"ghost cities"

[Blackdog Lin]

I just can't get my head around the rationale for these. I've read about and seen videos of 'em in China, but now China is building them in Africa?!!! (and didn't we read about one going up in Arizona - built by China - in the near future?)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-18646243

All that money. For why?

Conspiracy theorists welcome. I also firmly believe in "follow the money"; and I still can't come up with what these cities might be used for in the future, or how anyone is making any money on them, or how they are being used for fleecing the unsuspecting.....

[peggy]

How strange. Apparently built on spec with absolutely no research into whether anyone could actually want or afford them. Well, this serves one purpose. It shows us what a society looks like with no middle class. And the ruling class, the 1% if you will, who are banking this project, in absolute denial.
We see it in this country where the 1% simply cannot understand why everyone else can't just simply make more money or up-grade their lives and incomes. It's the 'they're just lazy' or 'they aren't working hard/smart enough' theory that so many hold. People born on third base who think they hit a triple.

The article states that they 'are' building a super highway to this remote location, which is another excuse the money bags are giving for the lack of interest, again not admitting that 3/4 of the population simply can not afford these places. These are middle class apartments and there is no middle class. I thought the funniest line was one person who said it isn't the cost of the units but the inability of the 'workers' to get loans! Really! Gee, I can't imagine why someone who makes $3 a day can't get a loan for $150,000!

[creaker]

"Kilamba was financed by a Chinese credit line - which Angola is repaying with oil - so it has technically been paid for.

But if the houses go unsold, then the Angolan government will be left with stock on their hands and a potentially wasted investment."

I think this basically says it all - some people have made a lot of money, probably certain members of the Angolan government benefitted, but the actual loss will sit on the shoulders of the Angolan people, who likely had little to no say in any of this. If the risk had sat with the developers, these would have never even been considered, much less built.

I expect that if these folks could just get huge amounts of money from the Angolan government without doing anything, they would have. But since that would be too transparently stealing, these "projects" are set up as window dressing.

[Gregg]

The Chinese involvement seems obvious enough. For decades now China has routinely bought up oil reserves or otherwise used their economic resources to secure future supplies. Building this city in return for payment with oil as currency fits right in with that.

Real estate development isn't a new wheel. There are examples of huge developments that were beyond the scope of reason, but apparently built to feed the egos of super rich owners. Dubai anyone? None of that ego stroking glitz and glitter seems to be present here. Angola is apparently one of the more corrupt counties (http://www.thedailybeast.com/galleries/2012/02/08/the-20-most-corrupt-countries-from-cambodia-to-afghanistan.html#slide3)in the world. If there is a 1% theory to be advanced here it is probably that 1% of Angolans have the political connections to line their pockets as the middlemen in this type of transaction by selling off the country's resources. That's not a new wheel, either.

The other down side for the Angolan people, besides trading their oil for nothing of value (like food), is that this place just seems like Cabrini Green waiting to happen. How long can it be before the folks living in slums down the road decide squatting in all that nice new empty space is a better deal? And when they do how long will it take the gangs, pimps, war lords, etc. to stake a claim?