Madam, - Joe Humphreys's articles on corruption in Africa were excellent and very timely (The Irish Times, June 10th and 12th). More than anything else, African countries need law-abiding, predictable and transparent government.
I first went to Africa in 1973, to Sierra Leone, a country I am now proud to represent in Ireland. Like many other African countries, it gained independence in the early 1960s. I taught in a secondary school run by Irish missionaries but all salaries were paid by the government of Sierra Leone. The school was in a rural area about 120 miles from the capital, Freetown. We had a local post office and dispensary, the roads were kept in reasonable shape and there was an excellent hospital, also run by Irish missionaries, 20 miles upriver from us. The country worked, it functioned - Sierra Leoneans could expect to live a normal life. Today the school, the post office, the dispensary and the hospital are in ruins, all destroyed in a vicious 10-year civil war.
How did a country so vibrant and rich in resources become the second poorest country in the world? A country which had the first and most famous university in West Africa, Fourah Bay, cannot now provide a stick of chalk for the few primary schools that struggle to stay open. The answer, quite simply, was a total failure of government. Corruption set in in the late 1960s. Development work continued apace; we busied ourselves with this project and that programme. We knew there was corruption at government level but we believed we could bypass it and work directly with the people, which we did for a number of years.
But corruption is not static: if it is not checked, it spreads. Sierra Leone descended into chaos in the 1980s and civil war in the 1990s. Schools, hospitals, dispensaries - all destroyed. Years of patient work by missionaries and aid workers undone. A society traumatised. Fifty thousand forced amputations, some on children as young as 18 months. Those of us who were there knew the government was failing but we never dreamed it would turn into such a nightmare.
If we do not address the issue of governance in Africa we put all our development work and money at risk. Africa is not short of resources. Africans are not lacking in enterprise. They just need a stable environment, which can only be provided by properly functioning governments. The greatest service we can provide to African countries such as Sierra Leone is to work with the government, supporting and encouraging those within the government whom we believe are trustworthy. This will be a slow and tedious task; it may take a generation to achieve.
We need to be more honest with ourselves and accept that development is a risky business and sometimes we need to be less diplomatic in our dealings with African governments. - Yours, etc,
JOE MANNING, Sierra Leonean Honorary Consul to Ireland, Market Square, Bagenalstown, Co Carlow.
Madam, - In congratulating Joe Humphreys on his excellent two-part series on corruption in Africa, might I be permitted to explain clearly Goal's stance on government to government aid?
Having been involved for the past 29 years in trying to alleviate the suffering of some of the poorest and most vulnerable people on the planet, I have come to the conclusion that government to government aid, in cases where the government of the recipient country is either corrupt or guilty of massive human rights abuses, is a complete waste of money and morally questionable.
The poor of the developing world desperately need every euro directed towards them. When Western governments use corrupt governments to dispense the aid, they know the huge risk they are taking.
If there were more developing countries with Nelson Mandela-like leaders who genuinely cared for their people, then government-to-government aid would be acceptable. But the reality is that few countries on the continent have enough honest officials who can deliver aid, medicines or schoolbooks without paying or receiving bribes or exploiting the aid for political patronage.
Goal believes there are safer methods of getting aid to deserving people when the recipient country's administration has shown itself to be corrupt. For years we have advocated that the Irish Government "adopt" one country and opt to implement humanitarian projects itself in that country. In that way, the risk of the money falling into wrong hands is significantly reduced. - Yours, etc,
JOHN O'SHEA, Goal, PO Box 19, Dun Laoghaire, Co Dublin.