Washington, DC — The Constituency for Africa (CFA) which first began to take shape under the umbrella of the NGO, Africare, is now in its 11th year. The loose-knit coalition attempts to bring Americans of all backgrounds together around African issues. Of special concern to the organization is the fight against HIV/Aids in Africa. In another in allAfrica.com's occasional series of interviews with leaders of Africa-interested groups in the US, Charles Cobb Jr. spoke with the CFA Executive Director, Melvin P. Foote.
What is the Constituency For Africa and why is it needed?
In terms of the number of groups focused on Africa there has always been that charge that "another one isn't needed [and that it] just takes away limited resources". When I first came to Washington I heard that, because there was Africare and Transafrica, the African-American Institute and so forth.
But I personally don't think there are too many groups; I think there are not enough. I think the reality is that they need to work better together, though. There need to be closer ties and contacts and cooperation and sharing of information.
I think there needs to be different approaches [to Africa] because people are diverse. Some need to be aggressive like Salih Booker - I'm all for Salih taking the cutting edge; there's others that are much less obviously aggressive - they can work with the administration, they can talk to them. So you need all of it.
But CFA is ten and a half years old now - we were ten in December. We were founded in December, 1990, as a project of the relief and development agency, Africare. I had spent 13 years with Africare, first as a country director in Somalia and then, back in 1984, [Africare Director] C. Payne [Lucas] asked me to come back to head up his new effort to educate Americans about Africa and to build a constituency to support Africa. So, it was that work that got me started.
And back in 1990, I decided to connect all the groups I had been working with. Senator Paul Simon was constantly saying there was no constituency for Africa. He talked about when he went to speak to the Jewish community they always talked about Israel. When he went to talk to the Polish community they asked about Poland. But when he went to talk to the African-Americans they would only talk about domestic issues - jobs, affirmative action, that sort of thing. So he was always [saying] there is no constituency for Africa in the United States.
I knew there were a lot of people out there who really cared about Africa. There were Peace Corps volunteers. There were former ambassadors. There were Africans who were living in the United States. There were Africanists, pan-Africanists - a plethora of groups and organizations that were interested in Africa.
But I detected that they were not connected. And I detected that there was a shortage of information about what's going on in Africa. Because if you heard what people were saying, it was the most outlandish things; they lacked information.
African-Americans in the 1960s and 1970s would put on their dashiki and comb their hair out and talk about "Black Power". But if you asked them to name three African countries they couldn't do it. Or name one African head of state - couldn't do it.
I was heavily involved with the 1984-85 Ethiopian famine with Africare - and the stuff I heard then! Why help Africa? People are hungry right here? Why help a country that has a communist government? I asked black journalists in Atlanta around that time, 'how many countries are in Africa?' and not one person in the room knew. One guy said a thousand.
So I had detected a shortage of information and when I set up CFA, I set it up first to connect the dots and secondly to infuse information. I didn't really care what you did with the information. My whole thinking was that you should get more and better information. I saw with the AKA [sorority]; I started giving them information and they started doing the right thing, building wells and health clinics.
Is CFA a membership organization? Can people join?
Well, I set it up as a loose-knit coalition. And I call it loose-knit because back then, egos were a prime factor out here. You still had these big giants out here. You had C. Payne Lucas who was a great leader. You had Randall Robinson who was absolutely great. These guys were almost like pioneers, but they didn't work with each other very well. So we tried to figure out a mechanism to work together, but [at the same time, acknowledging] I don't own you, I don't own what you think.
We had contemplated a membership program but we have not moved in that direction yet. I think we're going to move in that direction. I think that after ten years we have actually built a base and people understand what we're trying to do and the trust factor has been established.
We tried to set up an organization that broke the rules. We organized among mid-level managers as opposed to the top guys. My coalition is people you will not know if you're looking for the heads of organizations. We became independent from Africare in 1994, the same month that Nelson Mandela got his independence. April 1994, the month that Nelson Mandela walked out of prison is the same month CFA became independent. That's going to be my link to history. I wasn't really ready for it. I didn't know what was to be expected but we had, by that time, built up good name recognition. We'd built up a good collection of people working with us.
