Blog Topic #10 -- What's Up with Africa?

For many centuries, Africa was known as the "Dark Continent" because of the lack of European exploration.  Today it is known for its conflict, corruption, poor living conditions, and bad economic structure.  Because of this many Western countries such as the United States have poured in billions of dollars of financial aid to the poor African countries to help them become good, more developed countries in the new globalized world.  However, most of this money never reaches the poor, but is rather used by the few, elite African leaders.  So the question posed to us today is, "Should we continue to give Africa monetary aid or find some other way?"  Before we can answer this, we need to look at all of the facts.

Many plans have been implemented in the past to help Africa, but all have met with failure.  Starting in the 1960's, $500 billion dollars of aid has been given to Africa from wealthier countries with an average of at least $50 billion each year.  Many relief plans have been created such as the ones the UN in held in 1985 and 1996, but once they are over, nothing changes.  The only thing these efforts have accomplished is dependence.  50% of Ghana and Uganda's budgets are apparently aid dependent.  That means without our aid, these countries have no means of fulfilling their yearly needs. So where has all of the $500 billion gone and where is the current $50 billion going?  According to the evidence, straight into the pockets of the wealthy government leaders.

It is not an unknown fact that there is corruption in the governments of Africa.  The wealthy leaders use the money they receive for their own benefit rather than the benefit of their people.  In fact, about 40% of all money in Africa is invested outside the continent and the World Bank estimates about 40% is deposited in foreign banks!  More evidence continues to pour in with cases like that of Nigeria's Inspector General Tafa Balogun who had apparently deposited around $52 million in 15 different bank accounts.  According to the Nigerian Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, military leaders have stolen around $500 billion.  That is equal to the aid given by Western countries to help Africa!  I think it is quite clear just what has happened to Africa's aid money.

So what are we to do?  With the Per Capita Income lower than it was in the 1970's and with 350 million people, about half the population, living on less than a dollar a day, we cannot just turn our back on Africa.  However, giving them money will not help their cause much either and may even make things worse!  It is a sticky situation that we need to resolve, but there seems to be no clear solution.  I think the best solution is to remove all monetary aid from Africa and begin helping them in other ways, such as providing help with development.  The only successful countries are those that are independent, not dependent.  Already some African countries, such as South Africa, have pulled themselves ahead in the world.  If the same kind of help that was given to South Africa is given to the rest of the countries, I believe that eventually they will pull through as well.

If you are interested in reading more, I found an interesting article online concerning this issue of African Aid.  Check out this link!

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123758895999200083.html

Until next time!