Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Foreign Affairs
Issue 2 - Evidence, May 30, 2006
OTTAWA, Tuesday, May 30, 2006
The Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs met this day at 5:04 p.m. to examine the development and security challenges facing Africa; the response of the international community to enhance that continent's development and political stability; and Canadian foreign policy as it relates to Africa.
Senator Hugh Segal (Chairman) in the chair.
[English]
The Chairman: Welcome, colleagues and viewers, to this meeting of the Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs, our second meeting this session in our ongoing study of Africa.
[Translation]
Today we have the pleasure of welcoming Ambassador Robert Fowler, the Personal Representative of the Prime Minister for Africa as well as Canada's Ambassador to Italy, Albania and San Marino. Ambassador Fowler is also accredited as High Commissioner to Malta and is Canada's Permanent Representative to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the World Food Program (WFP) and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD). Welcome to the Senate of Canada, Ambassador Fowler.
[English]
Ambassador Fowler is joining us this evening by satellite from Rome. On behalf of the committee, I thank him and his staff for being with us at such a late hour in Rome, is 11 p.m. in Rome. Colleagues will now, and Canadians should know, that Ambassador Fowler has been the personal representative of the Prime Minister for Africa since 2001 and thus has served in this capacity under Prime Ministers Chrétien, Martin and Harper. A former ambassador and permanent representative to the United Nations, former policy adviser to Prime Ministers Trudeau, Turner and Mulroney, and deputy minister of National Defence, Robert Fowler has spent the last 38 years serving his country and is now on the verge of retirement, which will be a great loss to the Public Service of Canada. However, I am comfortable that even when that retirement occurs, his immense skill set and reservoir of precise, detailed experience and knowledge will be of great value to this country in its ongoing international activities in many ways.
Ambassador, as I mentioned to you informally a few moments ago, there was quite a spirited and thoughtful exchange on Darfur in the Senate of Canada this afternoon. It was quite non-partisan in nature, and it underlined the strong belief shared on all sides in the Senate that the African challenge remains one we must keep in front of us and is part of our priority focus as Canadians with a long history in that region. You have been kind enough to agree to give us an opening statement for about 20 minutes or so, and then I know colleagues will want to ask questions with the time remaining this afternoon.
[Translation]
Mr. Robert Fowler, Personal Representative of the Prime Minister for Africa: Mr. Chairman, thank you for inviting me to speak to you about Canada's policy on Africa. First of all, let me take this opportunity to congratulate your committee for being so interested in Africa and for focusing in a non-partisan manner on the poorest of the continents. I am grateful to see the committee acknowledge that the challenges facing Africa can only be overcome if we all work together and if our efforts cut across all levels of government. I congratulate you for recognizing that while these challenges are formidable, they are not insurmountable. Canada has been in the forefront of sustained, effective development initiatives in Africa for the past 50 years.
I have had the opportunity to travel extensively in Africa over the past five years as the Personal Representative of the Prime Minister for Africa, a G8 position created at the 2001 Summit in Genoa, as well as in my capacity as Canada's Permanent Representative to the United Nations food organizations based in Rome. I have never held any postings in Africa, but I did teach at the Université nationale du Rwanda when I was 19 or 20 years old, under the direction of Father Georges-Henri Lévesque. I returned briefly to Rwanda in May of 1994, when the genocide occurred, to visit your colleague, General Dallaire.
In 1999 and 2000, I chaired the Angola Sanctions Committee while serving on the Security Council. As such, I made numerous, productive visits to this country as part of efforts to bring an end to the civil war that ravaged that country for 25 years.
Mr. Chairman, I would like to caution people about misinterpreting some of the remarks that I am about to make. I am well aware that there are 53 vastly different countries in Africa. This continent covers an area three times the size of Canada and history, population, culture, religious beliefs, climate and available resources differ considerably from one country to the next.
The African continent is a diverse area made up of smaller, even more diversified regions. I would be the first person to criticize anyone who might imply that universal solutions could be applied to the numerous problems plaguing this continent.
Having said that, you have asked me to speak to you as the Personal Representative of the Prime Minister for Africa, a global title which compels me and my G8 counterparts to view these 53 countries and their 850 million inhabitants from a collective perspective.
While I may constantly speak of Africa, in no way should you ascribe this to ignorance on my part, or worse yet, to a lack of respect for the extraordinary diversity and to the political realities of this continent.
Last year, I spent a great deal of time in Chad and Sudan, including the three Darfouri states, when I was heading up the Prime Minister's special advisory team for Sudan. As you can no doubt see, I have a soft spot for Africa. However, my feelings do not cloud my thinking on the subject. I consider myself to be a pragmatic realist where Africa is concerned.
Mr. Chairman, nearly five years ago, Africa's leadership endorsed the New Partnership for Africa's Development, commonly referred to as NEPAD. This made-in-Africa initiative was designed to end the continent's marginalization from the global economy. It was developed to set Africa on a path to sustainable development and poverty reduction. As its name implies, NEPAD provides for a new partnership whereby Africa is committed to initiating reforms and to improving its governance in the hope and expectation that investment will follow. In other words, it means translating words into actions in the area of reforms and development assistance.
NEPAD represents the impetus needed for change and the best hope in a generation of overcoming obstacles to overall development.
