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G8 debt relief: Boost of $50 billion Dollars aid, too little
2005-07-10 10:52:56
By Editor
The G-8 countries have, at their Scotland Summit which ended on Friday, agreed to boost aid to Africa by $50 billion Dollars in addition to the total debt cancellation for 18 African countries.
They have also agreed to immediately target development aid to Africa. The $50 billion, is, however, to be provided over a time frame of twenty years!
This comes after the AU meeting of Heads of State and government who wanted more debt relief and increased aid flows. They believed that debt cancellation should include more countries, and there should be an increase in aid of about $100 million dollars.
Addressing leaders at the African Union summit in Libya recently, the African Union Chairman and Nigerian President, Olusegun Obasanjo, called for massive financial help from the West, saying that the continent was now moving from a past of coups to a future of good governance.
The 53 African leaders at the Summit unanimously called for full debt cancellation for all African nations without exception, as was the case recently when only some countries were singled out for debt relief.
Although these countries have welcomed last month’s 40 billion dollars debt relief package, agreed by finance ministers of key members of the Group of Eight, they are asking for the entire African debt of 350bn dollars to be written off.
The African leaders were hopeful that the G-8 Summit in Scotland, would meet some expectations of the African countries but unfortunately it has not been the case, as the $50 billion dollars has been described by some commentators as peanuts.
Let it be said, and repeatedly for that matter, that all the African countries are groaning heavily under the debt burden, and to expect them to have the ability to pay back their debts, is tantamount to cheating oneself
And to be frank, much of the money they have borrowed from the West or the former Soviet bloc and other countries, like Japan or China, has not been used for the intended purposes. How would you expect such countries to pay back their debts?
History has it that the G-8 member states are highly indebted to the African continent as a whole because without Africa, its resources, and its people, they would have got stuck somewhere. In his Book, ‘How Europe Underdeveloped Africa,’ Professor Walter Rodney, says that Europe used to get cheap raw materials from Africa in colonial times and ready markets for their manufactured goods, to sustain the industrialization process and development of which they are so proud today.
They also gained hugely from the slave trade for instance, and despite their technological advancement , it is only fair therefore that they accept this legacy and cancel Africa’s current debts.
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