On July 6, the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of China (CPC), General Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPC and President of China Xi Jinping, President of the ANC and President of South Africa Cyril Ramaphosa, General Secretary of the South African Communist Party (SACP) and Minister of Higher Education, Science and Innovation Blade Nzimande and other leaders of more than 500 political parties and organisations from over 160 countries as well as 10 000 and more representatives of political parties and representatives of various communities, participated in the cloud event of the CPC and World Political Parties Summit with “Working for the People's Well-being and the Responsibility of Political Parties” as the theme.
In the context of profound transformations and a pandemic unseen in a century, when human society has once again found itself at a historical crossroads, this successful summit has provided an important platform for the political party leaders from various countries to strengthen the exchange and mutual learning of experience in governance, to discuss co-operation in solidarity as well as future development plans, to enhance the capability to work for the people’s wellbeing, to promote world peace and development, and to promote the building of a community with a shared future for mankind.
After attending the celebration of the 100th anniversary of the founding of the CPC on July 1, General Secretary Xi Jinping expounded during the Summit once again the CPC’s proposals for the future of mankind and to the international community, especially to all political parties in the world. He proposed that political parties need to shoulder their historical responsibility as the major force for the progress of mankind, and elaborated the CPC’s mission as a major political party in a major country.
It is the historical responsibility of political parties to work for the people's wellbeing. Political parties, as an important force for human progress, need to set the right course forward and shoulder their historical responsibility to ensure the people’s wellbeing and pursue human progress. To achieve that, political parties need to work even harder on the following:
First, we need to shoulder the responsibility to steer the course of shaping a shared future for mankind. We need to heed the voices of the people and strengthen co-ordination and co-operation. By doing so, the interests of the people of one’s own country will be in line with those of all others and humanity will move forward towards a shared future.
Second, we need to build consensus by upholding and promoting the common values of humanity for peace, development, equity, justice, democracy and freedom. We need to champion the common values of humanity, foster broad-minded tolerance toward the understanding of values by different civilizations, and respect the explorations of different peoples to turn values into reality. By doing so, the common values of humanity will be translated into the practice of individual countries to serve the interests of their own people in a concrete and realistic way.
Third, we need to promote development by bringing greater benefits to all peoples in a fairer manner. On the road towards the well-being of all mankind, no country or nation should be left behind. We need to bring greater equity, higher efficiency and stronger synergy to global development, and jointly oppose the practice of technology blockades and divides as well as decoupling.
Fourth, we need to enhance co-operation by working together to address global risks and challenges such as Covid-19, terrorism, and climate change. In particular, we need to advocate solidarity and co-operation so as to close the “immunisation gap”. We must oppose the practice of politicising the pandemic or attaching a geographical label to the virus. We need to work together to build a global community of health for all.
Fifth, we need to improve governance by enhancing our capacity to ensure the people’s well-being. People of all countries are entitled to choose their own development paths and institutional models and to advance political democracy in a way that suits the national conditions of the country.
The CPC is committed to enhancing exchanges and mutual learning with various political parties in the world and the well-being for the people of China and the world. It is the unswerving goal of the CPC to run our own house well, ensure a happy life for the 1.4 billion-plus Chinese people, and advance the lofty cause of promoting peace and development for all mankind.
With the goal of moderate prosperity in all respects achieved, China has embarked on a new journey towards building a modern socialist country. The Chinese people are brimming with a greater sense of fulfilment, happiness and security with each passing day.
Fighting for the cause of human progress is also the international mission of the CPC. The CPC will continue to uphold a people-centred development philosophy, focus on the overarching issues of national rejuvenation and human progress in the greater context of time and space and always be a builder of world peace, contributor to global development, and defender of the international order.
The CPC has persisted in closely associating the future of the Chinese people with that of other peoples of the world and steered a steady course of China's development amid the general trend of the world and the currents of the times to promote common development and prosperity of all countries. We work with political parties from all countries to make new contributions to the wellbeing of people all over the world.
First, the CPC will press ahead with the Chinese-style modernisation and the CPC is ready to share with political parties of all countries experience in modernisation to enrich each other’s toolbox to modernisation.
Second, the CPC will take comprehensive steps to deepen reform and opening up. The CPC is ready to enhance communication with world political parties in steering economic globalisation towards greater openness, inclusiveness, balance and win-win results. We stand ready to work with the international community to improve global connectivity and further promote high quality Belt and Road co-operation, so that more countries and peoples will be able to share the fruits of development.
Third, the CPC will make new contributions to improving the well-being of humankind. We are willing to share more of our solutions and strength to the world’s poverty-alleviation efforts. China will help promote fair accessibility to and affordability of vaccines for developing countries, work hard to peak carbon dioxide emissions and achieve carbon neutrality, and advance the new process of global biological diversity.
Fourth, the CPC will actively improve global governance. We need to stand opposed to the practice of unilateralism disguised as multilateralism and say no to hegemony and power politics. The CPC will actively promote the improvement of global governance and China will always be a member of the developing world. We are committed to enhancing developing countries’ representation and voice in the global governance system.
Party exchanges between China and South Africa provide a powerful boost to the common well-being of the two peoples. The CPC, the ANC and the SACP are good friends, good partners, and good comrades who breathe the same breath and share weal and woe. They forged a deep friendship as early as the period of South Africa’s struggle against apartheid.
China-South Africa relations started from party-to-party exchanges. The strong friendship, close exchanges and important guidance provided by the leaders of the CPC, the ANC and the SACP have boosted the sustained development of bilateral relations.
After the birth of the New South Africa, our party-to-party relations has been developing rapidly, and has laid an important strategic foundation and provided political support to our bilateral relations.
In recent years, under the stewardship of the leaders of the two parties and two countries, high level interactions between political parties of the two countries are more frequent, and cooperation in various fields is getting closer, bringing huge tangible benefits to the two peoples.
China-South Africa relations have become a model for China-Africa relations, South-South co-operation, and the solidarity and co-operation among developing countries. It can be said that without the close cooperation between our parties, there would not be the establishment and development of the comprehensive strategic partnership between the two countries.
It is worth mentioning that President Ramaphosa, as the president of the ANC, delivered a passionate speech as the first guest speaker at the summit. The president spoke highly of the CPC’s contribution to the African countries’ development and the well-being of the people. He also mentioned that “China has been a good friend and loyal friend to many of us on the African continent …The ANC regards the CPC as a true, reliable and valued friend.”
On the occasion of the 100th birthday of the CPC and SACP, General Secretary Nzimande also attended the summit. All of these fully reflect the profound friendship between our parties and two countries.
It is our firm belief and strong expectation that under the leadership of General Secretary Xi Jinping, President Ramaphosa and other leaders of the our parties and two countries, with the joint efforts of both sides, the party-to-party co-operation will achieve more fruitful results and continue to inject strong impetus into the development of the China-South Africa Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, bringing more sense of gain and happiness to the people of our two countries.
The South African people are suffering from the third wave of Covid-19 infections. A few days ago, the CoronaVac Covid-19 vaccine manufactured by Sinovac Life Sciences Co of China has been authorised emergency use access in South Africa with conditions.
This is the latest development of China-South Africa Covid-19 response co-operation and a pragmatic measure taken by the ANC government for the wellbeing of South African people. The CPC is willing to work with South African political parties such as the ANC and the SACP to help South African people defeat the virus and create a happy life together.
* Chen Xiaodong is Ambassador of China to South Africa.
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of IOL and Independent Media.