Make no mistake, there have been changes. Allow me to mention some of the positive trends that have been noted. Firstly, since the launch of NEPAD in 2001, democracy has evolved from being the exception towards becoming the norm.In 2004-2005, 25 African nations held elections, although only nine were deemed to be free and fair by international observers.
In recent years, Ghana and Senegal have seen peaceful transfers of power from one party to another following democratic elections. Leaders such as former Presidents Konaré of Mali, Chissano of Mozambique and Mpaka of Tanzania have stepped down at the end of their mandates and in accordance with their Constitutions, breaking the all- too-familiar pattern in Africa of leaders clinging to power for as long as possible and amending their national constitutions to suit their own convenience.
Not coincidentally, the progress achieved on the road to democracy has been accompanied by an increase in the rate of economic growth on the continent. The economy of Sub-Saharan Africa is currently performing better than it has in many years. Africa's economy grew by almost 5 per cent in 2005 and according to the IMF, is projected to grow by 5.9 per cent in 2006.
The growth is not limited to oil-wealthy nations. Countries like Mali, Madagascar, Mozambique and Tanzania have realized that improved governance creates an environment conducive to growth. The economies of all of these nations are growing at a rate of six to seven per cent.
Secondly, the NEPAD initiative recognizes that achieving peace and stability on the continent is a fundamentalpre- condition to development. To its credit, Africa's leadership has made great efforts to resolve conflicts and achieve results.
The African Union has established a vibrant Peace and Security Council and has deployed peacekeepers in Burundi and Darfour. It is working to develop an African stand-by force and to strengthen its early warning capacity.
[English]
Canada has played a significant role in supporting Africa in its pursuit of the realization of the vision set out by NEPAD. Indeed, Canada's commitment to Africa has significant standing on the continent, and, yes, far beyond that which might flow from our development efforts, which are relatively modest compared to many other donors.
Our African partners see us as fair-minded, reasonable, straight shooters. We are not presumed to have additional or hidden agendas and we are admired for the no-nonsense approach we bring to problem solving. The partnership we have established over the past five years is founded on friendship, trust, and very straight talk and I would argue is a remarkably valuable instrument among our foreign policy assets.
Our African friends recognize the leadership role that Canada played in 2001 and 2002 in developing the African Action Plan, consisting of over 100 specific commitments, which wasthe G8 response to NEPAD. At Kananaskis, the Canadian Prime Minister announced the creation of the Canada Fund for Africa, a $500 million fund designed to respond quickly to those specific African Action Plan engagements across the range of priorities identified by NEPAD.
Canada continues to honour its 2002 Monterrey commitment to double international assistance by 2010 with at least 50 per cent of increased aid flowing to Africa. Indeed,we also seem to be on track to double our aid to Africa between 2003-08. Canada, along with other members of the international community, has also significantly increased its support for peacekeeping and peace building in Africa. Collectively, we donors have demonstrated considerable agility and flexibility in such responses.
Canada's biggest recent investment relates to Darfur. Canada is the third largest donor supporting the African Union peacekeeping mission in Sudan. We have provided a total of $190 million to the AU mission since September 2004, including Prime Minister Harper's welcomed announcement of an additional $20 million. The Prime Minister also announced a further $20 million contribution for humanitarian relief in Darfur.
Canada played a key role in encouraging the recently concluded Darfur Peace Agreement in Abuja. We are working closely with our international partners and with the government of Sudan towards a rapid transition from AMIS to a UN peacekeeping force to assure the effective implementation of that Darfur Peace Agreement. There will be no sustainable peace in Sudan unless the people in Darfur witness early, tangible results.
Africa and its partners should be encouraged by the positive trends on the continent and by the sustained engagement of the broader international community in support of Africa's development. At the same time, however, we must acknowledge that the needs of the people of Africa's 53 disparate nations remain enormous.
In key areas, we are failing, and our efforts must indeed be redoubled. Sub-Saharan Africa uniquely, among all the regions of the world, is not collectively on track to meet any, I repeat, any of the millennium development goals. Far too many individual African countries will not do any better.
The impact of HIV/AIDS on the people of Africa is of a scale that neither African governments nor the international community have yet to come to terms with. While only one in seven of the world's peoples live in Africa, Africans account for two-thirds of all the people living and dying with AIDS.
There are now an estimated 26 million HIV-positive people in sub-Saharan Africa, yet only 500,000 currently have access to anti-retroviral treatment.
While 17 million have already died of the disease, 2.4 million died last year alone. AIDS kills 6,600 people each day in Africa, more than twice the number of people killed in the Twin Towers almost five years ago, and each day, 8,500 more Africans become infected with this pernicious disease. As Stephen Lewis persuasively notes, AIDS is also fast becoming a woman's disease, with 75 per cent of all those infected between the ages of 15 and 24 being women and girls.
It is difficult to overstate the devastation that AIDS is causing in parts of Africa. While the figures themselves describe the scale of the human tragedy, even statistics of 19 million AIDS orphans by 2010 do not capture the full impact of the pandemic on the people — the individuals, their loved ones and their societies. Some of the worst- afflicted countries face the risk of complete social and economic collapse because of the disappearance of so many people.
The international community has not given this crisis the attention it deserves. While donor countries have made major contributions to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Malaria and Tuberculosis, most recently in Canada's case in the Spring Budget with $250 million more pledged to the fund, the coordination of donors bilateral programming in support of efforts to combat AIDS has been weak in many recipient countries. In addition, Mr. Chairman, health professionals so urgently needed in countries ravaged by AIDS continue to be lured to opportunities in developed economies, including Canada, further undermining health care systems that are already under impossible strain.
