July, 2003

Will The G8 Summit Deliver?
By Readith Mwila Muliyunda,

July, 2003 Will The G8 Summit Deliver? By Readith Mwila Muliyunda Africans are anxiously waiting to see what’s in store for them at this month’s G8 summit where Tony Blair will try to persuade other leaders to effectively deal with issues surrounding Africa’s highly publicized poverty.

The G8 has recently written off $16.7billion of about 18 countries on the continent out of the more than US$270bn owed by only Sub-saharan Africa..

This was a big step for the G8, although the cancellation is very minimal, infact less than even a quarter of what is owed. Therefore, the upcoming G8 meeting somehow holds most of Africa’s hope to see a total erasure of the debt and the correction of other irregularities that could allow Africa to compete freely on the international arena.

We are holding our breath, to see how far the G8 nation are ready to go in giving the continent what has been long overdue-justice. This will however call for absolute sincerety, honesty, open mindedness and selflessness among the G8 nations to be able to go beyond the selfish interests that has for a long time driven them into the alienation and exploitation of Africa for time immemorial.

But again, this calls for strong commitment as they will have to deal with a lot of other issues from the cancellation of the illegitimate debt, giving more aid (it’s also about the type of aid that they will be willing to give) and cleaning up the trade relations that has kept Africa alienated by the international community.

The biggest problem with the rich countries is that their generosity and sympathy for the poor ends where their interests begin. The interest to control and dominate, feel more superior while acting as good samaritans once in a while by giving away left overs. Hence the troubling question: “Will the G8 summit deliver that piece of cake?”

Before anything else, it will be necessary for the G8 nations to agree on the illegitimacy of the debt because most of it, if not all was money given to the West’s clients with the sole purpose of buying loyalty during the cold war. Some good examples are notorious DRC’s Mobutu Seseseko and Angola’s Jonas Savimbi or worse still South Africa’s debt which was accrued by the apartheid regime for the suppression of black people.

G8 nations will have to swallow their pride and admit like Tony Blair has done that they have played as bigger a role in Africa’s poverty as they African counterparts.

Although Blair’s proclamations about Africa are not at all new, what is new is that he is the first Western leader to actually admit to the world, the West’s almost conspiracy norm to keep Africa impoverished.

For this important acknowledgement, he should be patted on the back, although he sounded like somebody who had just stumbled on earth from another planet and was shocked at what was going on, on planet earth. It is fair to say a lot of people has sang and sang the same song that Blair has just repeated. But altleast it no seems people are listening, since the G8 has cancelled $16.7b worth of the debt owed by 18 African countries trimming down the continent’s total debt to about $284billion.

Question: Is the G8 summit going to assume responsibility for atleast one of their own’s admission of the part they played in the accumulation of that debt, hence get rid of all of it? Are they willing to sacrifice their one, effective control tool (debt) and allow those children that are dying everyday due to the direct effect of this debt survive or those that cannot go to school, eventually get the opportunity to do so?

The issue of aid is also another crucial issue for debate. Western countries have a tendency of always showing off to the public about how much aid they give to poor countries, particularly to Africa. So much that it is common to hear the not-so-well-informed people-cum African experts expound on how Africa seems to be bottomless hole in which the West continueS pouring funds without anything positive coming of out of for both the recipients and those that are giving.

Nothing is said about the fact that the so called aid either goes back to donor countries as service on debt interest or is tied to stringent and harmful conditions that still aim at making sure that it returns to the donor countries.

Among these harmful conditions are the notorious World Bank and IMF’s structural adjustment programmes that has left most countries in tatters, worse than they were before these institutions showed up. The truth is that these institutions have grown bigger and stronger by feeding off of countries of the south while they serve the interests of those that control them.

Statistics show that for every US$1 given in aid to Africa, individual countries on the continent pay back $3 more. Meanwhile the aid given to Africa (the second largest continent of 58 countries), in this case from the U.S, is five times less than the aid given to Israel, a country, only comparable to Africa’s smallest nation of Lesotho.

The new African magazine says “over the past 50 years, with the total estimated from $80bn to over $100bn, Israel would by far have the top place in the Guinness Book of Records of aid received”. Where the debt issue becomes uncomfortable for most western countries, is when it comes total cancellation free of conditions Then we hear them come up with all sorts of excuses and scapegoats.

This is due to the fact that they would rather continue to pretend that they are good people who are continuously giving to the poor rather than give up the power that the debt and aid yields for them. That is why there is so much skepticism when U.S officials stand on the podium and say “ African aid has already tripled under the Bush administration and that Millenium Challenge Account will increase the level of US foreign aid, now one of the G8’s lowest at 0.1% of GDP”.

Onother type of aid is one given on condition that the recipient country uses it to either purchase that country’s material, products or manpower. For example when the U.S wanted to give Zambia US$50million, they insisted that it should only be used to purchase the controversial genetically modified corn from that country, which Zambia had continued to reject.

The summit should also loosen trade barriers and do away with the current situation where Africa has been lied to and left in the cold in the name of liberalization. Africa has been duped into opening up it’s market to foreign trade (free flow of Western products into African countries), while she still waits to reap the benefits of the ‘liberal’ economy, waiting on Western countries to open their markets which have remained closed long after Africa opened hers.

Then once in a while, as if in mockery, the US would come up with carefully regulated instruments such as AGOA for some selected African countries to export their products to the U.S for a limited period of time, with maximum difficulty. One another hand, like Europe, they introduce high subsidies to their agricultural industries to produce in excess, some of which would be dumped on the open markets of Africa.

These, high import rates and other regulations are just among several factors that have carefully been put in place to alienate Africa in trade and consequently cripple it’s economies. We therefore hope that these crucial issues are going to be tabled and reviewed at the summit. This is the only time we as Africans are going to believe the proclamations, which by the way are not new, to help Africa as opposed to using us as an object to use when somebody’s seeking some world attention, or to satisfy their superiority complexes. African leaders should also show their commitment to work towards good leadership and development. And the people that are receiving this ervice from their leaders should be allowed to determine what is good for themselves unlike the old norm of a western leader declaring what deem fit for the people whose leader they have declared bad or good depending on how well they serve their own selfish interests or loyalty towards them.

African leaders should serve with honesty, dignity and respect of the people they serve. The situation where African leaders and all Africans in general are seen as childlike beings who are unable to take care of their countries and themselves respectively without the ‘watchful’ eye of the West is ridiculous.

Western governments have unfortunately always used this impression to their advantage and to evade real issues surrounding Africa. When dealing with debt and aid, you will hear condescending conversations that automatically give you signals that somebody is trying to duck away from the issue. It’s de ja vu! Ones side would say : “ we will not give them any more aid until they prove that they can behave better. And if we cancel the debt and give them aid, how can we trust that they will put the money in good use by themselves”.

Another side would imply, “yes, they maybe backwards, but the new crop of leaders are showing some signs of good behaviour.” The blanket declarations about Africa’s seemingly bad politics works well for the West as they use it to gain leverage and avoid doing anything about important issues.

Those termed “leaders showing some kind of improvement” are then paraded-like recently- in front of cameras and given promises or some minimal 2% cut off of their national debts for the glory of those that are making the cuts. Again, no disclosures are made on when the pledges will be fulfilled or what conditions go with deal. Each time this is done, the media blows the trumpets, the passive public watches, listens and gets convinced of how the West has continued to ‘give’ to Africa without positive results from there.

Our hope now lies on the G8 summit that by substantially dealing with the various issues, this kid of hypocrisy that in the end only hurts the innocent will cease, with the help of Mr Blair whose chances to be listened to are presumably higher as he is one of them.