Was there any particular reason you became independent?
Africare saw it as a conflict because CFA started getting a lot of publicity. I was featured in the February 1994 issue of Emerge magazine. That created certain pressures within the organization. I think the basic decision was that CFA would not grow if it stayed within the Africare structure.
It was a friendly parting of the ways. C. Payne Lucas is on my board of directors and was on the founding board of directors. He actually provided a great deal of stability. He is a very brilliant leader. Of all of the leaders, he is the most successful in terms of the Africa-focused groups. We get a lot from Africare, get a lot from C. Payne. We continue to be friends.
One of the issues that the constituency is very concerned with is AIDS in Africa. What's the scope of that problem?
Ron Dellums, our current chair, went to South Africa when he left Congress and really got introduced to the HIV/Aids problem and he became a zealot really, a real force to be reckoned with. He took the lead in pushing for global support to combat HIV/Aids in Africa.
So when he became chair, one of the discussions was that CFA would take a major role in focusing on HIV/Aids. I knew a lot about it back in 1984, 1985 in its early stages, because of the work we do. But Ron added greater dimension and really got us involved in information services.
Today, there is no problem in the world that is greater the HIV/Aids challenge. If you look at the tragedy of September 11 in this country, a perhaps even greater tragedy on that very same day is that we also lost 7,000 in Africa from HIV/AIDS.
Twenty-five million people in Africa are currently infected with the virus. You've got more than 13 million orphans in Africa and that number is going to swell to at least 40 million by 2010. Whole countries are being weakened. Infrastructures are being weakened. In many respects the continent is being totally fragmented and undermined because of the HIV/Aids pandemic. So it's devastating to Africa.
And Africa is only the tip of the iceberg. It's a global pandemic. Our main thing is that if we don't do something to draw the line and deal with it in Africa, we won't be able to stop it in India. We won't be able to stop it in China. We won't be able to stop it in the Caribbean. And we won't be able to stop it here in the United States. We say draw the line in the sand in Africa and learn how to come to grips with it, not only in terms of saving Africa, but saving the world.
That partially answers a question that came to mind as you were speaking. If you're building a constituency for Africa here in the United States, why wouldn't people respond by saying: "With the kind of Aids problem we have here in the U.S., especially among Black people, Hispanics and other minorities, why should we focus so much energy on the Aids problem in Africa, bad as it is?
One of the things we understand about the disease now is that it knows no boundaries. It knows no race. It knows no creed. If you are exposed to this disease you are at risk of contracting this disease. So having Aids in Atlanta or having Aids in Washington or having Aids in Denver is the same as having Aids in Africa. It's the same disease.
One of the reasons we ought to be involved [with the Aids fight in Africa] is, firstly, we have a lot of experience dealing with it in our country that can be shared globally, and we ought to do that. Secondly, if we don't deal with it in Africa it will expand greatly here in the United Sates and other parts of the world. The biggest reason is, is that it is a global pandemic. People are at risk, largely because of culture, poverty, war, and these are all issues ]for which] you can't say geographic boundary is the defining factor.
Is Africa anywhere near a turning point, either in terms of the kinds of resources and support it needs from countries like the United States or in the sense of its own consciousness and ability to come to grips with the problem, using its own resources?
The honest answer to that is, 'Heck no!' I don't see the light at the end of the tunnel, and I'm an optimist.
Only one out of 100 people in Africa even know their HIV status. You've got women, children, young people - people out there who have no idea that they are even infected. So how do you create a program to mitigate it if people don't even know their status? And then, even if they do know, because of poverty and other problems there is not much that can be done. The pharmaceuticals are not available. The medical clinics are not available. The counseling is not available. African society plays against it because of culture. In many places you will be ostracized. Stigmatized.
