Official Chinese Media Begins to Replace VOA

 The Wall Street Journal published on 13 July 2025 an article titled "China Gets More Airtime Around the World as Voice of America Signs Off" by Aruna Viswanatha, Alexandra Wexler, and Clarence Leong.

Media time slots in foreign countries once used by the Voice of America are, in some cases, now being allocated to official Chinese media outlets.

China's Information Campaign in Africa

 The Diplomat published on 23 October 2024 a commentary titled "China's Battle for Narratives in Africa" by Samir Bhattacharya and Yuvvraj Singh, both with India's Observer Research Foundation.  

China has built narratives to its advantage in Africa, a region that has increasingly become a theater of great power rivalry.  China's information strategy in Africa consists of three parts.  First, it hosts and trains numerous African media professionals each year, teaching them to promote Chinese investments as a positive force.  Second, China invests in local African media outlets, influencing their editorial practices to align with the Chinese narrative.  Third, China sells technology to African governments that enables tighter control over digital information, including blocking websites and shutting down internet access.  

China's Media Propaganda in Africa

 The United States Institute of Peace published on 16 March 2023 a report titled "China's Media Propaganda in Africa: A Strategic Assessment" by Joshua Eisenman.

This report examines China's investments in Africa's media sector, assesses their effect, and makes recommendations for how the United States can respond to China's influence campaigns.  

Impact of Chinese Media on African Public Opinion

The International Journal of Press/Politics published in 2016 a research article titled "China in Africa: An Analysis of the Effect of Chinese Media Expansion on African Public Opinion" by Catie Snow Bailard, George Washington University.

Using Pew Global Attitudes Project data, the author explored correlations between attitudes toward China and the extent of the Chinese media presence across six African nations in 2013. The analysis provided tentative support that the sweeping efforts to expand the reach and relevance of Chinese media in Africa have moved African public opinion in the desired direction.

China Radio International Discussion on China and Africa

China Radio International (CRI) Today show ran on 4 December 2015 a 54 minute panel discussion on China-Africa relations coinciding with the Sixth Forum on China-Africa Cooperation being held in Johannesburg.  The panelists were Ambassador Liu Guijin, dean of the China Africa International Business School at Zhejiang Normal University and former ambassador to South Africa and special envoy for Africa, Kemo Bosielo, South African political commentator now at Tsinghua University in Beijing, and myself. 

The topics focused on President Xi Jinping's visits to Zimbabwe and South Africa, China's relations with those countries, FOCAC 6, trade, investment, infrastructure, industrialization, business, labor, African agency, security, conflict prevention, and some of the challenges China faces in Africa.

China Making Major Media Push in Africa

China has long emphasized its media activities in Africa but it has only been in the last decade or so that it had the resources to compete with western governments and private news sources such as Voice of America, BBC, Reuters, Bloomberg, Agence France Presse and Associated Press. China's official news service, Xinhua, now has at least 20 bureaus in Africa and regional centers in Cairo and Nairobi. China Radio International (CRI) transmits from Kenya in Swahili, Chinese and English. China Central Television (CCTV) is the newest addition with a headquarters in Nairobi. All of these media services are government controlled.

Tom Rhodes, a Committee to Protect Journalists consultant based in Nairobi, recently commented on China's growing media footprint in Kenya. He noted that CCTV has a local staff of 50 and 14 correspondents in South Africa, Nigeria, Somalia, Uganda, Zimbabwe and Senegal. CCTV plans to expand to 150 staff and become by 2015 an all news, 24-hour channel similar to CNN. This is occurring as western media sources are reducing their efforts in Africa.

Chinese media tend to emphasize "positive news stories" in Africa while western outlets report more negative developments. Rhodes adds, however, that Chinese media do not generally permit criticism of Chinese activities in Africa. Click here to read the authors brief commentary on this issue.