What Africa needs now is benign neglect

The new Millennium was welcomed not only with fanfare and fireworks but also with renewed sense of obligation, hope and good will towards those less fortunate countries of the world. Foremost among these countries are the so called HIPCs (for definitions and other info see my blog, August 2). As the majority of the HIPCs are located in Africa, 33 countries out of 41 as classified by the World Bank, the spotlight in the new Millennium was placed on Africa. From pronouncements by His Holiness POPE John Paul II calling on the international financiers to “cancel outright” the international debt of these countries, the Millennium Declaration, signed by 189 countries, to Bono’s private and passionate efforts on behalf of people in Africa, a fresh opportunity was opened for Africa to enter into a fair partnership with the industrialized countries of the world.

But the Millennium also spotlighted a dark picture of Africa. According to the World Development Report (2005), 40 % of the world’s violent conflicts are in Africa, including several of the bloodiest: the Rwandan genocide in 1994 killed almost 1 million people; the civil war in the Democratic Republic of Congo has killed some 7% of the population. In Sudan a 20 years war between the North and the South claimed 2 million lives and displaced over 6 million people. On the economic front, most of the HIPCs in Africa have per capita income of less than $2 a day; have unsustainable ratios of debt to GDP and to Exports, and a Growth rate of less than 2 per cent.

The news about Africa is not always grim. One day one hears good ones, other day bad ones. The good news comes from the awareness of people in the developed world of the plight of people in Africa, whether due to war, famine or disease and their genuine efforts to do something about it; the bad news comes with the same efforts exerted on African behalf not for the sake of African but to serve one’s own agenda.

In the past two weeks, few articles on Africa appeared in several news papers. Two in particulars are noteworthy. The first appeared on July 19 in The Christian Science Monitor. The Monitor reports: “Global elders launch new alliance”. The alliance brings together two former leaders: Nelson Mandela and Jimmy Carter. This high level gathering of the “elders” according to the Monitor, included in addition to Mandela and Carter, several former world leaders (see the Monitor, p. 7 for the list), the idea being initiated by Richard Branson and his friend the rock star Peter Gabriel. The Monitor quotes Branson as saying about the initiative “The elders will play a role in bringing us together to help unnecessary human suffering and to celebrate the wonderful world we are privileged to be part of”. Aside from its focus on human right, no agenda has yet to be set by the “elders”. The meeting closed with Gabriel singing “Biko”, a song about Stephen Biko, an apartheid activist who died in police custody in 1977. As the monitor tells it “tears flowed as the audience heard the music”.

The second article, an OP piece written by Mr. Uzodinma Iweala also appeared in The Christian Science Monitor, July 24^th with the title “ An African Plea: No More Saviors”(p.9).

My first reaction as I read the title of Mr.Iweala’s piece is that he did not care much about the “elders” initiative, I did harbor the same thought myself. But then as I read the article, I found a lot more to his chagrin than what a group of “elders”, free agents with no political responsibilities hope to do for Africans. In his article Mr. Iweala articulated (based on my interactions with scholars from Africa) what many African felt the way African are presented in the Media; about slogans, to quote Mr. Iweala, such as “ Save Darfur”, “Keep a child alive/ I am African”, and white men painting the I am “African on their white skins”.

A more damaging indictment of those would be “SAVIORS”, is Mr. Iweala’s contention that the saviors campaign smack of colonial ideology. In his words “Such campaigns, however well intentioned, promote the stereotype of Africa as a black hole of disease and death….. The relationship between the West and Africa is no longer based on openly racist beliefs, but such articles are reminiscent of reports from the heyday of European colonialism, when missionaries were sent to Africa to introduce us to education, Jesus Christ, and civilization”. Alluding to the G8 Summit meeting (see my blog August 2d), where an African declaration was made, he makes the plea: before the next Summit “I hope people will realize that Africa does not need to be saved”.

Sympathy with the sentiments expressed by Mr. Iweala’s aside there is no denying the fact that many countries in the African continent are in a much worse shape today than shortly after independence ( see Martin Meredith “ The Fate of Africa: from the Hopes of Freedom to the Heart of Despair ” NY, Public Affairs 2005). But there are also success stories, countries like Botswana, Madagascar, Mozambique, Cape Verde, as well as few others who have achieved positive growth rates of GDP, improved governance, improved education and infrastructure and so on (see World Development Indicators 2006). The improvements in the economic and social indicators were brought about by concerted actions on the part of the countries themselves with the financial and technical support of the World Community.

Perhaps donors, policy makers, movie stars as well as ordinary citizens are over eager in showing that they do care about Africa and African. A doze of neglect may hasten the cure, and if you must do good, you should perhaps head the advice I have received a long time ago from my grandmother: “Do Good, but expect nothing in Return”. To that I would like to add: “let the Do Goodder do their Thing, but do not Trumpet it nor Belittle it”.