I think, in terms of resources, Kofi Annan has called for a ten billion dollar trust fund to meet the needs of those infected with Aids in Africa which is nothing, on a global scale. After the bombing two weeks ago, America came up with a 40 billion dollar commitment at the drop of a hat; but when the call came for Africa the best we could muster was two hundred million.
Where are the resources to fight Aids in Africa going to come from? If they are not going to come from the rich countries of the world, where are they going to come from? The world has dropped the ball on HIV/Aids. In my mind, one of the real tragedies of September 11 is that 25 million people have basically been condemned to death, have been sentenced to death - 25 million people in Africa.
What do you mean by that?
They won't get the help that they need. They won't get the financial resources. There won't be the pressure to deliver the anti-retroviral drugs. My fear is that Africa will be further marginalized as a result of the terrible tragedy of September 11.
Since you brought up September 11, there is a sense that Muslims in general get blamed for the attack and Africa has an enormous Muslim population. How concerned is the Constituency For Africa about a backlash against Africans, particularly North Africans, here in the United States?
I think anybody today with a turban on and anybody who has a Muslim surname has a problem. We know about racial profiling and African Americans. I think the Muslim community is now feeling a lot of that. I think Africa is very vulnerable. After the attacks on the embassies in Kenya and Tanzania a few years ago, America closed a lot of embassies, they cut back. That meant that business people couldn't get their visas. People could not go where they needed to go. And in many respects Africa took a beating because of that too. There were people using the fragile infrastructure of Africa to attack America.
I think the countries with weak infrastructures are going to continue to be adversely affected by terrorists. They're the ones who are allowing nuclear waste to be dumped in their country for a fee. They're the ones who are susceptible to a wealthy Osama Bin Laden coming in offering money and resources and contracts and so forth. It's hard to turn down if you're a poor country. So I think the impact has been devastating on America, certainly, but its been more devastating on African countries.
I wonder, in terms of this administration's war on terrorism, whether we won't get back to something akin to the old Cold War days in Africa, when countries were either lined up with the United States or lined up with the Soviet Union and decisions about how to relate to them was based on that?
All of the countries in Africa have come out strongly against terrorism and have come out strongly for working with the U.S. against terrorism.
Right. But before September 11 the U.S. was pushing for more transparency in government, more liberal democracy. Now, would the United States, in the name of waging this war, be willing to tolerate repression - a Charles Taylor? Or tolerate a slave-trading Sudan, or tolerate a warlord-run Somalia? If the highest priority is fighting terrorism, do the other issues take a back seat?
I try to work with the administration. My view is that the Constituency For Africa should work with whoever is in the White House, be it a Democrat or a Republican. CFA has always operated that way.
With that preface, U.S. policy toward Africa has always been in flux. Very good strides were made during the Clinton years to engage Africa. Clinton deserves a great deal of credit for going to Africa and putting the spotlight on Africa the way he did.
I think the Bush people did a smart thing - and we advised them on it and they accepted it. We said: 'don't throw the baby out with the bathwater'. Usually when you have a change of administration, the first priority is to discredit anything your predecessor did. If your predecessor engaged this country, you don't engage it.
But what they did was look at what Clinton did in a clear light and most of the program initiatives like on HIV/Aids or the Growth and Opportunity Act, they said, 'we can work with this' and in many respects have stepped up the effort.
I think that Colin Powell's attention to Africa has been stronger than [former Secretary of State] Madeline Albright's, for instance. Clearly the Bush Administration wants to deal with oil-producing countries. They feel Middle East problems may result in oil to the U.S. getting cut off in some kind of way. They are actively looking at other countries who can source oil for us.
Countries like Sudan fall in that category. We will work with them [now] whereas before, we probably wouldn't have worked with them. I think if Sudan did not have oil, you would not see American trying to engage them.
But I don't see the U.S., all of a sudden, dropping its demands for human rights. I think the U.S. will still want good governance. I don't see the day of us supporting a Mobutu in Africa anymore. I don't see any days when we would support a Siad Barre [former President of Somalia] just because they are our allies. I think that's because the constituency we have been working to build will demand it. Ten years ago, 20 years ago, you would have had no demand.