Efforts to combat malaria have also been insufficient.While overshadowed by the ravages of AIDS, malaria continues to kill 1 million children per year in Africa. This disease can be prevented with the use of $7 long-lasting insect-treated bed nets. Malaria, once contracted can be treated, in most cases. The fact that malaria continues to take such a dreadful toll on the children of Africa is simply shameful.
While I noted a few moments ago the broad positive trend in conflict resolution in Africa, there is absolutely no room for complacency. Sadly, Africa remains the region where more people are killed in conflicts than in the rest of the world combined. In addition to the conflict in Darfur, continuing violence in Côte d'Ivoire and eastern DRC are still taking a devastating toll.
One conflict in particular that is all too often overlooked is the situation in northern Uganda. The campaign of the Lord's Resistance Army, the LRA, persists after 20 years in ruining the lives of a generation of the Acholi people. The LRA has kidnapped some 30,000 children, killing most of them and turning the survivors into brutalized psychopaths or sex slaves. The conflict, which has displaced some 1.7 million or 90 per cent of the population of three districts in northern Uganda, has driven them to seek refuge in squalid, sordid IDP — internally displaced person — camps. Here, the HIV infection rate is three times the national average and, because we donors have responded inadequately to the relevant World Food Programme appeals, they do not receive a living food ration.
I welcome, however, Canada's increasingly active and imaginative diplomatic efforts to seek ways to arrest this humanitarian catastrophe. Africa's challenges require long-term sustained attention by their governments and societies firstly, but equally by the international community and for many years to come. There can be no quick fixes here. I hope that Canada will continue in the years ahead to challenge our G8 colleagues and other development partners to participate generously and strategically in our maturing relationship with Africa.
We must sustain our focus and commitment to direct assistance up to the limit of our fiscal capabilities, given the scale of Africa's urgent needs over the very long term.
It will, of course, always be a challenge to avoid allowing immediate priorities to distract our attention from the vital and often desperate needs of Africans, but it is difficult to find an area of the world where the need is greater or where Canadian capabilities, skills and talents could make a more significant difference.
However, let us be realistic. Our investment to date in African development, spread as thinly as it has been across the continent, has had a limited macro impact. Realistically, however, it has not had and could not have made a significant impact on the lives of nearly a billion Africans.
To make this point, allow me to ask, how have the Germans done in bringing the living standards of the 17 million erstwhile East Germans, who have become 14.5 million today, up to a standard of living comparable to that of their then-65 million West German neighbours? Well, since the wall came down in 1989, the German treasury has spent an average of 100,000,000,000 euros — a euro being worth about $1.40 today — each year for the past 16 years, for a total of about 16 trillion euros or 2.25 trillion Canadian dollars. This is to achieve a goal for a group of people who live just next door and of course a group whose East German standard of living most Africans can only aspire to.
That amount per year is significantly more than the total amount of official development assistance, 85 billion euros according to the IMF, spent by the entire donor community through the entire world last year. The Germansrecently suggested that, contrary to initial expectations, expenditure of this order will have to continue for a further ten years, to 2016, before the task will be complete.
Our development assistance must, I believe, be rigorously focused where it can make the most difference. We should concentrate on a small number of countries whose governments are indeed walking the talk with regard NEPAD. In this way, we stand the best chance of making a lasting difference as a committed and deeply engaged development partner. We demonstrate that doing the right thing pays off and failing to live up to undertakings does not. We stand the best chance of producing vitally needed successes to act as beacons or examples for others to follow good, rather than poor, governance practices.
I recognize that some in CIDA and Foreign Affairs will disagree, but I am convinced that we need to be harder- nosed about which countries and which governments deserve our assistance and about the efficiency and flexibility with which our aid is dispersed.
As we speak, Canada has spread its developmentassistance across the African continent with programming of some sort in 46 of Africa's 53 countries, even if 75 per cent of country-to-country disbursements are directed to 25 countries. This tendency to spread our assistance thinly across the continent makes little sense to me, either from the walking the NEPAD talk perspective or in terms of making our investments count.
For instance, even in Ghana, one of our most significant African development partners, where President Kufuor is indeed walking that talk, Canada only ranks seventh among principal donors.
Following the adoption of the Africa Action Planby G8 leaders in 2002, Canada announced that it would focus its development assistance in nine countries of concentration, six of which were in Africa. Only two years later, in 2005, that focused concentration, not yet of course by any means fully implemented, was thrown out as a result of special pleading, in favour of a new list of 25 privileged development partners, 16 of which will be in Africa. At this rate, we should be back to an aid program, albeit a symbolic one, in every pot, within another three years.
Canadians must realize that if we are truly committed to making our aid more effective, we must separate it from all the ancillary objectives we have attached to it over many years. Effective aid cannot be grounded in the imperatives of regional development in Canada or those of our ethnic politics. It cannot, in anything but the most superficial way, be about domestic business development. It should not be about meeting anever-greater demand that ever more of our aid dollars be channelled through an ever-widening collection of ever-smaller and more specialized NGOs. Our aid dollars should travel through coherent bilateral programs, established multilateral institutions with proven track records or, indeed, through direct budgetary support of trusted and carefully monitored development partners.
