African corruption

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financeguy

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While most of Equatorial Guinea's population starve, the dictator's family live it large on oil money...

http://www.laweekly.com/news/news/malibu-bad-neighbor/15436/



This tiny African country should be as wealthy as Luxembourg, but most of its inhabitants get by on a dollar a day..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equatorial_guinea


..never fear, though, its democratically elected president talks to God every day, so everything is being run properly.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teodoro_Obiang_Nguema_Mbasogo




No doubt, Bono and Geldof will tell us its our fault....

Sorry guys but while this kind of situation continues, the degree to which I feel responsible for, or guilty about Africa's problems is: none, zero, zilch.
 
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You should read some interviews or something instead of creating your own "Bono and Geldof do...".

They have accepted the knighthood, and although it goes against your holy belief they shouldn't have done so it's still their decision.

Out of this bias, or whatever caused it, you shouldn't do such bland statements.

There was not one statement in which they said "It's your fault..."
 
Vincent Vega said:
You should read some interviews or something instead of creating your own "Bono and Geldo do...".

They have accepted the knighthood, and although it goes against your holy belief they shouldn't have done so it's still their decision.

Out of this bias, or whatever caused it, you shouldn't do such bland statements.


This is a thread about African corruption...do you have a view on the subject?
 
financeguy said:

No doubt, Bono and Geldof will tell us its our fault....

Well then you've completely ignored what they've been saying. Doesn't suprise me.

When Live Aid was completed in the 80's. They raised the largest amount of aid that had ever been raised. Bono had been quoted as saying, for years they patted themselves on the back, but reality is it didn't put a dent in the situation due to a; the amount was nothing compared to the situation, and b; the corruption blocked a lot of the money going to aid.
 
Re: Re: African corruption

BonoVoxSupastar said:


Well then you've completely ignored what they've been saying. Doesn't suprise me.

When Live Aid was completed in the 80's. They raised the largest amount of aid that had ever been raised. Bono had been quoted as saying, for years they patted themselves on the back, but reality is it didn't put a dent in the situation due to a; the amount was nothing compared to the situation, and b; the corruption blocked a lot of the money going to aid.


Well, I haven't heard Bono talking about corruption that much, if he has then I welcome this.

Bono is looking for debt relief. Unfortunately it is not difficult to picture a scenario whereby debt relief is given, the governments, finding that their credit ratings have improved and they can borrow again, then promptly take out MORE loans, squander the money on themselves and their associates and we're right back to square one.
 
financeguy said:



This is a thread about African corruption...do you have a view on the subject?

Ah yes, of course, about corruption.
So all the Bono and Geldof will was just thrown in for good measure. :rolleyes:

My view: Corruption is a huge problem, and it's to be found everywhere. So we have to fight it everywhere.
However, to think everything will be bloomy perfect from one day to the other is very far from reality. It's a slow progress with a lot of backfalls. But it doesn't justify to talk it all bad and only look at what's going wrong, or where it is bad.
It's also about what has been achieved, how has it acheived, how can we adapt it to other countries, and finally, how can we do the progress needed and fight the corruption that kills people.

However, your statement that Bono or Bob Geldof would say it's our fault is just wrong because there is no basis.
They've also stressed that there is still a lot of work lying ahead, and that corruption still is a problem. But there was no statement that it's our fault.
 
Re: Re: Re: African corruption

financeguy said:



Well, I haven't heard Bono talking about corruption that much, if he has then I welcome this.

Bono is looking for debt relief. Unfortunately it is not difficult to picture a scenario whereby debt relief is given, the governments, finding that their credit ratings have improved and they can borrow again, then promptly take out MORE loans, squander the money on themselves and their associates and we're right back to square one.

http://forum.interference.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=175293&highlight=die+zeit As an example. Excuse the English, wasn't very well that day.
 
From the article..

