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The stolen African voice

Salim Lone

In the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks, Tony Blair’s passionate denunciation of impoverishment in Africa as “a scar on the conscience of the world” convinced many that the west would propel the issue of mass poverty and injustice to the top of the international agenda in the cause of a more stable world.

This week’s news only confirms that it was a misplaced hope. Not a single country in sub-Saharan Africa has met the criteria set by the United Nations’ millennium development goals on poverty alleviation, the centrepiece of the project. Some observers believe the number of poor, and the intensity of the poverty, has actually risen in almost all countries.

In truth, there was never any real prospect that western governments, which have gleefully presided over the creation of new classes of the super-super-rich, would use their considerable influence to push African leaders to pursue policies that would shift resources away from the rapacious national elites towards the poor. Nor was it likely the west would permit Africa to stray from the neo-liberal orthodoxies prescribed by the World Bank and the IMF. These policies have generated wealth for elites and created economic growth in a few countries, but have proved over two decades singularly unable to reduce the human misery afflicting hundreds of millions.

After many false starts, the millennium project, launched with huge fanfare in 2000, was meant to be the definitive development compact, a blueprint to substantially reduce the extreme ravages of poverty by 2015. But now it is sputtering. Abutting virtually every African slum are the castles of the unimaginably rich. There is little incentive for those who hold the reins of power to redirect investments away from themselves to the very poor, given the abiding conviction on the continent that they have an unlimited capacity to weather their punishing adversities — with the help of repressive security systems, of course.

But the poor do not always tolerate such inhumanity. There are mini-revolts brewing in many places. In Kenya, for instance, the Mungiki sect, which has tens of thousands of members and is loosely fashioned on the Mau Mau freedom movement, is pushing for land redistribution and a return to traditional values.

In the last two months this sect, which raises funds from protection rackets, has killed more than a dozen policemen and beheaded 20 civilians, hoisting some of their heads in front of government offices.

G8-approved plans are not going to end poverty. Africa needs strong, revolutionary leaders popular enough to put pressure on both their elites and international partners to modify their policies, not only in the interest of humanity but also of security and stability.

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In the end, only Africa’s own leaders and people can address its rawest suffering. Donors have a minor but vital role to play, but they must get this role right, and that includes recognising that what Africa needs most of all is space to formulate its own policies. Despite the rhetoric, Africa’s voice is rarely heard. It is the statements of its leaders that reach donors’ ears, not the anguish and aspirations of its people.

Can British Prime Minister Gordon Brown make a difference? After the multiple promises Mr. Blair made and betrayed, no one will want to get too excited about his successor. He has also made the extraordinary appointment to the Africa portfolio of Mark Malloch Brown.

Both these Browns are likely to be more firmly committed to the rule of law in resolving international disputes, but they will also have to shed some of their conviction in the power of the free market — even when it is working well — to uplift the poor. —

Guardian Newspapers Limited 2007

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