PHM-Exch> The trouble with aid: why less could mean more for Africa (2)

[Claudio Schuftan]

From: molly tumusiime <tumolly2000 at yahoo.com>


I am in total agreement with Jonathan Glennie assertion that 'less could
mean more for Africa' if we are talking about the trade imbalance that is
practiced on a global scale where the African continent has been running a
consumer economy unlike our economic masters who practice a supply economy
that translates into siphoning all the money from Africa to the developed
world to develop the latter even further.
The proponent of less aid to Africa needs to also study why poverty levels
are soaring high. This could be attributed to lack of willingness by the aid
providers to give aid that promotes production so that we are all at the
same footing when it comes to market access for finished goods. In Africa ,
and Uganda in particular, people still use a hand hoe to cultivate (oh gosh!
) the so called cash crops which fetch them peanut payments, because they
sell them when no value has been added only to bring them back as finished
products at a cost that no farmer can afford.(wondered why Africa puts on
second hand clothes made from cotton and yet cotton is produced  using the
soils of  this very continent!?)

'The aid conditions of privatisation and liberalisation have had more impact
than aid money'- this is true but have the Africans benefitted altogether?
For example, it is common knowledge that most privatised enterprises are run
by non Africans and that most of the profits are repatriated to their
countries of origin instead of being reinvested within the economies of the
countries where the enterprises are! This is not to underrate the employment
opportunities that these investors come with especially in the provision of
cheap labour which leads to massive returns to the investor.

A very pertinent observation by Jonathan C-‘He points out, “In reality, in
many African countries aid has meant more poverty, more hungry people, worse
basic services for poor people and damage to already precarious democratic
institutions.” However, my observation is that the situation is more complex
than the aid itself. There’s a synchronized effort to keep Africa in a state
of perpetual suffering through maintaining the status quo. I would dream of
aid that comes with industrialization aimed at making Africa more prominent
in exporting finished goods. I suggest geo-economy? Look at Uganda. The
river Nile starts and flows across the country but its people  are dying
from  hunger  exacerbated by long spells of drought; we do not have any
viable irrigation scheme that can turn that water into life for Ugandans! We
need such aid so that people can start feeding themselves to begin with!  We
need meaningful aid at the moment to make us stand on our feet. If the
institutions are letting the aid communities down, aid should be directed to
the right people,’ the poor’.A study needs to be done to come up with how
much aid meant for the poor actually reaches them!

Molly Tumusiime

Uganda
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