Fw: Africa: South African Churches on NEPAD

["Cor Groenendijk" <groenend at antenna.nl>]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Africa Action" <apic at igc.org>
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Sent: Saturday, June 08, 2002 6:23 PM
Subject: Africa: South African Churches on NEPAD


 Africa: South African Churches on NEPAD
 Date distributed (ymd): 020608
 Document reposted by Africa Action
 
 Africa Policy Electronic Distribution List: an information 
 service provided by AFRICA ACTION (incorporating the Africa 
 Policy Information Center, The Africa Fund, and the American 
 Committee on Africa). Find more information for action for 
 Africa at http://www.africaaction.org
 
 +++++++++++++++++++++Document Profile+++++++++++++++++++++
 
 Region: Continent-Wide
 Issue Areas: +economy/development+  
 
 SUMMARY CONTENTS: 
 
 During a press conference at the South African Council of Churches
 on June 6, the South African churches issued an assessment of NEPAD
 as a discussion document. This posting contains brief excerpts from
 the summary and plain text version of the document: "Un-blurring
 the Vision: An Assessment of the New Partnership for Africa's
 Development by South African Churches." The full plain text version
 will be available in the web archive of this posting at
  http://www.africaaction.org/docs02/nepa0206.htm
 The complete document, including footnotes and graphics, is
 available as a Word file  from Ms Thabitha Chepape at the SACBC
 Justice & Peace Department, tel. + 27 (0)12 323 6458, e-mail
 tchepape at sacbc.org.za  The document will be published in hard copy
 for further distribution in the coming weeks.
 
 For more information contact:
 
 Neville Gabriel, Justice & Peace Department, Southern African
 Catholic Bishops' Conference (SACBC), 140 Visagie Street PO Box 941
 PRETORIA 0001 South Africa;  Tel. +27 (0)12 323 6458 Fax. +27 (0)12
 326 6218 Mobile. +27 (0)83 449 3934;  E-mail: ngabriel at sacbc.org.za
 Web: http://www.sacbc.org.za
 
 Links to a wide variety of additional documents on NEPAD are
 available at http://www.web.net/~iccaf/debtsap/nepad.htm 
 See also:
 http://www.africaaction.org/docs02/accr0204.htm 
 and
 http://www.africaaction.org/docs01/eca0112.htm 
 
 A related posting sent out today contains a request for
 organizational signatures on a letter to be sent to the G7 finance
 ministers. 
 
 +++++++++++++++++end profile++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 
 Un-blurring the Vision: An Assessment of the New Partnership for
 Africa's Development
 
 SUMMARY
 
 Africa's social, economic, and political relations urgently need to
 be transformed through a focused and determined international
 effort if Africa is to be lifted out of the poverty trap. The New
 Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) presents itself as a
 visionary and dynamic initiative by a core group of new generation
 African leaders to reconstruct and develop the continent.
 
 Blurred Vision
 
 But NEPAD's vision is blurred by fixing its sights on increased
 global integration and rapid private sector growth as the answer to
 overcoming poverty, and by its failure to engage with Africa's
 people to transform the continent. The remarkable political will
 generated by NEPAD must be focused into a participatory
 transformation of Africa through direct, immediate, and decisive
 action to overcome the causes of Africa's impoverishment. ...
 
 The general issues addressed by NEPAD are not entirely new but
 NEPAD does contain several promising aspects that could give
 renewed hope and life to Africa's people. NEPAD can strengthen
 accountability and effective collaboration between African
 governments in a way that has not happened before. ...
 
 NEPAD contains some problematic elements that have proven to be
 ineffective in building peaceful, just, and caring societies in
 Africa. Its economic strategy is discredited by the harsh impact on
 the poor in African countries that have already adopted similar
 policies. It pretends to be unaware of the severe negative social
 impact that rapid privatisation of basic and social services has on
 impoverished communities in Africa. It fails to address the
 underlying power relations that constrain Africa's development. It
 does not provide a decisive mechanism to repair the persistent
 damage done to individuals, families, whole societies, and
 environments in Africa's history. Most of all, NEPAD has neglected
 Africa's people both in the process of its construction and in its
 primary focus. If NEPAD does not focus on Africa's people first, it
 can result in an increasingly divided Africa at the continental and
 national levels.
 
