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Museveni bids West against holding Africa hostage to funding

Museveni bids West against holding Africa hostage to funding
Written by Larry Moonze
Friday, September 25, 2009 6:06:48 AM

UGANDAN President Yoweri Museveni has said Africa can no longer be held hostage to foreign funding. In his address before the on-going 64th UN General Assembly in New York, President Museveni said Africa had actually grasped the development compass in the last 15 to 20 years.

He said for instance Uganda's economy had been growing at the rate of 6.5 per cent a year in the last two decades while last year it registered a seven per cent gross domestic product (GDP) growth.

"This was despite the global recession," President Museveni said.

He said the reasonable growth in Uganda have been achieved despite the fact that three vital infrastructural requisites remain to be resolved decisively.

President Museveni said progress had been slow in the area of electricity, roads and railways because of dependence on foreign funding which tended to be frivolous and erratic.

But President Museveni was quick to say rising tax collections had now put Uganda in a position to fund projects in those areas and that foreign investments were welcome.

"But Africa could no longer be held hostage to foreign funding in those vital infrastructural areas in which there were shameful global inequities," he said.

President Museveni said the United States, for example, had an electrical usage rate of 14,124 kilowatts per capita per year while Africa had 574, and some African countries had rates as low as nine kilowatts.

"How can growth and transformation be expected in such a situation?" he asked.

President Museveni said the whole of Africa needed to ‘wake up’ and cooperate on finding solutions to that matter and to the poor condition of roads.

He said in China, the cost of transporting a tonne of cargo between Beijing and Shanghai by rail was US $12 while in East Africa the cost was US $65.

President Museveni said other obstacles related to the export of raw materials and the lack of progress in modernising subsistence and traditional agriculture.

He said the present process of exporting raw materials constituted modern slavery.

President Museveni said many Africans equated it to slavery because such exports brought in only 10 per cent of the final processed product.

However, President Museveni said Africa was entering a phase of growth and transformation.

He said Uganda faired well during the global economic recession because of regional trade.

President Museveni said Uganda would do much better when the three infrastructural elements of roads, electricity and railways were in place.

He said Africa had great growth potential that was not yet tapped and multilateral action would unlock the dormant potential.

President Museveni said the situation was similar to the current global crisis which had been caused by lax regulations in managing the world’s economics.

He said multilateral actions had been required to stop money laundering and to strengthen regulations.

President Museveni said African countries had a double task.

"One is to transform their economies from pre-industrial to modern ones," said President Museveni. "The other task is to cope with problems caused by others such as the global financial crisis and environmental deterioration. The need for dialogue among civilisations is long overdue."

Labels: DONORS, YOWERI MUSEVENI

posted by MrK @ 5:07 AM