From the article:
The Trump administration’s message to Africa has been blunt: Choose the United States over China and Russia.
Officials announced the details of that policy challenge Wednesday in the southern African nation of Mozambique, urging hundreds of African business leaders at an economic conference to ramp up partnerships and trade with American companies.
…
Gyude Moore, a Liberian former minister of public works, said that the United States’ new strategy in Africa is considered a positive step but that the absence of political star power at its announcement was insulting.
“There’s a saying: What you’re doing is so loud, I can’t hear what you’re saying,” Moore said. “The U.S. does not have the decency, the courtesy, to send a Cabinet-level official to this event.”
In the optics battle with China and other competitors, “we’re losing,” said Todd Moss, who was a diplomat in West Africa during the George W. Bush administration.