"Bono: We should stop to give aid in form of blank cheques. That's money thrown out the window. And it's naive. However, we from DATA support targeted aid. It should reward countries that distinguish themselves by good leadership, tackling of corruption and transpareny. We want to see where the money is going in detail. "

That's a little short on specifics. I'd like to hear how he intends defining good leadership, how he intends validating whether corruption has indeed been tackled, how he intends assessing transparency.

And with all due respect to you Vincent Vega, in that very article you posted he does indeed say that its our fault! He says that the reason Africa has bad leaders is that we in the West put them there (to fight communism).
 
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And, didn't we?
However, he doesn't blame you, me or Joe Average. Here in Berlin there is an ad campaign for an aid organisation with statement's like: "Look, your piggy bank just swallowed a nurse!" and such.
This is totally the wrong way and nothing Bono would say.
He doesn't say we should feel ashamed that we live a wealthy life whereas others are starving.
Talking about dictators in Africa he doesn't blame you for that.
Still, the West and the East have helped those dictators during cold war. He didn't specify it by saying only the West did.
Then, in the 90's, they more or less didn't give a damn about what's happening there. We have to accept that, but why should Bono now say it never happened.

There are facts you can't change, but for the rest, he and Bob Geldof don't go and always blame you for the AIDS pandemic or corruption.

Today Bono, Bob Geldof and others presented the DATA report for 2006. Interesting stuff. I will try to go through it over the next days.
 
Re: Re: Re: African corruption

financeguy said:


Bono is looking for debt relief. Unfortunately it is not difficult to picture a scenario whereby debt relief is given, the governments, finding that their credit ratings have improved and they can borrow again, then promptly take out MORE loans, squander the money on themselves and their associates and we're right back to square one.

My understanding is that DATA stands for democracy, accountability, and transparency in Africa. I've only heard Bono advocating for debt relief for those countries that are free of corruption and allocate aid and monies freed up by debt relief towards more social programs.
 
That's correct. Some countries, like Uganda, are relatively clean. On the other hand, Zimbabwe is a nightmare and they're still managing to dig wells there. I guess the important thing is to not let the corruption keep you from giving to Africare or the Africa charity of your choice.
 
It is indeed a tiny country with a tiny population - (less than .1% of Africa's total).

financeguy said:

Unfortunately it is not difficult to picture a scenario whereby debt relief is given, the governments, finding that their credit ratings have improved and they can borrow again, then promptly take out MORE loans, squander the money on themselves and their associates and we're right back to square one.

The loans have certain "conditionalities" attached to them. And the loan will be used to pay for XYZ boondoggle project using Western contractors, which benefit as well.

Liesje said:

My understanding is that DATA stands for democracy, accountability, and transparency in Africa. I've only heard Bono advocating for debt relief for those countries that are free of corruption and allocate aid and monies freed up by debt relief towards more social programs.

Their website says:
"DATA (Debt, AIDS, Trade, Africa) is an advocacy organization dedicated to eradicating extreme poverty and AIDS in Africa. "
 
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Re: Re: Re: African corruption

financeguy said:



Well, I haven't heard Bono talking about corruption that much, if he has then I welcome this.

Bono is looking for debt relief. Unfortunately it is not difficult to picture a scenario whereby debt relief is given, the governments, finding that their credit ratings have improved and they can borrow again, then promptly take out MORE loans, squander the money on themselves and their associates and we're right back to square one.


At the round table discussion, (World Economic Forum 2007 in Davos) Bono spoke about corruption in Africa. Especially Liberia.
There was a head of state from an African country, who did not look like he was to fond of what Bono was saying.
 
Bono refers to corruption as "Africa's biggest problem", even bigger than AIDS and poverty.
Don't worry he knows his stuff.
The D in DATA stands not only for Debt, but also for Democracy.
I think it's commonly agreed amongst politicians that the money in Africa has to be spent very carefully and not, like it has for years, on "decorating presidential palaces", as Bono is putting it.
 
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