Brother Sidibeh,

This debate has inspired some diverse view points and I am enjoying the exchanges. I?m glad you are familiar with the work of Stiglitz. It is alarming how the policies designed by the International Financial Institutions (IFI) leave African economies so impoverished. The Ethiopian example is common elsewhere like in Nigeria in 1986 when IMF/World Bank prescriptions prompted a spiral of inflation and economic stagnation. A host of other African countries also experienced similar downward trends that paralysed their economies, consequently hindering development. The transformation of the social, cultural and economic structures of these African societies are often a result of myopic and chequered development planned and implemented through weak local institutions (e.g. post-independent leadership) by the powerful institutions in the global arena. Stiglitz`s revulsion and discontent is understandably inspired by this Western economic dominance lamenting ?I saw first hand the devastating effect that globalisation can have on developing countries, especially the poor within those countries?. It is therefore evident that the IFIs contribute in the remarkable deprivation that leads to the mass exodus of these migrants. That I believe is indisputable.

Having acknowledged the negative role of these institutions, African poverty is also a failure of human solidarity, especially in this world of opulence and plenty. The level of disparity in the world leaves the most powerful to expunge and appropriate the resources of the weaker ones as seen in cases where cheap labour is contracted, which creates an inverse relationship of development between the labourer and the employer. In such a setting, the poor are eternally condemned to be poorer. The example you gave on Gambian and Senegalese labourers on Spanish farms explains this disparity. If only the world can learn from the South African concept of ?Ubuntu? that played a significant role in reconciling the nation after Apartheid, a collective solidarity to fight global poverty can in many ways heal the wounds of the many deprived. May be then the number of boats leaving Mbour (Senegal) or the Mauritanian coastline for The Canary Islands will decrease.

Reversing this downward trend calls for a concerted effort, a ?Global Compact? as described by Jeffrey Sachs, but African governments should rethink social policy not as a way of doing a favour to the poor, but as a way of enhancing development. The real freedoms that people enjoy should be expanded in order to enhance their capabilities and free agency. Your catalogue of policy issues to Ginny are spot on. To add to those, it is also crucial to revisit local spaces so as to be able to respond positively to the felt needs of the people who are in a better position to decide their own development agenda, hence a bottom- up approach for a fair playing ground that fosters mutual economic, social and cultural interdependence in the heat of globalisation.

Good night

Regards,
Omar






> From: Momodou S Sidibeh [[log in to unmask]]
> Sent: 2006-10-07 08:09:36 CEST
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: "SunuGaal"/ Behind this trade there are Europeans involved and well paid.
> 
>   Brother Omar,
> 
>   Perhaps I misread your quoting Bailo: "...Bailo pointed out the valid 
> point of the failure of political independence and it makes me wonder 
> whether this mass exodus of African migrants is not a form of reverse 
> colonisation; the coloniser being colonised by its former subjects..."
> 
>   All the same, you are right in that Africa's post independence leadership 
> has a lot to answer for in our search for the sources of abysmal economic 
> and political performance especially since the early 80s.  But I can at once 
> tell you that it is nothing near a case of the coloniser being colonised. 
> When Spain, last year granted amnesty to over 700 thousand illegal migrants, 
> amongst them "villages" of Gambians and Senegalese, its economy boomed 
> almost immediately. They provided a cheap source of skilled and unskilled 
> labour, generating huge growth in that country's construction industry 
> (especially) and its agricultural sector. The migrants not ony became a 
> welcome addition to Spain's consumer population, pressuring firms for higher 
> productivity in services and goods. Tney became a huge source of tax revenue 
> for the Spanish state as well.
> 
>   Joseph Stiglizt's "Globalisation and Its Discontents" is recommended (I 
> think)reading for students of banking and other courses related to economics 
> at the university of the Gambia. (I sent a copy of it to a friend of mine 
> three years ago). Stiglitz not only detailed the forces behind IMF's market 
> fundamentalism, but his own experience in Africa is weaved expertly into the 
> vortex of globalisation as a predatory phenomenon for some developing 
> countries. I recall Stiglitz's exposure of a ludicrous case of a U.S bank, 
> with the backing of the IMF, insisting that the governement of Ethiopia pay 
> up a loan more slowly and not before obtaining "permission" from the IMF to 
> do so. This insistence was pushed even though it made more economic sense 
> for the Ethiopians to repay the loan quickly, but also because as a 
> sovereign nation, Ethiopia needed no permission from any institution in 
> determining the rate it chose to pay a loan.
> 
>   An investigation into Senegal's relations with global financial 
> institutions, its relations with donors, bilateral trade/fishing relations 
> with the EU, and Maitre Wade's own economic policies may help us all in 
> locating solutions to continuing misery in Africa.
> 
>   Many thanks,
>   sidibeh
> 
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