Representatives from African Countries Visit SCIA for China-Africa Cooperation on Arbitration

On June 24, 2019, 27 representatives of African legal community, including judges, prosecutors, judicial officers, lawyers and in-house counsels, from 12 African countries, including Egypt, South Africa, Mauritius and Tanzania, visited the Shenzhen Court of International Arbitration (also known as the “South China International Economic and Trade Arbitration Commission” and “Shenzhen Arbitration Commission”, the “SCIA”) to review the development of international arbitration in Shenzhen Special Economic Zone over the past four decades of China’s reform and opening up, to exchange views on the China-Africa Joint Arbitration Mechanism and SCIA’s explorative efforts and practices in dispute resolution service, and to discuss China-Africa cooperation on arbitration. This is another visit paid by trainees from the “Training Class of China-Africa Legal Professional Exchange Program.”

SCIA’s Vice President AN Xin and others received the visitors. At the subsequent meeting with the visitors, SCIA’s Assistant President YANG Tao briefly described achievements made by SCIA from participating in the development of the China-Africa Joint Arbitration Mechanism. He said that SCIA, based in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Greater Bay Area (GBA), serves the Belt and Road Initiative (“BRI”) and global dispute resolution demands and has made proactive and effective exploration and innovation in dispute resolution mechanism development and international cooperation to better respond to market demand and provide more efficient and convenient dispute resolution services to parties from Africa and other countries around the world.

SCIA’s legal counsel CHI Wenhui delivered a keynote speech on innovation in the SCIA Arbitration Rules of 2019 and diversified dispute resolution mechanisms, elaborating the specific manifestation of the principle of “party autonomy” in the Arbitration Rules and the pioneered “optional appellate arbitration procedure ”and its application and sharing with the African legal professionals diversified dispute resolution mechanisms established by SCIA, including the GBA Arbitration and Mediation Alliance, Shenzhen Securities and Futures Dispute Resolution Center, and Negotiation Facilitation Center.

Based on his work experience in Africa and in the context of China-Africa investment agreements, SCIA’s deputy legal counsel HUANG Yiming delivered a keynote speech on how to draft appropriate arbitration clauses from the perspective of African parties, sharing his insights into issues such as how to select and agree upon a range of matters, including, but not limited to, arbitration institution, place of arbitration, arbitration rules and place of hearing.

Deputy Director of the China Legal Exchange Center of the China Law Society WANG Wei made concluding remarks. He fully recognized the achievements of this exchange and pointed out that this exchange would contribute to the closer communication of China’s arbitration institutions with their counterparts in African countries and international organizations and the promotion of mutually beneficial development, good partnership, and pragmatic cooperation between China and Africa. 

The China-Africa Joint Arbitration Mechanism originates from the Beijing Consensus on the Creation of a China-Africa Joint Dispute Resolution Mechanism executed in June 2015. With the support of the Arbitration Foundation of Southern Africa (AFSA), the Shanghai International Economic and Trade Arbitration Commission (SHIAC), the Shenzhen Court of International Arbitration (SCIA), the Beijing Arbitration Commission (BAC), and the Nairobi Center for International Arbitration (NCIA), the China Africa Joint Arbitration Centre (CAJAC) Johannesburg, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Beijing and Nairobi were unveiled from 2015 to 2018. In March 2017, CAJAC Shenzhen was unveiled at SCIA, representing the transition of the China-Africa Joint Arbitration Mechanism from cooperation “on a point-to-point basis” to synergistic innovation “at a broader level”. Upon the invitation of AFSA, NCIA and other institutions, SCIA visited Africa in 2016, 2017 and 2018 respectively to conducted exchanges and cooperation with Mauritius, Tanzania, Ethiopia, South Africa, Kenya and other countries. At the CAJAC Beijing Conference held in April 2019, representatives from the five CAJAC international arbitration institutions discussed CAJAC’s constitution, rules, and case acceptance mechanism, and the preparation of a panel of China-Africa joint arbitrators. CAJAC will pursue joint innovation in institutional cooperation, arbitration rules and arbitrator training and other areas and offer a more solid and reliable rule of law basis for mutually beneficial development and pragmatic cooperation between China and Africa.

Based on the background of the BRI and considering the development of China-Africa Joint Arbitration Mechanism, SCIA has continued to engage more arbitrators from Africa. The SCIA Panel of Arbitrators released in 2019 includes 890 arbitrators from 76 countries and regions. More than 40% of them are overseas arbitrators from most of major BRI countries, including 12 African arbitrators from 7 African countries, including Egypt, South Africa, Tanzania and Nigeria. With the growth of the China-Africa cooperation on arbitration, SCIA has seen an increasing number of parties from Africa, including parties from 28 African countries, including Congo, Egypt, Algeria, Kenya, Senegal, South Africa, Tanzania, and Zambia, and has provided efficient and strong service assurance for China-Africa economic and trade exchanges.

Associate Inspector of the Political and Legal Affairs Commission of the CPC Shenzhen Committee WU Lifu and Deputy Secretary-General of the Shenzhen Law Society HAO Zhi also attended the meeting.

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