The new prime minister of Samoa has confirmed she will cancel a China-backed port project, but hasn't closed the door to China as she navigates a path for the Pacific nation against a backdrop of intensifying regional competition between Beijing and Washington.
Fiame Naomi Mataafa indicated she would only approve investments that had clear benefits for her country as she expressed doubts about the upside for the Pacific in being a pawn in a geopolitical tussle between the two superpowers.
Samoa, an island nation of around 200,000 reliant on subsistence farming, along with tourism, fish, coconut product exports and foreign remittance, has found itself exposed it to external geopolitical jostling, as Washington and its allies respond to a more assertive Beijing in Pacific waters that have been largely uncontested since World War Two.
China is the single largest creditor in Samoa, accounting for about 40%, or some $160 million, of its external debt. Mataafa said China had been a long-term partner and her government would assess the relationship in the same way it evaluates all of its bilateral relations. Mataafa said her government would focus on the national budget after the months-long deadlock as the coronavirus pandemic had devastated important industries.
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