"They come like a thief in the night, bang on the door of your hotel room and ask for your identity card. Whoever cannot identify himself, is taken away. They are unrelenting, Sir.
They questioned me for two hours in the police station, while my papers are fine. What did I do here? What sort of business was I into? How much money did I make? After two hours they let me go, without explanation nor apology. Human rights? They have never heard of such things here. And we Africans are the victims.
One acquaintance of mine panicked during one of these police raids and jumped out of a fifth floor window. His thigh bones stuck right through his body. He survived, but after first-aid he was put on the plane right back home."
Universal complaint
A Somalian salesman
In the reception of Hotel Donfranc in the center of Guangzhou (formerly Kanton) he looks at me with wide open eyes. Francois Mbosi* from Guinea, strongly coloured T-shirt, fashionable jeans with prefab holes. His complaint is universal. Almost every African has a similar story to tell. As if they are outlaws.
Mbosi talks in a soft voice. While other Africans walk in and out, he hesitantly embarks on his story in a typical West-African French accent. Soon he stumbles over his own words in indignation. "We don't have any rights here, we are treated like dirt."
Mbosi knows very well that your visa must be in order. If not, you are sent immediately to the immigration department detention centre. Illegals are kept there until their relatives or friends can pay the fine of 10,000 yuan (1160 euros). After payment, the detainee remains in custody for one more month before he is deported, as an extra punishment.
Embassies from many African countries have stationed envoys in Guangzhou, to help the countless offenders. Francois Mbosi speaks of a real industry, designed to extricate money from the pockets of Africans.
He reads out loud the telephone number on my business card. Can't I help him acquire a visa for the Netherlands? Then his mobile phone rings and he walks out gesticulating, while he negotiates in poor Chinese the price of a batch of T-shirts and jeans.
Depicted as drug-dealers
Street scene, Guangzhou
Photo: Chameleo at Flickr
From the early eighties, when African students could still study for free at the Beida University in Beijing, discrimination against Africans in China was reported in the international media. Since then, the story has been regularly repeated.
Just before the Beijing Olympics, racism was front page news again. In the bars of Sanlitun, the downtown area for foreigners, they were systematically denied entrance, just as in the discos of the capital.
In May and October last year, the police held a large-scale raid among Africans in Guangzhou. In the local media they were depicted as drug-dealers and pimps. Also many Chinese youngsters distrust Africans. "You know what they are doing here. They trade in drugs and girls. In their neighbourhood Dengfeng you can't go out in the street at night. Too dangerous", says Mi Mi (24). She is a receptionist in an apartment block that carries the suitable name World Peace Hotel. "Could I marry an African? Have you gone mad? No, interracial marriages between Chinese and Africans happen hardly ever or never. With Europeans, that's a different story." Has she ever been in the African neighbourhood? She shyly shrugs her shoulders.
*the name Francois Mbosi is fictional for reasons of privacy
Tags: Africans, Beijing, China, discrimination, Guangzhou, racism