China's influence in Africa grows as more young people learn to speak Mandarin
Inside a brightly-lit classroom, around 20 schoolchildren are enthusiastically singing the Chinese national anthem.But this scene is not taking place in a Chinese school but at Lakewood Premier school, thousands of kilometers away in Nairobi.
Here, schoolchildren are learning Mandarin, a language spoken by nearly 1 billion people almost 8,000 kilometers away from their home. Sandra Wanjiru, 13, is one of hundreds of African schoolchildren who are increasingly proficient in the Chinese language. More will join their ranks in 2020 when Mandarin will be officially taught in all Kenyan schools alongside French, Arabic and German, which are already on the curriculum., where Wanjiru studies, has begun the program a year early to give its pupils a head start.
"I chose to learn Chinese first because it's interesting to learn a foreign language but also because I would want to travel and do business in China," said Wanjiru.:"The place of China in the world economy has also grown to be so strong that Kenya stands to benefit if its citizens can understand Mandarin."China has become increasingly powerful and prominent across Africa over the past two decades.
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