The question occurs because most immediately pending in the Congress is the Sudan Peace Act, at the same time that the Bush administration is seeking the support of Sudan in terms of counter-terrorism. The administration would like to see that Act slowed or postponed. It's that kind of dilemma that I wonder about.
I've been to Sudan three times in 2001. We went to Khartoum and met with the government. We met with opposition people in Khartoum. We met with women. We met with business groups. We went to Nairobi and met with rebels, and up to Southern Sudan, where we talked to the SPLA. We talked to all sides. We came back with a totally different viewpoint than the Clinton Administration had put forth on Sudan. We saw the [Clinton] administration as being an obstacle to peace, actually. We made our recommendations to the Bush Administration early. I met with [Secretary of State] Colin Powell in April and they basically examined our recommendations and accepted them - the State Department, the White House, the Sudan government and the opposition groups all looked at the recommendations and basically agreed with them.
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Are you surprised at the apparent interest in Africa on the part of this administration?
We engaged the administration back in August during the campaign. We engaged both George Bush and Al Gore while they were running for office; and we asked them about their position on HIV/Aids in Africa. We were shocked to see that the Bush people sent back a much stronger, much more detailed letter, thoroughly looking at the issue, talking about it in a way that made sense. The Gore letter was very wishy-washy and very simplistic. Bush basically said he would make it a priority. He was saying what we were saying; it's a global pandemic and America must play a leadership role. The Gore letter was less committed to anything, sort of acknowledged the problem and that's about as far as it went. We followed that up, and ironically, I've had better access with the Bush Administration than with the Clinton Administration. I never met with Madeleine Albright, for instance, but I had a face-to-face meeting with Colin Powell early.
What did you tell the Secretary?
I had just come back from the Sudan and was able to give him a first hand view of what was going on. We talked of the Aids epidemic and conflicts in Africa. We discussed the priorities of the administration.
Do feel that the United States should make overtures to the Khartoum government?
If the aim is to end the war, you have got to talk to both sides. The U.S. talked about ending the war but gave moral, if not financial and material support to the southern rebels. And they didn't give the rebels enough so they could win the war, but gave them enough support to stay engaged. What that meant was that people continued to die in the middle. Millions of Sudanese have died or have been made refugees because of this conflict.
America, being the mighty superpower, should have been the broker, should have been the one pulling the two sides together, forging a peace. We found the Sudan government very open. They want to get on with economic development. They've been embarrassed by the allegations of slavery and other things that have been said, largely by lobbyists over here.
Lastly, I am compelled to ask you about the World Conference Against Racism in Durban last month. Should the United States have participated? And for that matter, was the meeting even worth anything?
Republicans tend to have a hard time dealing with African people and African-Americans. They have a hard time being fluid and dealing with us when the issue is perceived as an African-American issue. Certainly they should have been there in Durban. And certainly they should have made their points clear. I saw no reason why they could not have participated in that conference.
Now in terms of the conference itself, I didn't expect much to come out of it. We're dealing with a racist world. Nobody can deny that. Look at the plight of Black Americans today. It's not much different than it was after slavery. A small percentage is doing well. The bulk of African-Americans are still suffering, lacking health care, lacking education, lacking job opportunities. There is no mandate to improve the African-American community in any substantial way; it's all incremental. Let's not fool ourselves. Those of us who are doing well here, we're the exception, not the rule.
So I think the issue of racism is much more difficult, much more perverse than a conference would be willing to solve. I saw the conference as bringing together a lot of dispirited elements, a lot of people with anger, a lot of people with hate, a lot of people with just out-and-out disgust. In that kind of environment I'm not sure what could [emerge] that makes rational sense, that is going to be implemented.
I would advocate for a racism conference here in the United States. That should have been the follow-up to John Hope Franklin's effort with the Clinton Administration. Everybody's got to deal with this question. I never felt it could be dealt with in the context of one country. I thought that even the venue of South Africa was peculiar, given the apartheid history of South Africa which is not over, either.