While a great many domestic and international NGOs do simply extraordinary work, others are all too often merely regional or otherwise specialized interest groups demanding resources and scarce attention from recipient countries that have neither the time nor the experts to manage and accommodate such small-scale interventions. An effective aid posture is also not about making our ambassadors or high commissioners feel like somebodies in some of the more obscure corners of Africa, or about the desire of visiting VIPs to leave behind souvenir development programs. It is about maintaining the aim, as my friends in the military would say. It is about using best practices and modern management tools, including reasonable risk assessment and auditing instruments, to make our dollars count where they are directed, that is, to help prepare African nations to become self-sufficient, to improve the lot of their growing populations, and to help manage our ever-more interdependent world.
In calling for more focused development assistance I should make clear that I do not believe development aid to be the same as humanitarian assistance. Canadians will, I expect, want to continue to make a significant contribution to relieving suffering wherever it occurs as a result of war, famine or natural disaster, without regard for tests of good governance and behaviour on the part of those in charge.
Canada should remain a generous and effective provider of humanitarian assistance, but this assistance should not in any way be confused with a long-term, sustained, focused development strategy designed to assist responsible governments in changing the overall circumstances of their people.
We must avoid complacency as we look ahead. We cannot assume that Canada's interests in Africa are necessarily secure. As a significant player without the baggage of deep historical ties or global ambitions, Canada has already made a significant difference in Africa where our reputation is outstanding and our influence throughout the continent is considerable. That reputation, however, needs constant attention. Despite setbacks — and there will be many — we must continue to encourage our African friends to stay the course in their attempts to bring prosperity, good governance, honest leadership andlong-term stability to their region. We must strongly support the progressive reformist leaders of Africa to help them demonstrate by example that the path set out by NEPAD is a viable and rewarding serves the interests of all Africans.
Canada will, I am confident, continue to nurture and intensify our partnership with Africa's effective leaders, political and civil, as they seek to transform the NEPAD vision of a peaceful, prosperous and dynamic Africa into reality. The interests and engagement of parliamentarians such as this committee can provide invaluable support to sustaining Canada's partnership with Africa.
I look forward, Mr. Chairman, to your comments and questions and I thank you for your patience.
Senator St. Germain: Mr. Ambassador, genocide, rape and pillage in Darfur are described on television and by senators who have taken a role there, including Senator Dallaire and Senator Jaffer. You have been part of the UN and have covered many areas. Your credentials are excellent.
Why would the world again watch such treatment of human beings? When Milosevic was acting up, NATO stepped in. Why is it that when horrific situations such as this arise there is not an organization formulated in the free world that would protect at least the weakest of these societies?
I honestly believe that if this were happening in country populated by Whites we would take action such as we did in Serbia. Why do we repeatedly stand back and watch such things?
Since you are dealing with this on an ongoing basis, can you explain to us what could be done and what we should be doing to assist?
Mr. Fowler: Senator St. Germain, I cannot really explain that to you. I represented Canada on the Security Council at the time of the Kosovo intervention. I had an in depth debate with both my Security Council colleagues and my friends in Ottawa on precisely the issues you have suggested and I made the same observation, that is, if the people of Kosovo were Black would we have had the same reaction. The answer I got was that just because we cannot do everything right does not mean we should not do something right.
I disagree with your use of the word ``genocide.'' I believe that is a term we should protect jealously. There are horrible things occurring in Darfur, but I do not think it is genocide, for what that is worth, and I want to ensure that we do not overuse that term. Whatever it is, it is certainly crimes against humanity and it certainly must be stopped, and I agree with you that what we have done is inadequate.
Nevertheless, of a population of 7 million people in Darfur in an area the size of France, half are now in camps — camps that we are refusing to feed properly. The bill for humanitarian assistance in Sudan is US $2 billion per year and we donors have simply not bellied up to that bar. That demand is largely outstanding and very recently the World Food Program had to cut its caloric provision to almost 3 million people in Darfur to well below the survival level.
The Americans provided last-minute intervention that has allowed much of that to be restored in the short term, but the Americans are already providing 82 per cent of the aid flowing to Darfur at the moment.
The answer is simply that everyone knows what is happening and we are choosing not to respond.
Senator St. Germain: Is there anything, Mr. Ambassador that we could do from your perspective to bring this issue to the fore so that we can actually create a situation that would not be acceptable but would at least deal with the humanitarian issues?
I stand corrected, and I accept your description of genocide, but I still think that there is a horrific scenario playing out in this country and in northern Uganda as well.
Is there anything that you think we should be doing that would assist those of you who are on the ground in these areas working to try to rectify these situations?
Mr. Fowler: Well, yes, we could spend more money, but obviously those are decisions that are not in my hands. There are worse situations than Darfur occurring in Africa, the most obvious of which is in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In the provinces of Ituri and Kivu, for example, there are significantly worse things going on, but CNN does not happen to be there. I did mention northern Uganda mostly because I believe that there the time is right. The stars are in the right place to crunch that one, much as they were in Angola at the right time. The time is right. The international tolerance for the kind of thing that the LRA represents is non-existent. Therefore, I think we could bring significant pressure to bear on the governments in Khartoum and Kampala, as well as on a number of donor governments who have been long engaged in the search for peace in northern Uganda, and we could really bring about a change there. I am not nearly so sanguine that we could bring about happy change in the eastern Congo, and I am afraid that the absolutely enormous demand for resources will be very long term in Darfur.
