Annan calls for more aid, fairer trade and green revolution for Africa
Africans have undertaken a remarkable struggle over the past 10 years to confront the three overarching challenges of greater security, better development and respect for human rights, but the magnitude of the continent’s needs leaves little room for complacency, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan said last night.
“Africa needs more and better aid, it needs fairer trade, and it needs a green revolution to improve agricultural production and feed its people,” he told an applauding audience at Georgetown University in Washington where he delivered the Oliver Tambo Lecture in honour of the late South African anti-apartheid leader.
“Development remains the foremost African need, both as an end in itself and as a foundation of security,” Mr. Annan said, citing the progress that has been made, with inflation at historic lows in many countries, the continent’s economy growing by some 5 per cent, advances on debt relief, and world recognition of the urgency to confront HIV/AIDS.
“My fellow Africans justifiably look to their allies in the international community for strong and sustained support,” he added. “The truth is that, for Africa, the ‘global partnership for development’ remains more a phrase than a fact. About 50 per cent of all Africans have never made or received a phone call. A minuscule proportion have ever logged on to the internet.
“The global green revolution has bypassed African farmers, whose ranks have also been decimated by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Ours is the only continent that cannot feed itself today, much less ensure food security for its people. And, bucking the worldwide trend, sub-Saharan Africa has sunk deeper into poverty.”
Africa lags behind in the race to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which seek to slash a host of social ills such as extreme poverty, hunger, maternal and infant mortality, and a lack of access to education by 2015, he stressed.
Turning to security, he noted that about half the world’s armed conflicts, and some three-quarters of UN peacekeepers, are in Africa, but compared to a decade ago, there are fewer inter-State conflicts and many civil wars have ended. “But, here too, we should be under no illusion,” he warned. “In far too many reaches of the continent, people are still exposed to brutal conflicts, fought with small but deadly weapons.
“Every day, in Darfur, more men, women and children are being driven from their homes by murder, rape and the burning of their villages. Beyond Sudan, less visible but no less deadly conflicts – in Côte d'Ivoire, Somalia and northern Uganda – cry for African resolve and international attention.”
Ultimately, a peaceful Africa will be sustainable only if accompanied by democratic transformation and good governance, the third leg of African progress, he said, citing advances with more democratically elected governments than ever before, including that of Liberia’s Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the first woman ever to be elected an African president.
“The governance gains I’m referring to are real, but they remain tenuous in the face of grave challenges,” he cautioned. “Despite elections and better leaders, bad apples remain. And even some elected Governments continue to suppress opposition parties and tolerate large scale corruption, or practice it. Too often, the exploitation of natural resources continues to benefit only a few.”
Africa needs more leaders like Mr. Tambo and South Africa’s first black president, Nelson Mandela. “Now that the tide is turning, and Africans are holding their leaders to account, we have a real opportunity to help Africans help themselves,” he declared.
Today, Mr. Annan opened the Conference on the Kofi Annan Legacy for Africa, which took place at Georgetown University.