The Prime Minister met with journalists after the second meeting of the Commission for Africa in Ethiopia. Mr Blair confirmed that the Commission would meet again in February 2005, with the final report to be published in March 2005.
Read a full transcipt of the press conference below:
Prime Minister:
I thank you for coming to this brief press conference at the end of the Commission’s deliberations today, and I would like to express my thanks to all the Commissioners that have taken part in today’s discussions and who are here with us as well, and I have got KY, and Prime Minister Meles and Bob here on the platform with me.
I just wanted to say a few words by way of introduction. The purpose of today was to take forward the discussions that we have had and start to get to the point where we can reach some firm conclusions. And then the next step of the process will be a further meeting in February and then a report in March, and the discussions that we had today ranged over these issues - governance, peace and security, aid and debt relief, disease, education, the issues to do with culture and human development and conflict resolution. All of these different issues are ones where I hope, and am more confident at the end of our discussion today we can reach specific and clear conclusions. And then the idea is, if you like, to bring all that together so that what we actually publish when we publish it in March is a report that sets out a very clear analysis, a clear set of prescriptions and immediate points for action, plus - and this is something we will discuss over a working dinner this evening - we will also discuss means of implementation and follow through.
So I think it was actually a very good and sometimes tough discussion today on those issues, and I think what is very clear from that discussion is that we will be able to draw out some clear and specific conclusions to take forward. I don’t think I really need say any more by way of opening. Prime Minister Meles wants to just add a word or two and then we can throw it open to questions.
Prime Minister Meles:
I would like to start by welcoming the Prime Minister and to welcome Bob Geldof, because he comes and goes as he wishes. This is the second meeting we have had … another one. This is a meeting where we started to discuss issues seriously, and therefore this is the meeting where we had differences of perspective reflected in our discussions. For me that was a time of real discussion, real debate. I would like to highlight that. Secondly, this is a forum where we discussed issues as partners, not as donors and recipients. The principle behind our discussion today was that Prime Minister Blair is doing this meeting, has come to Addis, not just as a sign of generosity to Ethiopia, but as an obligation he feels as a normal human being. It is a duty. That has been the spirit, a spirit of partnership of the discussion today.
Question:
A question for Bob Geldof, if I may. If the problem for Africa is poverty, why doesn’t the developed world just give them more money?
Sir Bob Geldof:
I hope they will, but it isn’t a magic bullet. The singular condition of the singular continent of Africa is poverty. They die of Aids here, we don’t, because we can afford the drugs; they die of drought here, we don’t in Kent, because of poverty. But you must deconstruct that singular condition and find that it is a hydra-headed monster. And the Prime Minister said we attempted to deal with all its manifestations today, and I am not joining in the sort of diplomatic language of being full and frank, it was down and dirty, and properly and correctly so. And out of it came for me a genuine sense of having gone forward massively, and I think there was a consensus, particularly in the wake of what Tony Blair said in his speech when he moved off policy and moved to the personal, I think we picked up and moved forward from that emotional cue and the discussions were by any measure, and I use words advisedly, they were radical. I don’t think there is a single person who works in this area, were they present in that room, who would not be amazed at how radical these people who go round the IMF, the World Bank, the international club class route, got this afternoon. If we can carry that spirit forward to the conclusions in February, I think we will have done something fairly profound.
Question:
Prime Minister, earlier today you had a brief discussion with the opposition parties of Ethiopia, and you have talked about good governance as well as partnership. After your meeting they mentioned that they were willing to be part of the Commission as … stakeholders. Are you willing to allow them in, and what will be their role?
Prime Minister:
You mean the opposition parties that I spoke to today? Well obviously who the people of Ethiopia elect is a matter for them. And I think the fact that I meet the opposition parties and do so as a matter of course is an indication of the greater freedom and democracy there is here today. Now obviously we take these matters forward with Prime Minister Meles and his government, but I hope through the contributions that are made in civic society and the discussions that happen here in Ethiopia, everyone feels that they can participate and yield what they have to offer, and certainly there is no constraint upon that at all.
Question:
This is a question for Prime Minister Tony Blair. In your moving speech this afternoon you suggested that the report by your Commission would be a blueprint, so to say, for international action on Africa. But critics suggest that this will be yet another appeal. What is the source of your optimism? And the second question, in … with the assets of political will will make the difference between success and failure, but political will has remained elusive all of this time. What will it take to summon that political will?