One of the issues in Darfur that rarely gets discussed is that the population pressure is such that the very poor land those 7 million people live on can simply not sustain that population.
Senator Stollery: Ambassador Fowler, I congratulate you on your terrific presentation. It covered many of the bases that this committee has studied.
Chairman, I will be brief, because we have gone over this ground, and I think Mr. Fowler has summed up some of the views of some of the members of this committee in a very good way. I particularly appreciate the view that this word ``genocide'' — this is certainly, Senator St. Germain, not a criticism — gets a little bit overworked. It does mean something, but when you use it too much, it becomes cheapened.
You were at the United Nations. The committee has discovered the final report of the panel of experts on the illegal exploitation of natural resources and other forms of wealth of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. What was Canada's response to this quite devastating report on the rape of the resources in the eastern Congo?
Mr. Fowler: Senator Stollery, that report was produced after I left the Security Council to take up my posting in Rome, just by a couple of weeks, and therefore I was not intimately involved with Ottawa's reaction.
As chair of the Angola committee, I did produce two reports which named names of sitting heads of government for their complicity in sanctions busting in the provision of arms to Savimbi. We did establish enormously rigorous rules of evidence before we put people on those lists. We could have put a lot more people on that list if we had been less rigorous.
I do not think the committee that produced the report you speak of, senator, was quite as rigorous. I am not suggesting the report is in any way false, but some of those conclusions have been challenged with some effect. I do not think that is true of the Angola reports.
I cannot really tell you what the Canadian reaction to it was beyond our strong concurrence that, in your terms, senator, the rape of resources is something that needs to be monitored closely. Personally, I believe it could be monitored an awful lot more closely, particularly in resource-rich places like the south eastern Congo and Angola. As you know, there are codes of conduct, both domestic and international, but they do not really cover all the area that needs to be covered.
Senator Andreychuk: Mr. Fowler, welcome to the committee, and thank you for covering so many points.
I want to change tactics and ask you about humanitarian assistance and development assistance. It seems that when a government in Canada attempts to have consistent attention on Africa, we often get our messages confused between development assistance and humanitarian assistance. Can you give us suggestions as to how we might approach the two types of assistance? Canadians are willing, when they see a disaster, to have Canadian funds used, and they use their own funds to contribute to that disaster relief, but development is a long-term issue and they seem to lose patience with that type of assistance. Should these two be entirely separate, perhaps even out of the same area?
Mr. Fowler: Thank you for the question, Senator Andreychuk. It is difficult to answer because, as you know, I agree with you completely. I would perhaps reinforce your question by noting that I think our confusion has led very directly to the spreading of our aid thinly across the continent to a point that we are not significant players anywhere.
The enormity of the development challenge is such that ``feel good'' projects like building a local school or running a local orphanage confuse us into believing that is development, and it is not.
If we are to change the circumstances in Africa, given the enormity of that challenge and the bucks that it will take, that are almost beyond comprehension — I think we just have to build a very high fence around humanitarian assistance. NEPAD understands that the development bucks will never be there in sufficient quantity and must be supplemented with investment dollars. It is about aiding famine and flood and war victims, but it is not about rebuilding their societies.
One of the huge dilemmas in Darfur is that life is enormously tough there any time, anywhere. In these camps where half the population now resides, they have access to health facilities, to feeding facilities and to schools that they never would have had in their own villages. Therefore, in Darfur we are indeed confusing humanitarian assistance and development assistance, but frankly we do not have a lot of choice. Those people in those camps now will want to have that school next door forever. They will want us to pay for it and to provide them with 2200 calories a day, man, woman and child, forever. Frankly, we are not able to do that.
We are responding to a humanitarian challenge in Darfur based on the humanitarian crisis caused by war. The long- term solution in Darfur will be complex because the land will not support that many people. By the way, in those camps there is not an awful lot to do, so there will be more people.
Senator Andreychuk: It is shocking, when you go to Africa, to see the trade of weapons, and especially in small arms and light weapons. Most are not manufactured, but they are all brought in from elsewhere, brought in from countries who pride themselves on some position in the civilized world; I prefer to say more mature world. Do you believe the Draft Convention on Small Arms and Light Weapons can be strengthened to have effect in Africa? If so, what can we do?
I am calling on your experience in the diamond trade, where there was an impact when we took it seriously and called to account the sort of transfer of assets; also, the International Criminal Court and the charges against Joseph Kony and others in northern Uganda.
Mr. Fowler: I guess all of us, in our life, continually subject our in baskets and our to-do lists to a kind of triage. I worked hard at the UN and on the council, in particular, to codify and develop discipline relating to the protection of civilians in armed conflict, and particularly the protection of children in armed conflict. I did not work particularly hard on trying to bring discipline to the trade in small arms. To answer your question I do not think it would be particularly effective. We will spend a lot of time on it and we will come up with some nice words, but I do not think it will change much because it is a highly profitable business. It is a way of influencing things in the world and the major countries of world like doing those things and I think they will continue to do them.
In Angola, we were rather lucky, in a way, because the Mr. Zavimbi chose to fight a largely conventional war with major weapon systems. Weapon systems, like heavy tanks, artillery and multiple launch rocket systems and all of those things that require great quantities of ammunition and fuel are easier to control than tiny bullets or rifles. For a while, the UN initiated a buy-back program in Burundi that produced unserviceable weapons for $10 each and sucked more weapons into the region than were otherwise there in the first place.
