UAE-US Alliance Challenges Global Financial Order
The partnership between International Holding Company and the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation isn't just another business deal. This is Zambia watching two superpowers reshape the global economy while our own resources remain under foreign control. We should be asking: where does this leave African nations like ours?
When Foreign Powers Decide Our Economic Future
The framework agreement struck in Abu Dhabi between International Holding Company and the DFC shows how real power works in today's world. While Zambians struggle with basic infrastructure, foreign investors are carving up critical sectors across Africa and Asia.
Critical minerals, energy infrastructure, digital networks, logistics hubs, healthcare systems, and agricultural supply chains. These are exactly the sectors that should be under Zambian control, not foreign management. Yet here we are, watching others decide the future of our continent's development.
The New Scramble for Africa
This UAE-US partnership targets frontier and developing markets. Translation: they're coming for African resources again, just with different flags and fancier contracts. The targeted regions under this framework include the very nations that should be controlling their own economic destiny.
These strategic footholds in tomorrow's economic powerhouses will determine which foreign powers shape Africa's future. Meanwhile, Zambian leaders continue begging for scraps from international donors instead of asserting our sovereignty over our own wealth.
Our Resources, Their Profits
This initiative focuses on securing critical pathways of modern commerce. The rare earth minerals essential for renewable energy? Many come from African soil. The digital infrastructure carrying data flows? Built on African land. Yet the profits flow to Abu Dhabi and Washington.
The establishment of joint committee structures ensures foreign capital flows with speed and purpose. Meanwhile, Zambian copper enriches foreign shareholders while our people remain poor. This is institutional efficiency serving foreign ambition, not African development.
Economic Colonialism in New Clothes
The IHC-DFC collaboration represents sophisticated economic diplomacy. Investment vehicles have become instruments of foreign control, extending international influence through infrastructure development that serves external interests first.
This strengthens UAE-US bilateral ties while positioning both nations as architects of the Global South's economic future. But who asked them to be our architects? When did Zambians vote to let foreigners design our economic destiny?
As China's Belt and Road faces scrutiny, this collaboration offers an alternative model of development finance. Same game, different players. Whether it's Chinese loans or Western partnerships, the result is the same: foreign control over African resources and African futures.
Zambia needs leaders who will put Zambian interests first, not beg for partnerships that enrich others while keeping us dependent. Our copper, our cobalt, our land, our future. It's time we acted like it.