AfricaVox 2007

The sick priorities of the G8

This afternoon the G8 leaders announced their communiqué on climate change – but healthcare funding is still proving to be a sticking point. Walter Otis Tapfumaneyi of the Panos Global AIDS Programme is not surprised.

It never rains but it pours for Africa, and the light at the end of the tunnel always seems to get dimmer because the world’s richest countries insist on making the tunnel even longer.

As if slavery and colonialism were not enough, Africa today is still being looted in the name of unfair trade, brain drain, conflict and corruption. And it even has to pay for crimes it has not committed.

Take climate change, for example, which today the G8 made a series of announcements about. The G8 countries represent 13 per cent of the world’s population but emit 40 per cent of its greenhouse gases.

Africa has hardly contributed to global warming but, according to this year’s IPCC report, Africa is the continent most vulnerable to climate change.

By 2020, yields from rain-fed agriculture in some countries could decrease by as much as 50 per cent, exacerbating malnutrition and food insecurity, while a three degree temperature increase could leave up to 1.8 billion more people facing uncertainty over their water sources.

Climate change, however, isn’t grabbing the headlines because of its potential to harm people in Africa, but because it also affects rich countries. HIV and AIDS, on the other hand, are slipping down the agenda. The number one enemy of the African continent is barely of any concern to the G8 countries, it seems.

AIDS prevention paying the price of the G8 donor circus

Kaikare Kirunda

G8 negotiators have spent much of the week in disagreement over a range of issues – including the commitment made two years ago at Gleneagles to increasing aid to Africa. As the Summit opened today, the prospects for Africa weren’t looking bright.

Perhaps that’s unsurprising. It’s well known that aid has actually gone down in real terms, once debt relief is taken out of the equation. In fact aid agency Oxfam says, going by the present trends, the G8 could miss its 2010 target by $30 billion.

As the rows continue at the Summit, Germany too has been accused of only being interested in pushing its own model of social health insurance while apparently ignoring Africa’s own health strategy.

That all this is happening when some of the G8 countries – especially the US and Germany – made important aid increment announcements prior to the Summit is mind-boggling.

But what's happening here reflects the confusion these countries exhibit in their aid programmes for Africa and the rest of the developing world. More importantly these conflicts have damaging consequences on the ground.

Uganda's debts cancelled but health workers "don't see the change"

Esther Aikoru has been a health professional in Uganda for 15 years, but has barely a dollar in the bank.

Although healthcare systems are high on this year's G8 agenda, health experts such as Médecins Sans Frontières have slammed donors for failing to fund increases in health workers' salaries.

Esther told Collins Vumiria that she would like to see things change now that Uganda's debts have been written off.

Protesting for/against whom?

Richard M Kavuma

I’ve now arrived in Germany to be greeted by the massive and violent scenes of the anti-globalisation protests in Rostock. In theory, I – a journalist from one of the poorest nations in the world, Uganda – should have no problem understanding the protesters’ cause.

As the rich world reaps supernormal profits from globalisation, ordinary people in poor countries are getting more and more marginalised.

In Uganda the proportion of people below the poverty line has finally ‘improved’ to 31 per cent. But maternal mortality, infant mortality and deaths due to the clinically treatable disease malaria are still shamefully high.

There’s a lot the rich West can do to change this. They’ve made a start, but it’s not enough.

One thing about the Rostock demonstrations is the predictability of it all. Yes, globalisation is simply marginalisation of the poor. Yes, the rich countries – including Germany – have reneged on their promise (renewed two years ago in Gleneagles) to give more aid to poor nations.

But will this violence against police and blockading of roads necessarily change the plight of people in poor countries?

“We need the G8’s help in the fight against poverty and HIV”

Zinhle Mapumulo

I think South Africa is in denial. This applies to me too.

South African AIDS activist

When I heard there was a village in the North West Province where almost every household is affected by HIV and AIDS I thought “yeah, sure, it can’t be that bad”.

But it was – and is. I’ll be writing more about that in my next blog.

There’s been a fair amount of coverage about the South African government downplaying the HIV epidemic. But it’s not just HIV, it’s poverty in the country in general.

Urban dwellers like me don’t think that media reporting of ‘poverty-stricken’ Africa applies to Johannesburg, Durban or Cape Town – the cosmopolitan cities we call home.

So when I was asked to canvass opinion on my fellow South Africans’ expectations of the G8 Summit, I was surprised to find that this denial isn’t universal...

Anti-corruption efforts just a ‘donor-inspired drama’

It’s been a day of protest: in Germany, anti-G8 protestors clashed with police; meanwhile London saw demonstrators saying ‘the world can’t wait’ for an end to poverty. Campaigners resent the ‘self-appointed informal world government’ of the G8, which uses aid and financial muscle to police the leaders of other countries. But Richard M Kavuma says the aid conditions set by the G8 are doing little to stop corruption.

Interesting times we’re living through in Uganda. Only last month, two men who were previously ministers in President Museveni’s government had a taste of life in the country’s Luzira prison. 

These ex-ministers and a niece of first lady Janet Museveni have allegedly ‘mismanaged’ a fund worth nearly $5 million intended for the immunisation of Uganda’s children against killer diseases.

After netting such big fish, the President might have expected the whole population to applaud him. Instead the cynics are having a field day. One reason is that people simply don’t believe that Museveni is serious on corruption.

Instead of distancing themselves from the accused in this current case, members of the President’s party, his cabinet, and even members of his family have visited the accused in jail. Others held parties to celebrate their release on bail.

It is rumoured that Museveni only okayed action against his cronies to appease the donors, who can withhold their critically needed aid unless Uganda is seen to tackle corruption.

I’m not giving any credence to this latest anti-corruption probe until one or two of the accused are actually convicted and locked away. Short of that, it feels like yet another round of donor-inspired drama.