Opinion
Analysis
Africa needs
more than compassion
Debt relief is the catchword of the day.
But it is more likely that the West is doing more harm than good when the
African countries are not made to take responsibility for the debts they have
put themselves in.
Over the weekend a group of musicians contributed their fair share to the cause.
It is easy to be ironic over their reasons for supporting debt relief; over how
an ex-star like Bob Geldof sees this as his chance to return to the limelight.
But it would probably be wrong and unfair. Several of those who performed have
no problem attracting huge crowds even without the African hunger as a crowd
puller.
It is difficult to be untouched by starvation, genocide and refugee
catastrophes. Many want to help. But it is questionable if Live 8 concerts are
the right move. Or donor aid, Millennium Development Goals or debt relief.
The good news of the G8 meeting in Scotland this week is that Africa has been
put on the agenda. But Tony Blair’s push for a comprehensive debt relief for
many African countries is hampered with problems. So are music concerts.
The first live-aid concert is now widely regarded as a huge failure. When the
grains finally reached Ethiopia the war was over and local trade had started.
Prices slumped, and the local farmers found it difficult to sell their produce.
A market that had started to function was destroyed. Debt relief is also no
quick fix. After colonialism, and decades of different aid and assistance, there
is a belief that it is the West that is the cause of all problems. And not the
many bad and corrupt leaders that have turned natural resource rich countries
into poor nations.
There are examples of countries that have had their debt written off just to
take new loans and create debts. It has helped many leaders cling to power. The
picture of debt relief that is being offered is the one being painted by the
local leaders.
Nevertheless debt relief creates, in theory, the political room for manoeuvre
that every democracy needs. Instead of the budget being eaten by interest rates,
money can be used to create what the government wants to establish, determining
what the country needs most. And then be responsible for their priorities in
free and fair elections.
But that is seldom the reality. If you have learnt that you can have your debts
written off once, why not borrow some more tomorrow? Why take responsibility
when in the end someone else is being held responsible?
The only long-term solution is to give African countries the same possibilities
as European countries to enrich themselves. To give financial assistance with
one hand and maintain trade barriers with the other is a means to keep African
countries aid dependent.
The European Union is one of the culprits, as is the US. The help that is needed
comes neither from USAID or the Red Cross. It comes from consumer organisations.
That is what Tony Blair should point out to his friends in the G8.
High hopes for
new malaria treatment
Malaria, the deadly disease, will
certainly continue to take its morbid toll if appropriate steps are not taken.
People everywhere in the country are anxiously waiting for any news of a
breakthrough in medical science, which could help in countering the disease.
It is very sad to learn that those who commonly die from malaria are poor
children under the age of five, and pregnant women. Malaria is one of the main
causes of severe anaemia, miscarriage and death in pregnant women.
We understand that the government is doing what it can to help people, although
its efforts have often failed. The government has admitted (finally) that the
existing combination of malaria drugs, medically known as sulphadioxine
pyrimithmine (SP) is not effective any more.
It is shocking news that the resistance of malaria parasites to anti-malarial
drugs has been on the increase, reaching 25 per cent. According to research
conducted by the National Institute for Medical Research (NIMR), malarial
parasites are progressively becoming more resistant to SP drugs.
Also the drugs have serious side effects. There are many cases of patients
experiencing unpleasant reactions to them.
NIMR recommended the use of a combination therapy (artemether/lumefantrine) to
treat malaria, as it has been proven to be more effective than SP.
We are happy that the government and Health Minister Anna Abdallah have complied
with the given recommendations, and that the new drugs will be introduced into
the country as soon as the public have been educated on their use.
Most developing countries have been experiencing reduced income, productivity
and problems of high expenditure in treating malaria, the disease is in fact a
huge burden.
Iranians elected the president they wanted
By Evarist Kagaruki
Some commentators on world affairs have made the remarkably
interesting observation that the disintegration of the Soviet Union (or the
“death” of communism) was not the cause of the “New World Order”, but its
consequence. The real new order, they posit, began on February 11, 1979 when
Imam Khomeini’s decade-long struggle against the Shah’s regime in Iran came to
its logical conclusion. The mammoth demonstrations, on that memorable day in the
country’s history, resulted in the Islamic Revolution which caused the collapse
of the monarchy.
The revolution established the Islamic Republic of Iran in the face of
unrelenting opposition by both camps of the Cold War: the West and the East, led
by the US and the Soviet Union respectively. That Khomeini led a successful
revolution and founded an Islamic Republic was indeed a great feat. But perhaps
his greatest achievement (and what the West, and particularly America, perceived
as the greatest “danger” to themselves) lay in his waking Muslims up, to realise
the potentialities of Islam when embraced in all its dimensions.
It is primarily these potentialities which enabled the oppressed mass of the
Iranian people, whose only weapon was their oneness, and their recitation in
unison of the call of prayer – Allahu Akbar (Allah is above all), to descend on
one of the most fearful, brutal dictatorships the world had seen, and oust it!
And this at a time when the two rival superpowers were fiercely tearing the
world apart for their own benefit.
It is also on the basis of those potentialities and the unshakable faith (of the
Iranian people) in Allah, that the Islamic Revolution has survived and endured
to this day. Successive governments in Tehran have always striven to adhere to
Ayatullah Khomeini’s Will which, among other things, calls upon the Iranian
leadership to ensure that the Islamic victory of 1979 does not end up
discrediting and embarrassing the religion itself and the faithful.
The Ayatullah’s Will is even more important today when imperialism is becoming
more heinous and vicious in its militaristic form, using the banner of “war
against terror” to frighten and humiliate small countries that have refused to
become surrogates of the West.
The importance of the election of Mahmoud Ahmad-Nejiad recently as new Iranian
President should be seen from that perspective. The youthful former Mayor of
Tehran is one of the new breed of hard-line politicians in Iran, who are royal
to the religious principles of the Islamic revolution. He represents the Iranian
people’s aspirations.
But, not surprisingly, the West – especially the US – has scornfully resented
the election of Ahmad-Neijad, saying it was “flawed”. Not surprising, because
the election results were totally against their expectations. Their favourite
candidate was former Iranian president and moderate cleric Akber Hashemi
Rafsanjani whom they regard as “pro-reform”, and not so rigid on the Iranian
nuclear issue and “easy to do business with”.
The new Iranian President is certainly not a “reformist”, in the sense that he
does not conform to the western powers’ canon that democracy for Third World
countries must be conceived in, and imposed from, Washington or London, for
example. And the man has made it clear that his government will not bend in
negotiations with the West, including negotiations over Iran’s controversial
nuclear programme.
Arguably, it is important for Iran to reform its political and economic
institutions to make the society more democratic, and to modernise the economy.
But the reforms should be home-grown; they should be engineered by the Iranian
people themselves, and not imposed on them from outside! The country has the
institutional and resource capacity to bring about the desired changes in its
political and social systems that are culturally derived.
There is no doubt that the people of Iran, like their brethren anywhere in the
world, want freedom and democracy. But they want these in the context of the
teachings of the Holy Quran – that is, in accordance with the precepts of Islam.
The post-revolution Iran that we all know, cannot, for sure, allow itself to
sink into the abyss of blind imitation, for example, of the so-called freedom
that permits all that is forbidden by Islam – things like homosexuality and all
the filth that goes with the decadent western culture.
By Islamic Republic, the Iranians meant a form of government which might bring
them freedom and independence in the light of belief in the divine revelation of
Islam. And that, apparently, is what the West has failed (or does not want) to
comprehend.