The story of building the National Assembly of Cameroon with the development, struggle together and promote friendship.

From September 4 to 6, the summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation was successfully held in Beijing, opening up a broader and magnificent prospect for China-Africa cooperation and development in the future.

Not long ago, CCTV reporters walked into the important project of China's "ten major cooperation plans" with Africa undertaken by Beijing Urban Construction Group and participated in the construction of Beijing Urban Construction North Group to aid the National Assembly building of Cameroon, which vividly demonstrated the fruitful achievements and profound friendship of China Cameroon cooperation in co construction and sharing.

In the heart of the African continent, Cameroon, with its rich natural resources and unique geographical location, has become the economic "locomotive" of Central Africa ". In Yaounde, the capital, a new landmark built by Chinese enterprises, the National Assembly Building of Cameroon, has attracted great attention from Cameroonian citizens. This project is not only an important part of President Xi Jinping's "ten major cooperation plans" for Africa, but also a symbol of the people of China and Cameroon working together. It carries the expectations of the Cameroonian people for the future and is another brilliant witness of the friendship and cooperation between China and Cameroon.

The National Assembly Building of Cameroon includes semicircular parliament hall and ancillary buildings, celebration hall, office building, porch structure and other ancillary buildings, with a total construction area of 37500 square meters and a total investment of 0.57 billion yuan. The outer walls of the parliament hall and the celebration hall are designed with large-area glass vertical windows, while the office building stands on the high side of the city, with glass curtain wall as the main building material, just like a bright "glass palace". The main buildings are independent of each other in function, but they are connected as a whole in form, scattered and undulating like hills, echoing the title of Yaounde "City of Seven Hills. After the completion of the project, it will become the center of political, economic and cultural activities in Cameroon, which is of great significance to improve the office efficiency of the Cameroonian government and promote the local economic and social development.

Since the start of the project, the Group has made every effort to promote the construction of the project with a high sense of responsibility and mission. The vivid stories that took place during the construction process all demonstrated the responsibility of Chinese enterprises, the demeanor of Beijing Urban Construction National Craftsman and the spirit of the Iron Army, which not only won the respect of the people of Cameroon, but also enhanced the friendship between the people of China and Cameroon. The business card of a great power has been polished in the land of Africa.

 

Call of Duty, Go to Africa

Far away from the motherland and relatives, they came to the strange land of Africa. Although they were full of thoughts for their families and worries about the unknown environment, a group of Beijing urban construction builders chose to devote themselves to the overall situation of supporting the construction of Cameroon.

Liu Jianbo, the chief engineer of the project, has rich experience in overseas engineering projects. He has participated in the construction of Doha garbage transfer station in Qatar, Banyan Hotel in Malaysia, Baiweinian Shopping Mall, official office building and other projects. In August 2020, after the global epidemic eased, Liu Jianbo took the first flight to Cameroon, the first time he came to Africa, and his second son was only 2 years old when he went to the project.

Zhao Chenyue, daughter of production manager Zhao Changrong, resolutely followed her father to Cameroon to participate in the construction of this important project of China-Africa cooperation. This family support strengthened Zhao Changrong's belief and determination: "Foreign aid projects represent the image of the country and are completed with high quality on schedule. We are duty-bound to deliver a perfect parliament building for Cameroon and create a new landmark for Yaounde."

 

Start hard, go ahead with adversity

The construction of the Cameroon National Parliament building project has not been smooth sailing, the project started at the end of 2019, soon after the impact of the new crown epidemic, becoming the more serious area of the 54 countries in Africa, the medical resources and risk situation is very serious. In order to ensure the safety and health of workers, the project department has formulated strict daily epidemic prevention and control bills and emergency plans, implemented closed management, and built a new 200-person worker dormitory to provide free board and lodging for local workers. At the same time, the project department also regularly carries out nucleic acid testing and strictly implements the epidemic prevention plan to ensure the safety and health of project personnel. This dynamic control measure of "early detection, early isolation, and early treatment" effectively curbed the spread of the epidemic and ensured the orderly progress of the project.

At the same time, Africa is a high incidence area of malaria, and the project team is also facing the threat of malaria. Despite various anti-mosquito measures, some employees were unfortunately infected. Whenever an employee is infected with malaria, the whole team will act quickly, from buying medicine, taking care to psychological comfort, everyone will do their part. This friendship of sharing weal and woe makes the project team more closely united, and also provides continuous and strong spiritual support for the smooth progress of the project.

 

Craftsmanship, excellence

The construction process of the project is undoubtedly complex and arduous. It not only tests the engineering and technical ability, but also involves cross-cultural communication, logistics management and cost control.

The project team actively understands and abides by local policies and regulations, and actively communicates and coordinates with the local government and relevant departments of Cameroon to ensure the legality and compliance of construction activities; at the same time, through in-depth understanding of the management process and national cultural needs of Cameroon, it continuously optimizes and deepens the design and construction plan, and plans the construction details scientifically and accurately. As many materials and workers need to be transported from China, the time cost and freight cost of shipping are very high. The project department ensures the construction efficiency and project performance with precise and planned project management.