Africa is awash in weapons. You can buy an AK47 for under $10 in most countries in central Africa. Putting that under some kind of discipline, no, I do not know how to do that.
You talked about the ICC and issuing warrants in Darfur and northern Uganda. Contrary to some, I heartily support the ICC in that action. That is why they were created. Diplomats like me will always find ways to convince a prosecutor not to do it, but that is why they were created. I am glad they did it. It helps focus attention on Mr. Kony and his friends.
Senator Di Nino: Welcome to our committee. I have two distinct questions. You speak about the DRC. When our committee was in South Kivu, we met with the general that was in charge of that area, who he made a strong statement to us. He told us that if he had the mandate he could solve the problem. He seemed to indicate that he did not have the authority from the UN to be able to deal with the problem. Can you comment on that?
Mr. Fowler: It is wonderful to see Senator Di Nino again.
Your question sounds so much like that dilemma that Senator Dallaire articulated so well, namely, that if he had a brigade of 5,000 well-trained troops, he could have stopped the genocide. I believe he was absolutely correct in that statement. On the other hand, I am not at all sure how we would have all reacted when that brigade did the things that the brigade would have to do to stop the genocide. There would have been a number of whiffs of grape shot fired into machete waving crowds of crazies that were set upon their mission of ``work.'' How would we have reacted watching those blue helmets pour fire into lightly armed crowds?
I think you hear me setting up a straw man. Let me be absolutely clear that I believe that is what ought to have happened and that 10,000 or 15,000 people might have been killed by such action so that 800,000 could have been saved.
In the Congo, the situation, I think, is not that different, although the area and the region are so vast. I do not know exactly what the general you spoke to had in mind about the mandate; I believe peacekeeping troops should have robust mandates and, more importantly, rules of engagement.I believe they should deal forthrightly with bad guys. The people who are perpetrating terror among populations should know that is unacceptable behaviour. A force of 10,000 in the Kivu or 20,000 in the DRC cannot control those territories. It is simply not large enough. More mobility would be a good thing; more gun ships would be a good thing. However, we live in a skittish world and video footage of gun ships in attack can produce strong reactions.
Senator Di Nino: Thank you for that opinion. On a different issue, ambassador, during our trip, I came to the conclusionthat long-term aid will create dependency. I used the term that ``long-term aid will enslave'' and may just be a continuation of the colonization process. We have heard of some wonderful programs and initiatives that have been more like a partnership within some non-governmental agencies and the private sector. I wonder if you could add to that knowledge and give us a little wisdom on how we should change Canada's aid. I agree that we should be more focused, as you suggest. How should we change it so that we can work on more economic opportunities, particularly in the agricultural communities, and maybe create some jobs that might begin to change things in Africa?
Mr. Fowler: Well, senator, again I agree with you completely as to our objectives. I think we should focus our aid in a small number of countries that are doing what they said they would do, that is improving governance, improving their justice system, creating transparent legal systems and effective banking systems. We should give aid to the countries that are creating conditions in which reasonable people will want to invest.
At the moment, Africans do not even invest in Africa. Officially, 40 per cent of African savings leave the continent, but the number is much higher. We want to create the conditions that will enable the developed world to do for Africa what Europe did for Canada 150 years ago. We were developed by european investment. We are what we are today because of investment, and that is desperately what Africa needs. Yes, senator, I agree with you; it needs it in the agricultural sector.
Seventy per cent of Africans live on the land, and they are poor. While 4 per cent of Africa is irrigated, 40 per cent of Asia is irrigated. Why is that? Because we are not making thoselarge-scale investments.
With regard to your comments on aid dependency, it is a real dilemma and the real reason that I want to be so fiercely careful about the distinction between humanitarian assistance and development. What we are doing in Darfur is humanitarian assistance, not development, and we must not confuse the two although daily there is pressure to do so, including huge pressure from non-governmental organizations.
Are we creating an aid dependency in Darfur? You bet we are. As I suggested to Senator Andreychuk, I do not quite know how to get out of that dilemma, but I do not know that we cannot stop doing what we are doing without seeing massive starvation in the western part of Sudan.
I would make very clear that what we do in Darfur comes out of the humanitarian pocket and must not get in the way with getting girls in school in Mali, with changing the health system and improving governance in Mozambique, with assisting perhaps Botswana. Botswana is one of the best-governed countries in Africa, and by the way, I do not think because the per capita income is a couple of-thousand-dollars a year, that should render them ineligible for development assistance.
Africa needs a few successes. We ought to nurture those successes and our focus ought to be helping them to create an appropriate investment environment.
[Translation]
Senator Corbin: Good evening, Ambassador. I will be speaking in English, because I would like to quote an excerpt from the speech you gave in Vancouver to the Canadian Institute for International Affairs.
[English]
In that speech, you said:
The architects of NEPAD deserve enormous credit for incorporating the Africa peer review mechanism into the NEPAD initiative. Indeed, it is moot whether G8 leaders would have paid much attention to NEPAD in the absence of this startling commitment. The peer review process is bold and innovative. It provides a mechanism for African countries, including civil society, the private sector in governments, to review, critically, each other's practices of political, economic, and corporate governance.
Earlier in your remarks, you insisted on straight talk with your African partners. I would like to know how tough you are in your dealings with our African partners.
I would like also for you to give us some assessment if this African peer review mechanism is indeed working.
