China's President Hu Jintao to visit Saudi Arabia and the four African nations of Mali, Senegal, Tanzania and Mauritius

Skyline of Port Louis, the capital of Mauritius.

Ooh, Mauritius is included. That's my favourite African country. Maybe along with the visit there will be a few pieces on the countries themselves in the Chinese media (Mauritius is written as 毛里求斯 in Chinese) and that might include some info on the language there, a creole derived from French.

Source: turkish.cri.cn (Turkish)

Hu Jintao, Suudi Arabistan ve 4 Afrika ülkesini ziyaret edecek

Hu Jintao to visit Saudi Arabia and 4 African nations

(GMT+08:00) 2009-02-03 21:28:24 cri

Çin Cumhurbaşkanı Hu Jintao'nun, Suudi Arabistan Kralı Abdullah Bin Abdülaziz, Mali Devlet Başkanı Toumany Toure, Senegal Devlet Başkanı Abdoulaye Wade, Tanzanya Devlet Başkanı Jakaya Kikwete, Morityus Devlet Başkanı Anerood Jugnauth ve Başbakan Navin Ramgoolam'ın davetlisi olarak 10-17 Şubat günlerinde adı geçen beş ülkeyi ziyaret edeceğini duyurdu.

Chinese President Hu Jintao will be making an overseas visit from the 10th to 17th of February to five nations, where he will meet King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz of Saudi Arabia, Mali's President Toumany Toure, Senegal's President Abdoulaye Wade, Tanzania's President Jakaya Kikwete, and Mauritius' President Anerood Jugnauth and Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam.

Sözcü, Hu Jintao'nun ziyaretlerinin, Çin ile bu ülkeler arasındaki dostluk ilişkilerinin daha da sağlamlaştırılıp pekiştirilmesi, Çin-Afrika İşbirliği Forumu Beijing Zirvesi'nin sonuçlarının hayata geçirilmesi ve ortak gelişmenin hızlandırılması amacını taşıdığını belirtti. Hu Jintao'nun ziyaretleri sırasında çeşitli ülke liderleriyle yapacağı görüşmelerde, Çin ile adı geçen beş ülke arasındaki ikili ilişkilerin yanısıra, her iki tarafı da ilgilendiren uluslararası ve bölgesel sorunlar üzerinde fikir alışverişinde bulunacağı bildirildi.

A spokesman said that the goals of the visits are to further consolidate and reinforce friendly relations between China and these countries, implement results from the China-Africa Cooperation Forum Summit in Beijing, and speed up joint development. In the talks to take place between Hu Jintao and the leaders of these various nations during his visit, besides bilateral relations between China and the aforementioned nations there will also be an exchange of ideas on international and regional issues between the two sides.

Read more...

Lots of worry at this year's Francophonie summit, but there's some good news too

There's a lot of worry out there at the moment for the future of the French language, especially with such news as Rwanda having decided to become an English-speaking country. The article however, says that:

The decision taken by Paul Kagame is more political than cultural. Rwanda has been most vociferous in accusing the French government for its participation in the genocide, which took place in the country 1994. After severing diplomatic ties with France, Rwanda has threatened an international legal action against some French personalities who were serving in government at the time of the tragic genocide.

The switch over to English also does nothing to change the current situation, where Rwanda is the tiny blue dot on the edge of all those French-speaking nations, next to Burundi just below and the humongous Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west, another French-speaking country and with a population of 62 million.

There's no reason a country can't have two languages of course; happens all the time. Case in point: this article on Mauritius, probably the coolest African country there is (from what I can tell). They have about three official languages there (French, English, Mauritian creole which is based on French) and since the language people use in everyday life there is based on French there's a natural inclination towards French itself, the use of which is increasing in the country:

Despite Britain's ouster of its French colonial rulers and being in predominantly anglophone Africa, Mauritius is seeing a rise in the use of French in the absence of an official language.

The Indian Ocean country's constitution makes no mention of an official language and its one million citizens speak either English, French, Hindi or Mauritian Creole -- a French patois.

Only in parliament is English stipulated as the official language -- but lawmakers are allowed to address the speaker in French.

"There is evidence of increased use of French," said Arnaud Carpooran, a lecturer at the University of Mauritius. "It is difficult to find a Mauritian who does not speak French."

...

Still, it appears French and English can exist in harmony here.

"The extraordinary thing is that French is not becoming dominant at the expense of English," Furlong said.

"The Francophonie is not a dance to the tune of French," said Carpooran. "We are celebrating being multilingual and French is evolving alongside other languages, including English."

Belgium could learn a lot from Mauritius.

And in other news, Vanuatu has a new French-language newspaper:

A new French language newspaper has been launched in Vanuatu. L'Hebdo Du Vanuatu is to be published by Vanuautu's Daily Post newspaper. Not only will it cover news in Vanautu, but will provide coverage of New Caledonia, where it will also be distributed.

Bottom line: French won't be going anywhere anytime soon, and those who are worried about the future of the language should have Africa's best interests in mind, because the more conditions improve there the more influence the language will have. This article agrees with me: "L’avenir du français passe par l’Afrique" (the future of French passes through Africa).

Read more...