A report published on Thursday, 10 September, by CEDESA identifies Portuguese construction group Mota-Engil as a key channel of Chinese influence over the Lobito Corridor in Angola — a project the West is backing precisely to reduce its dependence on China.
The Centre for Studies on Economic and Social Development in Africa (CEDESA) highlights what it describes as a ‘Chinese Paradox’ in an article examining China’s influence over the Lobito Corridor, the major railway project designed to link the Atlantic coast to Africa’s mineral-rich interior and facilitate the export of commodities such as copper and cobalt.
‘China controls, through Mota-Engil, an essential part of the infrastructure that the West intends to use to reduce its dependence on China. It is a strategic irony that is difficult to ignore,’ the organisation wrote. CEDESA is dedicated to the study and analysis of political and economic issues in Southern Africa, with a particular focus on Angola.
The Lobito Corridor project involves the United States, the European Union, and the governments of Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). According to the analysis, the project ‘seeks to offer a logistical alternative to Chinese dominance in the export of copper, cobalt, and other strategic minerals’ from the DRC ‘and, to a lesser extent, from Angola’.
The article concludes that ‘paradoxically, one of the greatest ultimate beneficiaries of its operationalisation is China’.
CEDESA’s analysis highlights ‘the decisive role of Mota-Engil, whose governance is heavily influenced by Chinese shareholders, the Chinese ownership of a substantial portion of the mines that will feed the corridor, and the strategic incapacity of the so-called West, marked by hesitation, lack of vision, and a cultural environment that undervalues collective ambition’.
The first reason cited by CEDESA ‘lies in the centrality of Mota-Engil’ to the project, having become ‘simultaneously a relevant railway operator, one of the largest contractors for complementary works, and an actor with a simultaneous presence in Angola and the DRC — something few European companies can replicate with scale and continuity’.
‘In recent years, Mota-Engil has secured essential contracts for the rehabilitation of railway sections, the modernisation of stations, the construction of bridges, and heavy engineering works associated with the corridor,’ the article states.
The analysis also notes that ‘Mota-Engil is today a company with decisive Chinese influence,’ with approximately one third of its shares held by Chinese interests and a Chinese presence on its board, even though it formally remains a Portuguese company.
In the author’s assessment, ‘Mota-Engil has thus become a hybrid instrument — simultaneously European in its facade and Chinese in its decision-making structure’.
The second reason cited is that ‘a substantial portion of the mines from which the minerals transported by the corridor will originate belong to Chinese companies’.
Minerals remain under Chinese influence
China has consolidated, over the past two decades, a dominant position in the DRC’s copper and cobalt sectors. The country controls between 70% and 80% of industrial production of these minerals through majority stakes in 15 of the largest Congolese mines, the report states.
The Lobito Corridor was conceived as a logistical alternative to transporting these minerals, which currently flow predominantly through ports in Tanzania and South Africa.
CEDESA observes that ‘changing the route does not change the ownership’ and that, ‘if the minerals continue to be extracted by Chinese companies, the corridor merely facilitates the export of resources controlled by Beijing, now through infrastructure promoted by the West’.
China benefits doubly, the article continues, because the Lobito Corridor ‘significantly reduces transport costs by providing a shorter, more stable, and less congested route to the Atlantic’ and allows for the diversification of export channels to both Western and Asian markets.
‘This reality does not stem from any recent Western mismanagement, but from two decades of consistent, patient, and strategically driven Chinese investment,’ the article reads. ‘The West hesitates while China watches, invests, consolidates positions, and benefits from the infrastructure that others finance and promote,’ the analysis concludes.
Source: Diário Económico
Original article: https://www.diarioeconomico.co.mz/2026/09/11/mundo/angola/corredor-do-lobito-ocidente-financia-rota-que-pode-beneficiar-china-alerta-cedesa/
