Is China really colonising Pakistan? Jiao Nie and Yao
Wang
Some critics have
claimed that CPEC could become another East India Company' and Pakistan: a
Chinese colony
MAY
19, 2018
Five
years have elapsed ever since the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor initiative
(CPEC) was proposed by the Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang in May 2013, and
changes have been taking place in every corner of Pakistan, including the
inauguration of the new Islamabad International Airport.
During
the past five years, we travelled many places in Pakistan and were welcomed
with enthusiasm and thoughtful receptions whenever we met Pakistani people.
Whether rich or poor, we found that the people of Pakistan are quite friendly
to Chinese. Pakistan is one of the most trusted countries and also becoming
increasingly significant to many Chinese, whether they are highest top Chinese
leaders or ordinary Chinese people in general.
The
mainstream of Pakistani media is always positive and supportive of Pak-China
relations and the CPEC initiative. Unfortunately, fewer arguments and negative
comments were published and impacted their readers in varying degrees, and need
to be clarified right here, for some critics have claimed that CPEC could
become another East India Company’ and Pakistan: a Chinese colony?
What
needs to be pointed out is that we experienced several invasions and suffered a
lot in fighting invaders in history, and had bad insinuations with the word of
Colony. Therefore?it’s sad to see that colony was used to describe Pak-China
relations by our few Pakistani brothers.
When it comes to those huge debts mentioned in
previous articles, the international community should be more worried about
Pakistan’s ability to repay them
On
the other hand, we believe that Pakistan is a democratic country and those open
discussions are not always harmful to enhance our bilateral relations, but
meanwhile, we also wish to clarify the truth and the facts, instead of
fabricating many lies deliberately.
To
colonize a country, political, ideological, economical and several measures are
implied. While the truth is that Pakistan is an independent country and
respectfully has its own political system and ideological system. During the
past seven decades, China has never imposed our political systems or ideology
on Pakistan. Now, the discussion comes to the economic system, the way we
Chinese do business with Pakistani is same as any other countries do business
in Pakistan, and all the activities are approved by the Pakistani government
and under the control of Pakistani legal system.
So
how it is possible to make Pakistan a colony of China? Indeed, we never deny
that there were some Chinese who were involved in wrongdoings in Pakistan, but
the solution is quite easy and simple i.e. to send them to the court and
receive their own punishments. To be honest, their behaviour would not be
allowed even in China.
Pakistani
people are the most genius people that we have ever met in the world, however,
acts of commercial dishonesty, fraudulent trading, temporary deprivation by
Pakistanis were regularly reported by Pakistani media.
As
scholars, we also worry that our government and state-owned enterprises won’t
be able to recover these huge investments in this regard, for most of those
funds are majorly collected by taxing every single common Chinese citizen. When
it comes to those huge debts mentioned in previous articles, the international
community should be more worried about the repayment ability of Pakistan.
In
terms of the projects under the name of CPEC initiatives, all the treaties were
signed and proved by the most talented people from both sides. As mentioned
earlier, it’s not an easy job to do business with Pakistan, and how is it
possible to cheat so many talented and well educated Pakistani elites in a
legally sound democracy country? In case our Pakistani friends find every
single treaty that is unequal, they should go through official procedures or
bring it to the court, rather than speaking ill behind our backs.
Pakistan
is a great country with a sound legal system and a time-tested democracy
system, and we respect Pakistani culture and dignity in this regard. We,
Chinese people, regard Pakistan as a window to understanding the Islamic world
and the gateway to communicate with the entire region. That is why this is a
win-win situation and the mutual benefit will meet the need of two brotherhood
countries, and more open discussions are not harmful yet quite necessary for
Pak-China future. Last but not least, we Chinese people are quite easy to get
along with and have no interest to colonize any country in the world including
Pakistan.
(Huazhong
TU, Scholar, Tsinghua University & Yunnan Academy of Social Sciences,
China. Jiao NIE & Yao WANG, Scholars, Yunnan University, China.
Published
in Daily Times, May 19th 2018.
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