 NEPAD must focus primarily on immediate poverty eradication
 interventions that will deliver direct benefits to the poor rather
 than it current focus on a long-term and indirect development
 strategy. Meaningful debt cancellation for Africa must be
 prioritised as a pre-condition for Africa's sustainable
 development, so that budget support can be provided for public
 investment in social services such as health care and education and
 the provision of water and electricity. NEPAD must also propose
 decisive structural changes to the current international financial
 and trade systems, including proposals such as an international
 currency transaction tax and special protection for vulnerable
 African industries. ...
 
 
 In the same way that African countries are willing to undertake a
 path of self-criticism and renewal, G7 leaders must make a firm
 commitment to support Africa according to the priorities and plans
 that are set through participatory and democratic processes in
 African countries. Ending the scourge of corruption cannot be seen
 as the responsibility of Africa exclusively because corruption is
 a global problem that could be worsened by increased foreign trade
 and private investment in Africa. A G7 over-emphasis on the
 "cost-free" elements of NEPAD such as peace-building and governance
 issues and on private sector development alone, without a
 corresponding commitment to support Africa's reconstruction and
 development in additional material budget-support terms, reinforces
 the distrust that makes many believe that African development based
 on the hope of a new partnership with rich countries is not viable.
 
 Un-blurring the Vision
 
 While NEPAD's analysis of the problems that confront Africa is
 accurate and its end goal of an African continent free from war and
 poverty expresses the deep-felt hope of all Africans and people of
 good will, the economic path it chooses is bound to fail this
 mission.
 
 NEPAD's vision is blurred by setting its sights on the hope that
 greater global integration will save Africa. Yet NEPAD's vision can
 be restored if Africa's leaders enter into a new partnership with
 their people. The vision of a new Africa dawning in the 21st
 century is too precious to be lost because we failed to see that
 Africa's children, men, and women are its greatest treasure.
 
 ************************************************************
 
 Un-blurring the Vision:
 An Assessment of the New Partnership for Africa's Development
 
 [Selected excerpts only. This paper was initially drafted by the
 SACBC Justice & Peace Department. It was further developed through
 various ecumencial consultations hosted by the South African
 Council of Churches (SACC) and the Southern African Catholic
 Bishops' Conference (SACBC). It was released as a discussion paper
 on June 6, 2002.]
 
 1. Introduction
 
 ... While Africa holds ten percent of the world's population,
 seventy-five percent of the world's people living with HIV/AIDS are
 in Sub-Saharan Africa and one-third of the world's poorest people
 live in Africa. Half the continent's population lives in absolute
 poverty. Africa has inherited a legacy of weak states and bad
 governance systems. Africa exports thirty percent more today than
 it did in 1980 but receives forty percent less income from these
 exports than it did in 1980 due to global forces beyond its
 control. Nearly half of the estimated 515,000 women who die
 annually from pregnancy or child birth are African meaning that one
 African woman in 13 dies during pregnancy or childbirth. 
 
 After more than fifteen years of Structural Adjustment 
 Programmes (SAPS) unemployment rates are estimated to be well above
 thirty-five percent on the continent. Nineteen thousand children
 die in Africa each day as a result of preventable diseases and
 malnutrition. Yet Sub-Saharan Africa has a foreign debt of more
 than $170 billion and pays creditors $40 million a week to service
 debts accumulated as a result of the cold war, apartheid, and
 failed projects. ....
 
 2. What is NEPAD?
 
 ... Conceived and developed by a core group of African leaders,
 NEPAD describes itself as a 'comprehensive integrated development
 plan that addresses key social, economic and political priorities
 for the continent'. It includes a commitment by African leaders to
 African people and the international community to place Africa on
 a path of sustainable growth, accelerating the integration of the
 continent into the global economy. It calls on the rest of the
 world to partner Africa in her own development based on her own
 agenda and programme of action. ...
 
 These plans of action were presented for approval by the Heads of
 State Implementation Committee (HSIC) at its meeting on 25-26 March
 in Abuja. The final versions will be presented to the African Union
 (AU) Summit in July in South Africa. The programme will also be
 presented to the G7 Summit in June in Canada.
 
 [The NEPAD Steering Committee includes Algeria, Egypt, Nigeria,
 South Africa, and Senegal.] ...
 
 5. Which Wedding Garments to Wear for the New Partnership?
 
 ... NEPAD may be seen as Africa's attempt to present itself in an
 acceptable manner to participate in the globalisation wedding
 feast. But the kinds of garments NEPAD chooses are telling of whose
 feast it is, who its guests will be, and what the quality of the
 marriage will be.
 
