Africa's New Realism
By THABO MBEKI
New York Times, June
24, 2002
CAPE TOWN -- A great moment is at hand: a chance for
developed countries to make a sound investment while helping to break the cycle
of African underdevelopment. This prospect now seems as obvious as it was
previously elusive.
The Group of 8 conference of industrialized nations that
begins this week in Canada comes as we plan for the World Summit on Sustainable
Development in South Africa in September. It follows significant commitments made
by the Bush administration and the European Union at a United Nations
conference earlier this year in Mexico to increase development aid. The common
thread here is the renewed determination among political leaders and civil
society to build a humane world of shared prosperity.
The idea gains its momentum not from the desire to provide
charity. Nor is it premised merely on fears in highly developed nations of new
immigrants or of poor regions becoming so volatile as to pull the rest of the
world into instability. The momentum for sustained development, in partnership
with the private sector, is based on a recognition that it is possible to
revive poor nations, particularly in Africa, through investments for mutual
benefit. There is an unprecedented resolve on the continent to turn away from
the begging bowl and engage in new efforts to build a better life.
The fact that most African states have held multiparty
elections in the past decade is relevant. So is the imminent formation of the
African Union, out of the Organization of African Unity, which will occur at a
summit in South Africa early next month. Such developments have helped reveal a
socioeconomic potential previously obscured, and they have given strength to a
new realism.
In this great effort, we Africans seek, and need, partners.
On offer to the investors from the highly developed economies are sound
prospects in countries whose infrastructures — limited telecommunications
systems, poor roads, rail and port facilities, sometimes dilapidated cities —
hold the promise of exponential improvement. Where others are approaching
saturation, Africa offers rapid growth.
Such cooperation will reward the many African nations
prepared to improve political and economic governance. But there could be
broader spinoffs. This partnership of equals may lead to new introspection
among the citizens of developed countries about themselves; it may rekindle
that humanism that should lie at the foundation of global relations.
Such might be the outcome, if the developed nations work
with Africans in redefining assistance, fashioning a fairer trade regime and
treating Africa as an investment destination. Group of 8 leaders and other
statesmen will gather in a remote spot in the Canadian Rockies to hear more
about the New Partnership for Africa's Development. African leaders will arrive
with concrete proposals on how to get this partnership off the ground.
A central feature of the new partnership is ensuring democracy,
human rights and good governance. It sets out independent mechanisms for peer
review, with provisions aimed at foreseeing problems and working to prevent their
spread — rather than just censuring and punishing when things go wrong. If
programs in manufacturing, agriculture, education and health are to succeed,
Africans in their millions must take an active part.
Most important, it is Africans who have done and will
continue to do the planning. As George C. Marshall noted in proposing his
famous plan to rebuild Europe half a century ago: "It would be neither
fitting nor efficacious for this government to undertake to draw up
unilaterally a program designed to place Europe on its feet economically. This is
the business of the Europeans." And so it will be for Africans now.
Thabo Mbeki is the
president of South Africa.