LONDON, 2 June 2003 — Until a decade or so ago, we were crying for the beloved country — South Africa. Today, however, we are crying for the entire continent. As the leaders of the Group of Eight (G-8) countries, meet in France for their summit, will Iraq, Afghanistan, and the war against terrorism once again overshadow the plight of the Dark Continent? The summit will focus some global attention on Africa. French President Jacques Chirac has invited 12 developing countries to attend the summit as observers — including five African ones: Nigeria, Egypt, South Africa, Senegal, and Algeria.
The irony of the summit’s location should not be lost on us. No doubt the leaders and their entourages will quench their thirsts with the pure spring waters of Evian. And while the entire UK population has access to clean water, this is not the case in the Democratic Republic of Congo or in much of Africa. The continent’s statistics are indeed dark and desperate. The average annual income of the industrialized nations is $27,854 compared with $1,690 in Africa. Life expectancy in the G-8 countries is 77 compared with 48 in Africa.
In the G-8 countries, the number of people who live on less than a dollar a day is zero compared with 291 million in Africa. There are about 1.5 million people infected with HIV in the industrialized world compared to 28 million people in Africa alone. Infant mortality for every 1,000 births in the G-8 countries is 5, compared with 174 in Africa. Not surprisingly, some 4.5 million African children under five die each year. The list is almost endless. Why then these inequalities and disparities? After all, Africa is blessed with a good share of natural resources. Libya, Algeria, Nigeria, Cameroon, and Angola are all major oil producers. Algeria is also one of the top five natural gas producers in the world. Sierra Leone, Namibia, Congo, Ghana, South Africa, Mozambique and Botswana have diamonds and other strategic metals such as gold, uranium, and platinum. North Africa, Sudan, South Africa, and West Africa could potentially be the bread basket not only of the continent but also for the world — blessed with a huge variety of fruits and vegetables.
It is tempting to lay the blame for Africa’s plight on the former colonial powers but it is not as simple as that. International agencies, developed countries and global financial institutions rushed to lend money to the developing countries, which were often wasted or simply siphoned off to offshore bank accounts. The result was that the countries fell into debt, were unable to service the debt properly — let alone pay back the principal — and so a debt trap developed. Most of Africa has now been independent for more than half a century. Blaming its societal and economic ills and failures on colonialism is no longer a plausible argument. As UN Secretary General Kofi Annan recently stressed, good governance is perhaps the single most important factor in eradicating poverty and promoting development.
The West may no longer have a historical duty to help Africa but there is a moral imperative.
The West after all subsidizes its farmers to the tune of a staggering $311 billion a year. This compares badly with the $13 billion the G-8 countries spend annually on aid to Africa. One estimate is that Africa would require a mere $30 billion a year in extra money to fund universal education for every child, to reduce poverty by half and to cut infant mortality by three quarters.
The moral imperative does not fall only on the West. The rich Muslim and East Asian countries too have the same moral imperative in helping Africa helping itself. The Arab countries through the OPEC Fund, the Arab Fund for Economic Development in Africa, and the individual national funds have contributed millions of dollars in aid to Africa, although this is not very well articulated in the international media.
The Jeddah-based Islamic Development Bank, for instance, has disbursed $9.3 billion of development finance and technical assistance to Sub-Saharan Africa over the last two decades or so. Last October the IDB at its 27th Annual Meeting of its board of governors in Ouagadougou in Burkino Faso, launched its Ouagadougou Declaration aimed at supporting economic and social development in its 20 Sub-Saharan African member countries (out of a total 54 member countries).
Under the declaration, the IDB will allocate $2 billion over the next five years to these countries for the above purpose aimed mainly at developing education (especially narrowing the gap between male and female education), healthcare, infrastructure, and the small-and-medium-term enterprises (SMEs).
In addition, the IDB has started a dialogue with the South Africa-based initiative NEPAD (New Partnership for African Development) and has stressed that it will finance some projects.
Africa, like other regions, must grow up. The era of one-party states and absolute rule is over.
The end to civil wars, military rule, corrupt dictatorships and the global players that arm and sustain them are all pre-requisites for poverty alleviation and developmental progress in Africa. African rulers are just as morally obliged to their populations, as the debt forgivers, and the haves who merely pay lip service to the plight of the hapless Africans.
