Should We Continue to Count On The G8 Summits?
blurb:isstoday:130708g8
13 July 2008: Should We Continue to Count On The G8 Summits?
“It is time our relations (between Europe and Africa) evolve from the archaic and unsatisfactory one of donor and beneficiary to an adult and responsible relationship between partners who respect one another and whose political dialogue forms the basis of a proficient and concrete partnership, able to steer us towards the objective of a Millennium devoted to development.”
José Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission.
The rich and poor are forever holding summits. Another summit of the most industrialized nations was held in Japan last week – in luxury far removed from the miseries and the rising prices of primary foodstuffs in almost every African country. At the same time in Mali a group of non-governmental organisations gathered to remind the leaders of the rich countries about the daily difficulties faced by those in the poorest countries and to remind them of their responsibility. Even though the issue was at the centre of the debate on the first day of the meeting in Hokkaido in Japan, the “anti-globilisation activists” as we call them, meeting in Katibougou in Mali, pleaded with the rich countries to go beyond mere promises to suppress the negative effects of the food crisis in Africa and to really look at contributing to the development of the continent.
It is certainly not the first time the commitment of the most industrialized nations have been questioned. At the dawn of the new millennium many hoped for radical changes in the relations between Africa and its development partners. This hope lied essentially with the project for a New Partnership for Africa’s Development (Nepad), adhered to grudgingly by the rich countries. Even though the summit in Genoa in Italy in 2001 adopted the partnership and initiated a plan of action that was debated two years later at the Evian-summit, it is clear the outcome is largely disappointing.
The idea was to mobilize resources to transform this plan into concrete acts that would lead to a better life for millions of Africans kept hostage by poverty, wars and disease. At the Gleneagles summit in Scotland in 2005, the G8 promised to cancel the multilateral debt of several of the poorest countries on the globe and promised to double aid to Africa by 2010. Today it is clear that these promises have not been kept and there is no reassuring sign that they will be in the near future.
Africa is still suffering, weakened by wars and conflict. And in places where there is no war, political quarrels caused by electoral fraud, the manipulation of constitutions and State institutions prevent the leaders from dedicating the necessary resources to the socio-economic development of their countries. Caught between civil wars and political crises, it is the ordinary people who are dying of hunger, illness and other calamities the leaders could have easily prevented if they had the political will and a rational management of the few resources they have available.
It is to be expected that the world food crisis that is affecting mostly African states could have lasting negative effects on the development of the continent. Faced with this crisis many countries are taking haphazard decisions to try and manage it on the short term, while the crisis, even if it does not have its origin in Africa, again highlights the necessity for an agricultural revolution on the continent.
Taking into account the above, the question is whether we should continue counting on the G8 to lead Africa out of its misery. The Nigerian political commentator Claude Ake said in the mid-1990’s that neither democracy and nor development can be imposed by proxy. The historian from Burkina Faso Joseph Ki-Zerbo said the same thing in his well-known book “A quand l’Afrique?” (When will itbe Africa’s chance?), published in 2003. The development and stability of African states is first and foremost a task of all Africans. Development aid has shown its limits and the various formulas and strategies used to reduce poverty, including the structural adjustment programmes of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, have not yet had the desired effect on the quality of life of the poor. One may not agree with the notion of poverty as it is generally defined by the international financial institutions, but Africa remains the continent where over 60% of the population does not have the minimum to live a decent life and where its children, due to an insufficient education system, are recruited into armies and sold to traffickers.
The activists who came together last week in Mali and others who revolt against these summits of the rich, founded on injustices, are aware that the economic and political conditions required of Africans – either implicitly or explicitly – tend to perpetuate, even to legitimize, the different forms of domination (symbolic, political and economic) that exist between the “partners” without really offering the continent a way out of its misery. That is why it is necessary to find another strategy for development. The Japanese, the Americans, the Chinese, the British and the French each have their own strategy to develop Africa. But the strategy the continent needs the most is one inspired by socio-political realities, motivated by a real concern to emancipate the continent and supported by a strong political will and the scrupulous respect of the norms of a system established through consensus by Africans themselves.
There is nothing that demonstrates that the Japanese summit will be any different than the others. The pollution of the atmosphere continues unabated while international commerce remains to the advantage of the richest countries. And while the African leaders fail to take responsibility for the socio-political and economic crises on the continent, aid, no matter where it comes from, will not change the situation. Africa will remain the continent rich with commodities and regrettably the continent of the poor. The West will remain the one dishing out lessons and master of the political-economic game. It has to be said, the development of Africa isn’t really at the heart of the concerns of Africa’s development “partners” and they are under no obligation to make sure that it is.
Dr David Zounmenou, Senior Researcher, African Security Analysis Programme, ISS Tshwane (Pretoria)
