Embassy Row

Aid-afflicted Africa

The brother of the president of South Africa scolded U.S. advocates of foreign aid for failing to realize that much of the assistance enriches corrupt leaders and does nothing for the poor.

“Think what would have happened at the Boston Tea Party if Italy and France had come to the Americans and said: ’We’ll solve your problem with England. We’ll pay the taxes to King George III.’ Then, there would have been no need to throw the tea into Boston Harbor. There would have been no war of independence, and America would have continued as a colony,” Moeletsi Mbeki told the Cato Institute on a visit to Washington last week.

“Slavery would have extended from the South all the way to California. In the 20th century, America probably would have been where Brazil is today, without the muscle or industry to stand up, and Stalin or Hitler would have run through Europe.”

Mr. Mbeki, deputy chairman of the South African Institute of Foreign Affairs at Witwatersrand University, said the reality is that Africa has suffered from the corrosive and unintended consequences of “free money” from foreign aid, according to reporter Tom Carter.

Contrary to popular belief, Africa is not poor and would be fine if it had better leadership, Mr. Mbeki said. Instead of African leaders using their vast natural and human resources to develop the continent, corrupt African elites are exporting African capital, much of it skimmed from foreign aid, and investing it in Europe and the United States.

“Seventy percent of the private wealth of Nigeria is held outside Nigeria,” he said of the oil-rich West African nation.

“We don’t need another Marshall Plan. Africa has had many Marshall Plans, but Africa is poorer today than it was 20 or 30 years ago.”

Any foreign aid that goes to Africa should be used for infrastructure and to rebuild economies, not the “consumption of the elites,” he said. “You need a very well-organized government to manage foreign aid.”

Mr. Mbeki’s brother, Thabo, succeeded Nelson Mandela as South Africa’s president in 1999.

Kiwis still anti-nuke

The U.S. ambassador to New Zealand continues to worry about that country’s relations with the United States that have been strained by an anti-nuclear policy adopted 20 years ago.

Ambassador Charles J. Swindells told an Independence Day reception at the U.S. Embassy in Wellington that the disagreements between the two governments could become worse unless U.S. and New Zealand leaders frankly discuss their policy differences.

“Successive governments in both countries have been unwilling or unable to deal comprehensively with the strains that have accumulated in the bilateral relationship since the mid-80s,” he said.

“The past 20 years have witnessed, unfortunately, a somewhat stifled dialogue. We keep disagreeing about the past. But the world moves on, and we need to move on.”

The problems began in 1985 when a Labor Party government banned nuclear-armed or nuclear-powered warships from New Zealand’s territorial waters. The United States, for security reasons, refuses to confirm which ships are nuclear.

Mr. Swindells said he fears the relationship could slip further.

“It needn’t happen if both countries open the door to comprehensive dialogue,” he said.

Korea monthly

South Korea this month published the first issue of a monthly magazine presenting South Korean views on international issues aimed at an audience of foreign policy specialists.

The Korea Policy Review is “expected to serve as a bridge of information linking the government of the Republic of Korea and intellectuals from the world over,” the South Korean Embassy said.

An on-line version is available on the government Web site (www.korea.net).

• Call Embassy Row at 202/636-3297, fax 202/832-7278 or e-mail jmorrison@washingtontimes.com.