Connecting youth in China and Africa

Photo taken on on December 8 shows the award ceremony of the Second CHINAFRICA Short Video Competition. (People's Daily Online/Wang Lei)

Award ceremonies of the Second CHINAFRICA Short Video Competition were held simultaneously in Beijing, Cape Town, and Dakar on December 8. Themed “Working Hand in Hand for a Shared Future,” the competition aims to promote China-Africa friendship and enhance people-to-people understanding.

A short video based on the life and work of an African football coach in China won the grand prize. "Through the video, I hope to present a real story of people-to-people exchange between China and Africa,” said Xu Wei, one of the creators of the video. The short video recounts how Pategou Kamgang Francis, a football coach from Cameroon, trains the youth in China.

Held in August 2020, the BEIJING REVIEW hosted the competition under the China International Publishing Group (CIPG), receiving additional support from the Chinese-African People's Friendship Association.

Compared to last year, this year’s competition has higher specifications, and is on a larger scale with more participants and entries. This year, the competition was held in three zones, receiving works from 28 countries in China, Senegal and South Africa. After preliminary review, online voting and expert evaluation, 19 entries were chosen as winners.

Among the entries, some show how people in China and African countries supported each other during the COVID-19 pandemic, some tell stories of African student volunteers standing together with Chinese friends to fight the virus, and some talk about how Chinese companies helped local residents in Africa prevent and control the epidemic.

Gao Anming, Vice President and Editor-in-Chief of CIPG, said in his speech that in the new era, China-Africa friendship, especially people-to-people exchanges, needs to be further enhanced.

Gao said the competition could effectively enhance the understanding between the people of China and Africa and the China-Africa friendship. It could also be part of the force pushing forward the development of the Belt and Road Initiative and the building of an even closer China-Africa community with a shared future.

“Most of the videos tell touching stories about China-Africa joint efforts to fight against the pandemic and praise our friendship,” said Zhou Yong, Counsellor of Cultural Affairs of the Chinese Embassy to South Africa. He said these vivid and moving video stories have become a positive force helping people overcome difficulties during the pandemic. “They also remind us of the importance of the healing power of cultural exchanges and people-to-people contacts in this time of hardship.”

This short video competition about China-Africa cooperation shows that audiovisual productions are a powerful vector of transmission, popularization of values and rapprochement between peoples through the magic of information and communication technologies, said Abdoulaye Diop, Minister of Culture and Communication of Senegal. “It is precisely through the discovery of other cultures that we can understand each other better,” he added.

Zhang Yanqiu, Director of the Africa Communication Research Center at the Communication University of China and one of the judges of the competition, noted that the competition is a way to connect the youth in China and Africa. “Young people have played an important role in promoting friendly relations between China and Africa. They bring African culture to China, and bring the goodwill of the Chinese people back to Africa.”