JK's Meeting On Africa’s Development Needs

[MegaPyne]

STATEMENT BY H.E. JAKAYA MRISHO KIKWETE, PRESIDENT OF ​

THE UNITED REPUBLIC OF TANZANIA, AT THE HIGH LEVEL ​

MEETING ON AFRICA’S DEVELOPMENT NEEDS,​

UN NEW YORK, 22ND SEPTEMBER 2008.​

Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen;
I am pleased to join all of you thing morning. I thank Secretary General Ban Ki-moon for conceiving the idea of holding this High Level meeting devoted to discussing Africa’s development needs. I also congratulate the Secretary General on his report on Africa’s Development Needs: State of implementation of various commitments, challenges and the way forward. Africa deserves this kind of attention because it is the poorest of the five continents. On all human development indicators Africa scores the least on almost all of them.

Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
The Secretary General’s report covers quite extensively and competently Africa’s needs and challenges for development. And certainly, numerous studies, publications, and multilateral conferences have enumerated and arrived at a consensus as to what constitutes Africa’s development, what impedes it, and what needs to be done about it.

The list of Africa’s development needs is long from provision of basic, social and economic services to ensuring food security and increasing people’s incomes through the transformation of the productive sectors.

The Secretary General has effectively reminded us in his report that one critical thing that stands in the way of dealing with Africa’s development needs, is the lack of the requisite resources. Development requires high amounts of resources which unfortunately because of the low levels of development Africa does not have sufficient resources to pull itself out of the poverty trap.

The Secretary General’s MDG Africa Steering Group has among other things quantified development assistance needs for meeting the MGDs which forms the bulk of Africa’s development challenges.

The good thing about this fact is that all of us, in the continent and in the international community recognize the question of Africa’s acute resource constraint. We also know that African governments have been taking measures to tackle their development challenges using the little resources available.

The other good thing also is the fact that the international community has been generous enough to assist African nations with resources to compliment their efforts. Unfortunately, the resources being committed and being made available are not sufficient to lift Africa out of the poverty trap quickly. The other unfortunate thing is the fact that a lot of the resources promised by the developed countries are not provided.

I would like to take this opportunity to express Africa’s disappointment at the failure of the developed nations to honour their commitments to provide resources to deal with the challenges of Africa’s development. Allow me to use this forum today to call for a new impetus on meeting their commitment. It is their historic duty, it is a moral obligation to help the needy in Africa. If is not charity.

Ladies and Gentlemen;
As we meet here today, it is important to recall the Monterrey Consensus adopted by Heads of State and Government in March 2002. The Consensus provided a key framework for financing development.

We, in Africa, saw the adoption of the Con(Tusi)sensus as an important step in scaling up efforts to mobilize domestic and external resources for our development and that of other needy developing nations on this planet.

Ladies and Gentlemen,
It is only prudent that, as we elevate Africa’s development agenda as a matter of global concern, we take stock as to where we are on the implementation of the Monterey Consensus and other decisions taken at different international fora. I am delighted to note the efforts of the United Nations Secretariat and General Assembly in this respect, particularly throughthe High-Level Dialogue on Financing for Development that took place here in New York in October 2007 and the Follow-up International Conference on Financing for Development to take place in Doha at the end of this year.

Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
We in Africa are appreciative of several efforts that have been made in recent years to address the challenges of financing Africa’s development needs. These efforts are reflected in the 2005 World Summit Outcome, the 2005 Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness, and the 2005 G-8 Gleneagles Summit Declaration. We are also thankful for G-8 countries for increasingly paying more attention to development issues affecting Africa.

However, while all these efforts have added momentum to the commitments made by world leaders in the Monterrey Consensus, we in Africa are increasingly concerned at the persistent gap between what has been promised and what has been delivered.

Collectively, the G8 are badly off track with their development assistance promises to Africa. I am told, in total, G8 assistance to sub-Saharan Africa has increased by only $2.3 billion since 2004, when it should have increased by $5.4 billion over that period.

If current trends continue, African countries will not be able to mobilize the resources required to finance the public investments critical to achieving the MDGs. Now is the time, for friends of Africa in the developed world to walk the talk. Not doing so now may be too late, as far as meeting the 2015 targets is concerned.

Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
The amount of aid is as much important as the quality. While we appreciate that some of the developed countries have stepped up efforts to meet their commitments, one concern for us in Africa is that most of the recent increases in aid are due to debt relief and humanitarian assistance and so do not reflect additional resources available to finance development programs.

Indeed, when these two components of aid are removed, it is clear that there has not been any significant change in real aid flows since 2004. Therefore, if donors are to meet their pledge to double aid flows to Africa by 2010, there has to be a significant scaling up of aid this year and next year, and beyond.

Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen;
Before I conclude I would like to underscore the fact that Africa is not a hopeless case. Neither are we desperate nor have we resigned to state of helplessness.

We are determined to wrestle ourselves out of our predicament. All that we are saying is, we need the support of the international community to compliment our efforts. We thank our development partners for the invaluable support extended to us over the many years. But much more needs to be done. This is all that we are asking for.

It can be done, let us all play our respective part.

I thank you for your kind attention!​

 

[Rev. Kishoka]

Kaka,

Should we consider this to be the official speech at UN?