Prime Minister:
First of all it is part of my life … critics who will naturally pose difficult questions and say well is this simply another talking shop, is this really going to result in something? I think there are two things that I would say to you about that. The seriousness of what we are about is indicated by the fact that we want to publish this report before the G8, we want to take it there and discuss it, and hopefully get agreement upon it. Now I wouldn’t put that process in train unless I actually wanted action out of this. I think also there is a huge movement in civic society, in Africa, in the developed world, behind this. And the third thing I would say to you is that sometimes I think it is possible for people to look back over the past few years and say well nothing has changed, nothing has happened. Actually a lot has happened that is positive. Even with all the problems we have, there are things that have happened that are positive. Governments have been changing according to democracy. Some countries, despite all the problems they have, have made progress. When Bob and myself met the young woman who as a baby had actually been filmed and photographed for Band Aid all those years ago and is now someone who is studying to be an agriculturist and to do nursing, and when - and he knows this better than me - you look at Ethiopia today and compare it with 20 years ago, there has been change, real change. If you look at debt relief and what has happened since we started to take this seriously in the international community, there are things that have moved as a result of that. So what we are really saying is there has been a welling up of this feeling that it is time to do something fundamental about the problems of Africa, this has been welling up for some time and now is the point at which we can really come to, as I called it, the year of decision. So you know people can be cynical about it or they can get on board, and I think the best thing is to get on board.
Question:
(Inaudible - relating to comments made by the EU Commissioner on debt relief)
Prime Minister:
Just on that latter point, I think there will be particular aspects that people have difficulty with, I think that is absolutely natural, but that shouldn’t stop us coming to the conclusions we need to come to, and laying it before people, and then let’s have the debate and see if we can persuade people to it. But some of these self-same things were said when we first started talking about Nepad - the African partnership - some years ago, but actually it did come about in the end and we have just got to keep arguing for it.
Mr Meles:
Obviously we support the IFS, we do not consider it a matter of accounting gimmick. But that is not the main issue as far as I am concerned. What we are concerned about in terms of development assistance is improving the quality and the quantity of assistance. I personally don’t care what mechanisms are used to deliver the beef so long as there is beef at the end of the story.
Sir Bob Geldof:
I think it is rich if the EU Aid Commissioner did it. Look to his own books. They are wholly woeful, in my opinion, in what they do. I think the debt relief issue is economic sophistry, if that is what he is suggesting. I think the IFS is elegant, timely, simple, necessary, and I am not a creature of government, either of the two represented here. KY, who has commissioned the Economic Commission for Africa, can probably discuss that more with you. He is talking through his arse, to be quite frank, and he shouldn’t have his job if he doesn’t want to help.
Question:
My question is directed to Prime Minister Zenawi. Yesterday he made a statement with the BBC that if Ethiopia maintains the pace of progress that he maintains now, … sufficient. But my question is … for security and in the area of security and self-sufficiency, there is a lot of progress, we know, but there remains a significant challenge, and the quality and quantity of aid is not as much as you expected. How do you reconcile these two points?
Mr Meles:
The most important resource we have for food security, and the most important resource we need for food security, are Ethiopian, its level of our peasants, its land, and the rain we have, and better … of the rain we have. These are the key resources. The resources that we get from our development partners are supplemental, if they are not supplemental, if we do not treat them as supplements, then there is something fundamentally flawed in our thinking. Now we hope to have more assistance to implement our development programmes, and I know some, including the UK, have increased both the quality and the quantity of development assistance they give us, but we will achieve full security with or without that assistance, preferably with that assistance, but we will achieve it, it is only time. With more assistance we could be faster, without it it will take us a bit more time, but we will achieve.
Question:
… and his delegates for the pan-African … Summit. This morning I was really impressed by your speech and you mentioned the Millennium Development Goals, and my question to you is I strongly believe that the availability of the youth … here in Africa, is … millions and billions US dollars … and where is your policy towards the involvement of youth in the Commission for Africa?
Prime Minister:
We have actually been trying to have meetings with people all over Africa, and many of the Commissioners have done meetings, not obviously just with young people, but with all parts of civic society, and Bob was telling me earlier about the meetings he has done literally right round the country. And the one thing I am absolutely sure of, and I saw this myself when I was out on my visit this morning, is that the young people, if they are given a chance, will take the continent forward on their own. They only need to be given a fair chance to succeed, and they will do it, and you only have to see the young people that are being given the chance, and what they are making of themselves and doing it, to realise that there is cause for optimism if the political will exists to give them that fair chance, and that is what we are about. And I am sure that for many of the young people they must look at all this happening and wonder well is it ever going to amount to anything, but in the end in a sense we know that there are barriers that we have got to remove, and help that we have got to give, that in the end we are confident that they will know what to do if they are given that chance, and they will do it.
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