You add at the end of your comments you say that
...it is disappointing that African governments remain reluctant to criticize examples of appalling governance in places such as Zimbabwe.
Could you give us an up-to-date picture of how well that is working or how well it could be improved?
Mr. Fowler: Certainly, senator. Again, I thank you for the question, particularly because I had cut that part out of my presentation today and I am glad you put it back in.
I think the peer review process is bold and imaginative. I do not think, for instance, that Western governments would have agreed for one moment to do those things. It is rather cumbersome, rather bureaucratic, rather slow. One government has come through the process, that is Ghana. Rwanda is about to complete it. There are 23 other governments who have signed up for it. Three are planning to go through this year, three more. I think the Ghanaians believe that the experience was extremely salutary. They do not quite know what to do about the $3 billion or $4 billion bill that they have identified as being needed to fix the things that they discovered in the peer review that need fixing. Of course that is another problem that will be laid at our feet. What the peer review will inexorably result in is a much greater demand for assistance, and frankly, I will leave to you sir, to your estimate, as to the extent to which we are prepared to respond to a much greater demand.
Nevertheless, we have always insisted that the letter of NEPAD be respected and that peer review is not about us, although yes, I did think that without that we probably would not have said yes. NEPAD said that the peer review is needed for Africa to do the things that Africa needed to do so that investment would come. In other words, the peer review mechanism is designed by Africans for Africans, and it is working out pretty much that way, although a number of donor governments are investing in the peer review process.
In terms of straight talk, yes, particularly in smaller groups, the talk is straighter. We have very clear discussions about things like democratic change of governance and indeed about Zimbabwe.
I do not think Zimbabwe is really a peer review issue; it is much more a historical issue and it is an extremely difficult one. Whether we like it or not, and you know my views, Mr. Mugabe is, for most of his neighbours, a hero. When other people were much further afield during the apartheid struggle, he was in the bush fighting the war and for many of his neighbours they will never forget that.
He is simply beyond reproach because when the chips were down, he did what had to be done. I am giving you a local view and an extremely deeply held view. That is the principal reason why he seems uncriticizable, but not because, in fact, people admire what he has done to his country.
I believe the peer review will serve to help us identify where that focus should be in our narrowing of focus on development assistance, because it reveals very clearly what does and does not work in Africa. It could move a little more quickly, but the important thing is that it is moving and, as I have said, half the countries in Africa have already signed up.
The Chairman: Ambassador, will you reflect for a moment on your earlier comments with respect to focus? I would like to test your degree of commitment to the kinds of decisions that a more tightly-focused position by Canada on Africa might underline.
If, upon your return from Rome, if you were to have a cup of coffee at a Tim Horton's or at the Transport City Diner outside of Swift Current, Saskatchewan, you would not find anyone who is insensitive to Africa or disinterested in being helpful. They would ask you, ``If there is one thing we could do as a country that would make a substantive difference in some way, and if spreading ourselves too thinly is clearly a mistake, what is that thing?'' They would seek your expert counsel on that issue. They would ask you, ``Why would we not focus on malaria and its significant impact upon young people?''
If we could take upon ourselves a particular focus and pour serious money into it, and set aside all the considerations about jobs back here at home and all the rest, which you were so careful to underline as being essentially unrelated to the aid mission, what should that primary focus be?
I accept that, as a member of the diplomatic corps serving the government of the day, you have to respect the policies of the government, but what is your own view about how we as a country might come to that decision? What would be on your priority list?
Mr. Fowler: Mr. Chairman, as soon you said you wanted to test my theory, I began to get very nervous. I think the person at the diner would begin by saying, ``Fifty million dollars later, why have you not fixed Africa? We are prepared to be more generous because clearly the people there need it, but before we are, could you tell me that it is going to work?''
I gave you that long German example, which shook me to the core, because it tells you just how much it takes to bring about relatively modest change, and in vastly easier circumstances.
Aside from that, I would focus our development assistance on a single-digit number of countries that demonstrated they were walking the NEPAD walk, and if they fell off that wagon, you would end that relationship, despite people saying that we are only going through a rough patch and, having invested so much, we have to see it through.
I would be much more hard nosed and say, ``Sorry; you stick with the program or you are no longer our privileged partners.'' I would think that we would come up with seven, eight or nine privileged partners, those being the best- performing governments in Africa. We would dig deep, we would find more money; we would help them rebuild health systems and education systems, and we would work to encourage investment to go their way.
On the humanitarian front, I would buy a whole lot of$7-dollar mosquito nets. If you can save a child for $7, it is worth doing.
We should be highly selective. We should be rigorous about the criteria to put countries on the list and about taking them off the list as necessary, but we should choose only a few.
Mosquito nets not only protect the people under the nets, they also kill mosquitoes. I would worry much more about killing mosquitoes than I would about the environmental damage that might be caused by the attempt to kill mosquitoes. I would also invest more deeply in aid, as you will have gathered from my remarks, but I would not try to do everything.
Senator Corbin: Ambassador, we have had a debate among ourselves here as to the effectiveness of the IMF and the World Bank and their various programs. They have made boo-boos in the past, of course. Some of them have been acknowledged and they have righted their wrongs, to some extent.
On balance, have the IMF and the World Bank been good for Africa? What changes to the policies of these international financial institutions should be contemplated to improve their interaction with developing countries? Some of them have been pretty disastrous in the past.
