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DEVELOPMENT-AFRICA: Spain Pledges Increase in Aid

Tito Drago

MADRID, Jan 11 2006 (IPS) - Although Spain’s socialist government plans to expand foreign aid to Africa in all areas, critics continue to demand a greater commitment and compliance with earlier promises.

Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero told IPS that the decision to bolster cooperation arose from two main objectives: solidarity with people mired in poverty, and the need to improve relations between the European Union (EU) and Africa, in both economic and social terms.

With respect to the improvement of relations, Zapatero underscored the need to regularise immigration flows, in order to avoid tragedies in border areas and ensure that the rights of immigrants are respected from their very arrival and that they are not marginalised.

Between 14 and 16 African migrants were shot and killed in October 2005 as they tried to scale the fences separating the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla from Morocco. In the previous two weeks, some 2,000 migrants had made the same attempt.

Foreign Minister Miguel Ángel Moratinos, who visited several African nations last month, described to IPS the strong impact of the suffering he saw. “Anyone with morals and ethics can understand how important it is to forge closer ties with (Africa), identify the obstacles, and modestly try to help them,” he said.

EU funds are necessary to this end, and the bloc must show “an intention of greater solidarity with the rest of the world,” argued Moratinos. The Spanish government will make every necessary effort to achieve this, added the official, a former EU special envoy for the Middle East.

In 2005, Spain’s humanitarian aid to sub-Saharan Africa amounted to 43.04 percent of the total of 33 million euros (nearly 40 million dollars), according to Spain’s Agency for International Cooperation (AECI).

AECI has approved a humanitarian aid budget of 52 million euros (63 million dollars) for 2006.

This year, official development aid will increase from 0.27 to 0.35 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), in line with Zapatero’s campaign pledge of doubling foreign aid from 0.25 to 0.50 percent in the course of his four-year term, which ends in 2008.

But despite these advances, there are criticisms and demands, like those voiced by Catholic priest Antonio Molina, who lived in Africa for 40 years as a missionary and now directs the Centre for Information and Documentation on Africa, based in Madrid.

Molina criticised the government’s decision to organise missions that will travel to African countries and study the situation on the ground, in order to design new cooperation programmes.

“What they ought to do is to talk with the non-governmental organisations and others who have been working in these countries for decades and know them well. There is no need to reinvent the wheel, but rather to provide the means to increase cooperation and to involve civil society in these efforts,” Molina told IPS.

In a 2005 report released Dec. 15, the NGOs Medicus Mundi, Prosalus and Médicos del Mundo (the Spanish chapter of Médecins du Monde) stressed that Spain should increase international cooperation in the health care sector with regard to both technical support and funding, as well as creating coordination mechanisms that include all of the actors involved.

Molina also expressed doubts about the Spanish government’s plans to work with the Moroccan authorities in order to solve the immigration problem.

“How can our government expect anything positive to come out of a partnership with a corrupt regime that doesn’t respect human rights and constantly violates freedom of the press and freedom of association?” he asked.

“When it comes to picking fellow travellers, you have to know whether or not they are suitable, and in this case, this is clearly not a suitable choice,” Molina maintained.

“They do not even guarantee minimum workers’ rights for Moroccan citizens,” he added, and can therefore not be expected to do so in the case of immigrants, whether they are temporarily passing through the country or living there.

In terms of economic relations, “as in all regions of the world, but especially in Africa,” there should be particular emphasis on fighting the weapons trade and the theft of natural resources, an area in which “the Spanish government should become fully involved and fulfil its pledges,” he said.

Many African countries “are wealthy in resources, and plundered,” he commented. As an example, he pointed to the smuggling of gold, diamonds and coltan or columbite-tantalite (a metallic ore used to manufacture electronic devices like mobile phones and laptop computers) during the war in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

“When a third world country is rich, the vultures fly in and make off with everything,” he remarked.

In an analysis paper published this month by the non-governmental Elcano Royal Institute for International and Strategic Studies, Moratinos stated that the Spanish government “is not only going to modify and reinforce its system of relations (with the countries of Africa) through a greater deployment of diplomatic and consular services, but will also undertake a review of its international development aid instruments and increase the quality and quantity of our cooperation throughout this administration.”

The government also plans to adopt a Plan of Action or Plan Africa that “will be in harmony with the global strategy defined by the European Union,” for which Spain will formulate “concrete proposals to increase its effectiveness,” he added.