 5.1. African-Owned Conditionality?
 
 The NEPAD framework provides the possibility for African-controlled
 conditionality, even though it is an inadequate process in its
 current form. It is determined by a nucleus of new generation
 African leaders and is endorsed by the Organisation of African
 Unity (OAU). ... As an outline of the conditions to which African
 leaders pledge themselves in entering into a partnership with the
 industrialised countries, NEPAD does not offer any dramatically new
 conditions. It largely follows the kinds of conditions that have
 been demanded by creditor and donor countries in the past, both in
 terms of governance and economic strategy. However, it does include
 a proposed process for mutual North-South evaluation and
 accountability, even though this is not developed adequately. ...
 
 5.3. A New African Bloc?
 
 NEPAD is a promising initiative to develop dynamic collaboration
and accountability between African governments in a way that has
 not happened before. It proposes to develop a code of conduct for
 African leaders that will include a limitation of terms for heads
 of state or government, as well as an independent peer review
 mechanism that will make its reports public. In many ways this is
 driven by a 'new-boys club' rather than the established 'old-boys
 club' of the past. However, understood in the context of shifting
 geopolitical alignments on the continent, this holds out the danger
 that the continent may be divided along two very clear lines: those
 backing NEPAD and those resisting it. Nonetheless, NEPAD holds out
 the possibility of creating an African bloc of leaders that can, if
 their policy and strategy advice is appropriate, radically alter
 the path of Africa's future participation in multilateral
 organisations.
 
 5.4. Ending Africa's Wars
 
 Highest priority is given to conflict management and resolution and
 peace-building as a precondition for sustainable development. The
 problem of conflict and wars in Africa is correctly associated with
 concerns around Africa's natural resources, systems of governance,
 and broader issues of poverty. African governments that have been
 actively involved in NEPAD have already undertaking some promising
 initiatives to end Africa's great wars and to promote political
 rather than military processes for resolving conflicts that may
 arise. However, the Sudan war remains the biggest challenge to
 NEPAD's peace-building initiative. How African governments respond
 in resolving the Sudan war will be the biggest test for NEPAD's
 general objectives of building an African consensus for peace and
 prosperity on the continent.
 
 5.5. The Free Market & Africa's Recovery
 
 The Model of Development: NEPAD fails to offer any alternative to
 the dominant market fundamentalist development model that places
 unquestioning faith in uncontrolled, private sector led, rapid
 economic growth as the answer to the problem of rampant poverty,
 despite the evidence that this strategy in fact deepens poverty,
 increases unemployment, and widens inequality in the short and
 medium term, while making national economies extremely vulnerable
 to speculative capital and 'market sentiment'. NEPAD in fact
 promotes a market-driven strategy as the solution to Africa's
 problems, effectively sacrificing the poor who are here now for
 some uncertain end in the distant future. ...
 
 5.6. Democratic Participation?
 
 NEPAD completely failed to meaningfully engage with communities and
 civil society organisations concerning its process and content.
 This highlights the problematic trend in the "globalised" world for
 major national and international priorities to be determined
 outside of democratic processes in un-transparent, unaccountable
 processes in the international sphere. While NEPAD, by design, did
 not include space for civil society input into its initial
 development, it did, by design, include high-level consultation
 with the IMF/World Bank and leaders of industrialised countries and
 the private business leaders. ...
 
 5.7. Changing Perceptions of Africa
 
 NEPAD is in many respects a marketing strategy for Africa that
 attempts to overcome the negative image and sentiment that Africa
 generates in the consciousness of many political, business, and
 civil society circles outside the continent. It has, for whatever
 reasons, received much acclaim and has won international political
 respectability that could be harnessed for the benefit of the
 continent.
 
 5.8. Africa on the Global Agenda
 
 NEPAD has succeeded to engage the global political and economic
 powers in a direct dialogue on the course of Africa's development
 so that the upcoming G7 Kananaskis summit has Africa and NEPAD as
 a major theme. The political will that has been generated through
 the NEPAD process as a result of energetic work by Africa's
 leaders, represents a major achievement for NEPAD that must be
 applauded. However, the direction in which that political will has
 been mustered is ambiguous at best. It remains to be seen whether
 the political will can be sustained if democratic processes alter
 the direction of NEPAD's primary focus.
 
 5.9. Poverty is a Secondary Focus
 
 The strategies adopted by NEPAD are intended to deliver long-term
 and indirect poverty alleviation through mechanisms that have not
 yet delivered real benefits to the poor in African countries that
 have tried them. NEPAD has no clear plan to address the current
 crisis of impoverishment that is rampant across Africa, including
 the joblessness crisis. ...
 
