ABSTRACT
In 2004, China Export–Import (China Exim) Bank extended a US$2 billion oil-backed loan to the Angolan government for the purpose of funding infrastructure projects related to post-war construction. The loan has been extended repeatedly and is widely reported to be several times the original facility ceiling. As I will argue here, the Angolan political elite has used the China Exim Bank credit line to strengthen its hold on power in the critical period immediately following the end of the country’s protracted civil conflict, effectively adopting a strategy of ‘extraversion’ to take into account Angola’s shifting political context in a post-war era. This chapter draws on fieldwork and research conducted between 2009 and 2011, concentrating on the years immediately following the cessation of Angola’s civil war in 2002 and focuses on the phenomenon of relations with China being subverted and utilized as a mechanism to bolster regime stability without Beijing’s explicit intention of so doing.
The Angolan case of the ruling party Movimento Popular para a Libertação de Angola (MPLA) utilizing relations with China and the subsequent credit lines from Chinese state-owned banks to operationalize a discourse of national reconstruction is explored. The intention of Angolan political elites was to bolster regime legitimacy, presented as political stability.
