BIG QUESTION.....WILL MONEY SOLVE AFRICA'S DEVELOPMENT PROBLEMS ?

Will Money Solve Africa's Development Problems?

Discussions on this topic have been released in a booklet (http://www.templeton.org/africa/) by the John Templeton Foundation, which serves as a philanthropic catalyst for research on what scientists and philosophers call the Big Questions. Dr Donald Kaberuka, President of the African Development Bank Group (AfDB), one of the contributors on this “Big Questions”, presented a large picture of Africa’s issues we want to share and discuss.

For the AfDB’s President the answer is

:”Not as long as there are issues such as prolonged violent conflict, bad governance, excessive external interference, and lack of an autonomous policy space. Alone, money cannot solve Africa’s development problems. Proof, if any was needed, is the fact that many of Africa’s natural resource-rich countries score very low on human development indicators.

Africa’s development challenges are multifaceted. Colonial history still looms large. Money cannot undo that history. Five decades after independence we are still grappling with building the nation-state. On the one hand, whole nations were split up by artificial boundaries to form separate independent countries, while on the other hand, several nation-states were lumped together within these same artificially delineated borders. To this already complex picture was added the impact of Cold War rivalries among major powers, which extended to the African theatre.

No amount of money can build the damaged trust between a government and its citizens. Decades of defective political and economic governance, and the failure by early post-independence governments to deliver on the promises of independence spun disillusionment and led to unfulfilled expectations paving the way to undemocratic dictatorial rule, the demise of the rule of law, ethnic strife, and economic and social chaos. In extreme cases these conditions led to a string of very weak or failed states.

This said, we must realize money is still needed and Africa will, for a while, require external support by way of concessional finance, given its limited domestic savings. Remember, 40% of Africans live

in landlocked states, often as far away as 2 2,000 kilometers from a maritime port. Building infrastructure that links countries and expanding market size and diversity requires significant resources; so do fighting HIV/AIDS and educating Africa’s children.

The good news is that a new generation of African leaders is determined to make a difference. In the

last two years, Africa has made substantial progress on the economic and governance fronts. We are

encouraged by the sustained strong macroeconomic and structural reforms on one hand, and improved governance on the other. These will go a long way toward reducing the risks and costs of doing business-prerequisites for stimulating both domestic and foreign investment, the only means to create wealth.

Lastly, Africa must be given a chance to meaningfully integrate into the global trading environment in order to sustain growth performance. It will not happen if international commitments such as those made at the Gleneagles G 8 Summit are not met. The Doha Trade Round negotiations need to succeed. These negotiations have been called a Development Round because they frontload the interests of developing countries such as those in Africa. At the end of the day, we are all God’s children and he gave us one world in which we are interdependent.”

Dr Kaberuka’s position underscored three pillars that (probably) annihilate money effect on Africa’s development.

He first identified long term African conflicts coming from diverse grounds. The governance and building nation-state failures is the second aspect and he finally pointed out colonialism and its aftermaths as the third.

This diagnosis browses the main issues of “money as a solution in Africa’s development”, considering the current standards.

When finished reading the picture described by Dr Kaberuka, one question comes with two sides.

From one side, what do Africans call development and the other one is how Africans choose to achieve if prior they have decided to get it.

This question is the main prerequisite to build a sustainable development. Indeed, the answer will allow setting the entire paradigm of the evolution of the continent. It involves the weight of history, the international context of nations and people and also a (re)definition of African point of view, not only for development but most largely about their own life.

To my opinion, that is the “Big questions” of Africa’s development problems.

The definition we could give to development is the translation in modern ways of values and human needs fulfillment.

Infrastructures, technology, healthcare system, education … all keep the same final purpose; serve values and human needs the policymakers defined prior.

Thus development for Africa is an exercise that leads to define values we want to change in everyday lifestyle and the fulfillment of people needs in two dimensions. The first dimension is related to Africa’s history and the second one concerns the projection of the continent in a dynamic sustainable development.

(Re) visiting Africa’s history to restore truth, heal minds, solve Africans conflicts (and its aftermaths) and extract some values for development.

Africa’s history is very important to be (re)visited for many reasons. We need to restore the truth on the continent and people, first. Truth on what Africa was and was not. Truth on what Africa did and did not.

Secondly, (re)visiting Africa’s history to heal minds from injuries caused by lies, wars, inferiority or superiority complex, role of African people in the global knowledge advancement, and also reinstate dignity of people who was undermined by any sort of human bad facts. For example, slavery caused by Africans to other Africans, and also caused by people from other continent etc.

Make people understand the precious link of humanity we all share from any continent and skin and that we should keep far from evil. This is the first purpose of history. Thus, conflicts raised up from bad relationship neighborhood, new boundaries coming from colonialism etc, could step down in a wise way because “we are all God’s children and he gave us one world in which we are interdependent” as Dr Kaberuka said.

After truth reinstatement, and mind recovery, the second purpose of history is to help highlight values which could allow a sustainable development from wealthy places Africa has earlier known. Not only values that stimulate economy but also culture, art, literature, religion and science.

Are any values useful for a sustainable development? Especially for Africa? No obviously. Values that should drive development are those who strictly promote human life and its environment. That’s why; we ought to explore all the values from any people that emphasized human life promotion and nature in order to reach the goal. The reason is simple. Development is for human. No human, no development. No environment where people can decently live, no human.

The first dimension of Africa’s development process prepares people, mind speaking, to face challenges. Before rising buildings Africa should raise minds. If not, little mind is able to destroy most high building, not raised mind. An integrated education policy is one of the principal key. Africans should also be taught who they were, who they are, who they will be and also values that lead development.

History for Africa development needs human and social science (history, sociology, anthropology, ethnology, linguistic etc.) with an effective use of capital in researches and school programs.

Second dimension, frame an African dynamic and sustainable development model

This part of the process will appear easy, if leaders, policymakers and next generations focus on the substratum of any sustainable development. Values that promote human life and its environment first and human need fulfillments second.

In the second dimension, the main issue is the understanding of global context running. Africa ought to draw up a new architecture of development face to global scarcity of natural resources, emerging economies, and globalization.

 Even if Africa describes its values for development, money will be necessary to turn values into reality. Before looking for money abroad, the limited savings of Africa should first hail leaders and people of finance to an authentic re-engineering of finance. Especially financial inclusion that will allow building a domestic capital market. No doubt. It is possible if many barriers are broken for a real inclusion of low income and also dedicate the engineering to a human-centered one.

In the new architecture of development, culture, art, and mind work should be promote to create more value, more capital for the continent.

Africa’s problematic development requires, absolutely, Africans involvement. They have to be at the first level of the matter, by thinking, working hard, struggling to achieve.