Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi's January visit to Tanzania highlighted the East African country's growing importance to Beijing. It's a strategically located Belt and Road country that has the potential to serve as a major gateway to inland regional markets along with easy access to some of Africa's largest ports on the Indian Ocean.But relations between the two countries have been quite bumpy over the past couple of years. President John Magufuli famously and quite publicly rejected a Chinese deal to re-build the Port of Bagamoyo and there was widespread outrage in Tanzania in response to the poor treatment of African residents in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou.University of Dar es Salaam political science lecturer Shangwe Muhidin is among the world's leading Sino-Tanzanian affairs scholars and joins Eric & Cobus to discuss why Wang chose to visit Tanzania now and how Beijing's ties there are quite different from those in other East African countries.JOIN THE DISCUSSION:Facebook: www.facebook.com/ChinaAfricaProjectTwitter: @eolander | @stadenesque | @ShangweliBeriaSUBSCRIBE TO THE CAP'S DAILY EMAIL NEWSLETTER:Your subscription supports independent journalism. Subscribers get the following:1. A daily email newsletter of the top China-Africa news.2. Access to the China-Africa Experts Network3. Unlimited access to the CAP's exclusive analysis content on chinaafricaproject.comSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.