 5.10. Redistributing Power?
 
 The current international power relations determine the boundaries
 of possibility for developing an effective development plan for
 Africa. NEPAD does not make clear proposals to change the current
 power relations that are the single biggest obstacle to Africa's
 development. It in fact proposes greater participation in the
 current international political and economic governance structures
 and processes as they are now, in the framework of 'a new
 partnership'. However, 'partnership' in a context of seriously
 disproportionate power relations, amounts to little more than
 domination.
 
 5.11. The Lure of Privatisation
 
 NEPAD adopts rapid and extensive privatisation in various forms as
 a key strategy to offer investment opportunities, attract foreign
 investment, and develop infrastructure across the continent. It
 does this in a way that pretends to be unaware of the severe social
 consequences of such measures, especially in a context of
 widespread poverty and inequality.
 
 5.12. What About Reparations?
 
 Only passing mention is given by NEPAD to Africa's history of
 slavery and colonialism with no mention of the need for
 reparations. This represents a political decision by NEPAD's
 engineers to avoid the politically charged language of historical
 justice and reparations. However, NEPAD presents itself in many
 ways as a post-colonial Marshall Plan for Africa's recovery.
 However, reparations remain a major concern not only amongst the
 Southern African victims of severe human rights violations under
 apartheid, but among a wide variety of civil society groups across
 the continent. ...
 
 6.2. Building on Unstable Ground
 
 Some crucial aspects of NEPAD are very disturbing. Despite
 widespread public discontent, NEPAD makes proposals that have not
 proven to be effective to build stable, just, and caring societies
 in Africa:
 
 6.2.1. NEPAD articulates the serious negative impact on Africa of
 "globalisation's" market fundamentalist development model but then
 goes on to adopt and promote more of the same model as the solution
 to Africa's economic problems. NEPAD's macro-economic framework
 must be seriously questioned on the basis of the current experience
 of the poor in African countries that have already adopted these
 policies.
 
 6.2.2. NEPAD pretends to be unaware of the severe negative impact
 that rapid privatisation of social and basic services has on
 impoverished and highly indebted communities.
 
 6.2.2. The process that gave rise to NEPAD glaringly neglected
 popular participation in any meaningful form. There can be no real
 development without the participation of Africa's people at all
 stages of the process.
 
 6.2.3. NEPAD fails to address the underlying international and
 national power relations, structures, and processes that will
 ultimately determine the success or failure of the process.
 
 6.2.4. NEPAD does not offer clear prospects to resolve the call for
 reparations that are due to Africa's people.
 
 ...
 
 Accordingly, the following proposals are made to correct the
 failures of the NEPAD process and to improve its content and focus:
 
 6.3.1. NEPAD must recognise that Africa requires a fresh start.
 Africa cannot begin to develop unless the massive current social
 backlog is directly addressed as a first step. NEPAD should
 therefore include, as a priority, an additional programme to
 deliver immediate and direct anti-poverty interventions that will
 lift the poor out of their current suffering. ...
 
 6.3.2. Meaningful debt cancellation must be prioritised as a
 precondition for the success of any other medium or long-term
 strategy for social and economic recovery.
 
 6.3.3. NEPAD must give higher priority to rapidly increased
 investment in social services such as health care and education,
 rather than the low priority that social services are currently
 given in NEPAD's plans.
 
 6.3.4. NEPAD must support proposals for corrective changes to the
 international financial system such as the proposed international
 currency transaction tax that could be implemented at national
 level, and that a set proportion of the revenues raised in rich
 countries should be directed to Africa's reconstruction and
 development.
 
 6.3.5. NEPAD must address the call for corrective action to repair
 the damage caused to individuals and communities as a result of
 Africa's history of slavery, colonialism, and apartheid.
 
 6.3.6. Broad-based national popular consultation processes must be
 initiated across Africa to review the NEPAD programme. To this end,
 a civil society liaison unit should be established within the NEPAD
 secretariat and national civil society representatives should be
 elected to participate in official NEPAD discussions.
 
 ...
 
 ************************************************************ 
 This material is being reposted for wider distribution by 
 Africa Action (incorporating the Africa Policy Information 
 Center, The Africa Fund, and the American Committee on Africa).  
 Africa Action's information services provide accessible 
 information and analysis in order to promote U.S. and 
 international policies toward Africa that advance economic, 
 political and social justice and the full spectrum of human rights.
 
 Documents previously distributed, as well as a wide range of
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 http://www.africaaction.org 
 
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 ************************************************************