Chinese Government provides RMB 800 million grant for African Union Conference Center and Office Complex Construction Project (Linked to Record ID#52335)

At a 2006 summit in Beijing, Chinese President Hu Jintao announced that his government would fund the construction of an African Union headquarters building.

In September 2008, the Chinese Government provided an RMB 800 million grant to the African Union Commission (AUC) for the African Union Conference Center and Office Complex Construction Project.

Dr Merriden Varrall, who previously served as Assistant Country Director and Senior Policy Advisor at UNDP China and worked on issues related to China’s international development cooperation policy in Beijing, has written that "[w]here disputes exist about aid expenditure issues, the parties can go to the State Council for adjudication.

One example where this occurred was in regard to the funding of the African Union Conference Hall in Addis Ababa, built at a cost of USD200 million, and inaugurated in 2012. According to a former MOFCOM official, MOFCOM and MFA both wanted more funding than MoF would allow. At first, MoF agreed to RMB200 million, about a fifth of the final total cost.

MOFCOM negotiated hard, and MoF eventually increased the budget to RMB400 million, then RMB600 million, and finally to RMB800 million.

In this case, as the official explained, MFA saw the diplomatic value of the project and thus agreed with MOFCOM that still more funding was necessary.

Together they put the case to the State Council, and the then-Premier Wen agreed, apparently conceding that when it came to affairs such as this one, strategic considerations should outweigh the budget concerns of MoF." The purpose of the African Union Conference Center and Office Complex Construction Project was to construct an office building (with one underground floor and 20 floors above ground) and a conference center in Addis Ababa (exact locational coordinates: 9.0002, 38.7446).

The office building occupies an area of 112,000 square meters.

The tower is 99.9 meters high to signify the date September 9, 1999, when the Organization of African Unity voted to become the African Union.

The conference center has a grand conference hall with 2,500 seats, a medium-sized conference hall with 697 seats, small conference halls, VIP conference rooms, a multifunctional hall, an emergency medical center and a digital library.

Tongji Architectural Design (Group) Co., Ltd. was the contractor responsible for project design and China State Construction Engineering Corporation Ltd. (CSCEC) was the contractor responsible for project implementation. A ceremonial foundation stone laying ceremony was held on May 25, 2007.

Then, on November 10, 2008, Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress of China, Wu Bangguo, attended a groundbreaking ceremony. An official project kick-off ceremony occurred on June 16, 2009. On December 2, 2009, China’s Vice Foreign Minister Song Tao visited the project site.

Then, on January 30, 2010, the Chinese Government's special envoy and Vice Minister of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, listed the project site. On July 20, 2010, Chinese State Councilor Dai Bingguo visited the project site. On January 30, 2011, Assistant Foreign Minister Liu Zhenmin inspected the project while attending the 16th AU Summit.

Construction ended on January 28, 2012 and involved 700 Chinese workers and 900 Ethiopian workers. Then, on May 8, 2012, a formal project handover ceremony took place.

This project become a subject of controversy after an independent investigation conducted by Le Monde revealed that China fitted the building with hidden microphones and transferred data every night from the AU’s data center to their servers in Shanghai.

After the discovery was made in January 2017, the AUC replaced all Chinese donated servers and ICT equipment at the headquarters building and acquired their own servers. Le Monde also alleged that the AUC had then covered up the hack to protect Chinese interests in the continent. China has denied any allegations of spying.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn said that he did not believe the French media report.

Moussa Faki Mahamat, head of the African Union Commission, said the allegations in the Le Monde's report were false. "These are totally false allegations and I believe that we are completely disregarding them." Incoming Chairperson of the African Union Paul Kagame said he did not know anything about it.