not eager to meddle in South African affairs.

As for Cape of Good Hope, although strategically important, it doesn’t hold as much allure to East Africa as imagined, since East Africa’s domestic railways play a certain substitutive role.

Certainly, British hegemony remains strong, making East Africa wary of stirring the pot. Were it any other country, East Africa wouldn’t possibly allow South Africa to escape its control.

Take the East Indies controlled by Dutch, for example; it’s Ernst’s next target for dismantling. The whole East Indies region is too large, and the Dutch have integrated these numerous islands under a unified colonial administration, which is actually unifying local political forces.

Ernst hopes that the future East Indies won’t develop a strong political regime like Indonesia in the past life, as that wouldn’t be beneficial for East Africa’s future endeavors in Nanyang.

Moreover, although the Netherlands is not as declined as Portugal and Spain, in today’s international community, it has little strength but occupies such a large colony, which falls under the category of ’holding a stone that attracts trouble’ for great powers like East Africa.

Of course, trying to stir trouble in the East Indies now is not opportune, especially with Britain’s backing of the Netherlands. There exists a certain cooperative relationship between the two, or else Britain wouldn’t have allowed the Netherlands to occupy so much land in the East Indies.