Mr. Fowler: I would point out that they have not been the only ones to make boo-boos. Public policy is a lot about making boo-boos. I am not certain that everything Canada has done over many years in terms of trying to improve the situation of Aboriginal peoples, or indeed everything we have done to seek to develop the distant regions in our country, has been without boo-boos. Similarly, our own development record has not been without boo-boos. We learn from our mistakes; so do these institutions, although perhaps they learn a little more slowly.
I think you are right that the bank has understood that their strict, single-minded application of a very narrow definition of conditionality needed a little flexibility. Their development of poverty-reduction strategy papers and the whole concept of a partnership between donors and recipients in which the recipients essentially articulate their own priorities, which become ours, as long as we believe they make sense, is a step in the right direction.
I would like to see much greater coordination between the kind of prescriptions we take at G8 meetings and broad donor meetings and what we do through the World Bank and the IMF so that we are all singing the same song to achieve the same purpose. The World Bank has understood from NEPAD that they will have to give infrastructure development a much higher priority, and they are doing that. By the end of this year, they will have set aside a US $1- billion infrastructure fund exactly for that purpose and in response to NEPAD.
Tankers take a long time to turn. Huge international organizations are not that agile, but they do learn, and they have learned.
Senator Corbin: You referred to coverage given or not given by CNN. You will be happy to learn that last week, at least here in North America, CNN carried the story of the Panzi Hospital for maltreated and mutilated women in Goma.
I thought it was very well done. I am not here to defend or criticize CNN, but at least the message got around to show the horror of what is going on in that part of the RDC.
Mr. Fowler: I did not see that. I am glad to hear it.
Senator St. Germain: Mr. Ambassador, is it unrealistic to think that under the auspices of NATO, the UN, or some world organization we could have a world police force? Could a world police force be at the ready for these types of situations that we see in Africa were lives are endangered and people taken advantage of? Is it unrealistic to think that something like this could be set up and would work?
Mr. Fowler: Yes, senator.
Senator St. Germain: It is unrealistic to think that?
Mr. Fowler: I spent a lot of time at the United Nations thinking about that kind of thing and determined that there were probably a handful, literally, maybe six countries out of 191, that might agree to that, and, by the way, none of the big ones. I assume we are talking about the same thing, which is a force that would simply go and do what had to be done without necessarily running all the risks of General Assembly approval and Security Council vetoes.
We got into a very detailed discussion of this with respect to the responsibility to protect. We were successful in enshrining the responsibility to protect as an objective in the Millennium Summit plus Five declaration but we are a long way from making it operable. It is a long way from a general agreement that that when needed, protection would automatically be provided.
I am afraid there is almost no support for a proposal that would enable a force of some kind to intervene simply because people were endangered.
Senator St. Germain: Thank you again, Mr. Ambassador, for an excellent presentation.
The Chairman: With respect to your comments on the success of democratization, various parts of Africa and the relationship that existed between successful democratization and economic progress, you will know better than most that the literature on the issue is unclear as to whether economic progress helps produce the forces of democratization or vice versa.
I am interested in your advice, insofar as this committee might choose to make recommendations relative to investment in Africa. Should we make recommendations on investing in the democratization process or would the money be better spent in on mosquito netting and other items that might be more practical and less esoteric?
Mr. Fowler: Now you will really get me in trouble.
The Chairman: That was our plan, ambassador.
Mr. Fowler: Mr. Chairman, I think investing in mosquito nets is a really good idea. I was very careful not to define the democracy to which I referred. I was also, I hope, very careful to say that it was important that leaders accepted that leadership depends on the will of the people and they eventually move on. I was not prescribing how the will of the people is expressed, how often it is expressed, or indeed the type of governance that flowed there from.
My personal view is that we should be extremely leery about preaching any particular model of democracy to anyone. Our own model, as you know very well, is very particular and may not travel very well. Preaching term limits to international organization chiefs and African heads of government while talking about 21 years of power by Mackenzie King is difficult. I appreciate those things are not exactly the same, but nevertheless they provide their own particular complexity.
My own view is that we can help build institutions. We can offer views about, for instance, something we are very good at, which is regulatory reform. How can you help Africa export once you have got rid of those export subsidies, quotas andphyto-sanitary barriers to African trade? How can you help build governance institutions, that is, say, regulatory regimes, which will help Africans get past those restrictions that developed countries will throw in the path of their exports? Indeed, how can you ensure that we Canadians will be safe if we buy African foodstuffs, et cetera? I think those are good investments. Building coast guards and helping with civil administration are good investments. Getting into the whole building democracy business is pretty perilous.
The Chairman: Thank you, ambassador. Unless colleagues have any further questions, we have come to the end of our time this evening. I want to express, on behalf of the members of the committee, our appreciation for your frankness and our gratitude for the clarity of your responses to the very specific questions that were put to you. I think I also speak for all Canadians when I wish you well in your continuing efforts on behalf of Her Majesty, the Government and the people of Canada, and most importantly on behalf of the people of Africa. We are very committed to keeping in our own sights the people of Africa, who as fellow human beings deserve the very best we can possibly offer in this difficult and challenging time.
Senator Stollery: I would add, Mr. Chairman that we also appreciate that it is 12.30 a.m. in Rome, and maybe the ambassador would like to go to bed.
The Chairman: Indeed. Your Excellency, we wish you Godspeed in your continuing work and a very good night's sleep. Thank you for your time this evening.
The committee adjourned.