The special soil quality of Cameroon has brought great challenges to the construction of pile foundation, and the difficulty of hole-forming directly affects the progress of the project. The project team has demonstrated a high degree of professionalism and resilience in the face of this challenge. In order to shorten the construction period, the team adopted a 24-hour shift operation. Project chief engineer Liu Jianbo personally worked on night shift to check the hole quality, check and accept steel bars, coordinate concrete pouring and other work. For the construction of formwork with a construction height of more than 15 meters, such as the entrance hall of the semicircular parliament hall and the entrance hall of the celebration hall, the project team has prepared a special construction plan and invited experts to demonstrate it to ensure the feasibility and safety of the plan.

In the process of project construction, technological innovation and green energy saving have become key words. The use of energy-efficient, low-noise products such as air-conditioning units and ventilator units makes the indoor environment of the building more comfortable and pleasant. Indoor lamps and lanterns use fluorescent lamps, LED light sources and other energy-saving light sources to further reduce energy consumption. In addition, the introduction of the intelligent lighting system allows the users of the building to adjust the brightness of the light and select the preset lighting mode according to the needs, which greatly improves the energy efficiency. The information facility system of the building is also a highlight. A number of advanced equipment, including communication access system, computer network system, voice switching system, etc., provide a good information environment for users and managers of the building.

During the construction of the project, the project department received many letters of commendation from the Chinese and Kazakh governments, affirming the hard work of the project team for the progress of the project during the epidemic, and highly recognized the construction quality and progress control of the project.

With the excellent professional skills and unremitting efforts of the team, the project has successfully passed the acceptance of the mid-term acceptance expert group of the OECD of the Ministry of Commerce, and achieved excellent quality evaluation; at the same time, it has also achieved remarkable innovation results, obtaining an invention patent and two A utility model patent demonstrates the innovative technology of the project team.

 

Across borders, together

In the project construction team, local workers from China and Cameroon gathered. During the peak period, nearly 400 local workers from Cameroon participated in the project construction, which effectively promoted local employment. The rich construction experience and superb technical ability of Chinese workers have effectively improved the local construction level. The project team specially organizes regular job skills and safety training for Cameroonian workers, and teaches skills selflessly with an open mind, which has won wide popularity among Cameroonian workers and greatly improved the overall engineering construction capacity of the local labor force. highly praised by the Government of Cameroon.

Nahm Martin is a Cameroonian head of the construction site. He said: "Participating in the construction of the National Parliament building in Cameroon has given me a lot of experience and has allowed me to achieve results in the field of architecture. I am very proud to be able to tell the next generation a history of friendship between Cameroon and China."

Despite the differences in language and culture, trust and understanding are gradually built through work. This cross-border friendship not only makes work smoother, but also makes their lives more colorful.

Security Director Liu Shalu: "We have also slowly learned the local language and can do some simple exchanges and communication. Through the continuous running-in of work, I have established a deep friendship with several local Cameroonian brothers. During their major festivals and major festivals in China, we will invite each other to visit and experience the festive atmosphere together."

During the festive season, in order to alleviate the homesickness of Chinese employees and workers working overseas, the project team will carefully plan a series of colorful activities during the festival, and Kazakh personnel will also join in. During the Spring Festival, everyone posted Spring Festival couplets and made dumplings together. The prize-winning question and answer, lucky draw and ring games made the festival atmosphere even stronger. The fierce confrontation on the basketball court, the ingenious dealing in front of the table tennis table, the precise blow in the billiard room and the laughter of karaoke all make every festival particularly warm and unforgettable.

In summer, "sending coolness" not only sends ice-cold consolation products, but also sends the group's care for the builders and affirms that a touch of coolness stimulates the motivation and passion of the on-site project builders to continue their struggle.

 

China Enterprise Responsibility, Warm Africa

The project team is well aware that what it shoulders is not only the important task of engineering construction, but also the lofty mission of giving back to the society and promoting the friendship between China and Cameroon. Therefore, they actively participate in local public welfare undertakings and interpret the responsibility and dedication of Chinese enterprises with practical actions.

The project has repeatedly invited foreign aid medical teams to organize joint free clinics and donated medicines covering common diseases such as rheumatism, typhoid fever, and malnutrition, which are particularly welcomed and praised by the local people.

The Deputy Speaker of the National Assembly of Cameroon, Tatuo Diodor, and Chief Bapa of the Bangu tribe, attended the free clinic and said: "Thank the builders of Beijing Urban Construction for their hard work and not forgetting to bring more to the people of Cameroon. Practical help, let us move forward hand in hand and develop together."

The project department also donated a batch of necessary learning tools including pencils, notebooks, erasers, rulers, letter boards, and schoolbags to the local plateau elementary school, which solved the school problems of local poor families and also inspired students to study harder. Let the seeds of China-Cameroon friendship take root and sprout in the hearts of the younger generation.

The project of aiding Cameroon's National Congress Building has come to an end. The project team is making the final sprint. The modern building will bloom in November and will be officially handed over to and serve the Cameroonian people. We have every reason to believe that under the grand blueprint of the "Belt and Road Initiative" initiative, China-Africa cooperation will continue to broaden its scope, deepen its connotation, and jointly write more new chapters of win-win cooperation. to inject stronger impetus and vitality into the building of a community with a shared future for mankind.