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Worst plan for Africa: Foreign
aid
WorldNetDaily
Prof. Walter E. Williams
February 27, 2008
President Bush's trip to Africa and promise of increased foreign
aid will do little or nothing to solve the ongoing tragedy in most
places on the south-of-Sahara African continent. Kenya is on the
brink of a civil war. Over 1,000 people have been killed and
another 300,000 made homeless. Rebels have invaded Chad. In the
Darfur region of the Sudan, millions of people have been displaced
in a genocidal war. Ethiopia and Eritrea threaten war again.
Somalian warlords are in a pitched battle. Zimbabwe, once an
independent, thriving jewel on the continent, now ruled by a
tyrant, is on the brink of disaster, experiencing a 66,000 percent
rate of inflation, expected to be over 100,000 percent by year's
end. To put that inflation in perspective, the government has
recently started printing 10 million Zimbabwe dollar notes. A
hamburger sells for 15 million Zimbabwe dollars.
The recent African carnage is by no means new. During a 100-day
period in 1994, an estimated 800,000 Rwandans, mostly Tutsis, were
killed. There were an estimated 100,000 to 500,000 Ugandans
murdered under the brutal rule of Idi Amin. Liberia, Ivory Coast
and the Congo have been racked by war, and slavery exists to this
day in Mauritania and Sudan. Added to this carnage is gross
corruption, AIDS, famine and repression.
African leaders, and many people on the left, blame Africa's
problems on the evils of colonialism. They sometimes blame the
violence on the borders colonialists created that ignored
ethnicity. Many African nations have been independent for four
decades. If colonial borders were a major problem, how come they
haven't changed them? And, by the way, colonialism cannot explain
Third World poverty. Some of today's richest countries are former
colonies, such as: United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand
and Hong Kong. Some of today's poorest countries were never
colonies, such as: Ethiopia, Liberia, Tibet, Nepal and Bhutan. The
colonialism argument is simply a cover up for African dictators.
The worst thing the West can do to Africa is to give more foreign
aid. For the most part, foreign aid is government to government.
As such, it provides the financial resources that enable Africa's
grossly corrupt and incompetent regimes to buy military equipment,
pay off cronies and continue to oppress their people. It also
provides resources for the leaders to live lavishly and set up "retirement"
accounts in foreign banks.
Africa is the world's most natural-resources rich continent. It
has 50 percent of the world's gold, most of the world's diamonds
and chromium, 90 percent of the cobalt, 40 percent of the world's
potential hydroelectric power, 65 percent of the manganese, and
millions of acres of untilled farmland, as well as other natural
resources. Before independence, every African country was
self-sufficient in food production; today, many depend on imports
and others stand at the brink of famine.
The only people who can solve the problems of Africa are Africans
themselves. It is only they who can change their leaders, end
corruption and bring about transparency in government and end the
African wars. Only they can stop the continent's massive brain
drain. This was brought home to me, a number of years ago, at a
dinner I was invited to in honor of a new Nigerian ambassador to
the United States. During his speech, he admonished the Nigerian
professionals in attendance to come home to help the country
develop. The Nigerians seated at my table, and nearby tables, fell
into quiet laughter.
Most of what Africa needs the West cannot give: rule of law,
private property rights, fewer economic restrictions, independent
judiciary and limited government. The one important thing we can
do to help is to lower our trade barriers.
Walter E. Williams, Ph.D., is the John M. Olin Distinguished
Professor of Economics at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va.
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