Blair Africa Commission 'A Chance to Move From Rhetoric To Action'

4 March 2004
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United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (Addis Ababa)
press release

Addis Ababa — The UN Economic Commission for Africa's Executive Secretary, K.Y. Amoako, has said he believes the new Commission for Africa launched by British Prime Minister Tony Blair offers an opportunity to move from rhetoric to action.

"The international community and Africa have agreed on the central importance of a partnership to achieve Nepad's goals but we must now focus on implementation and action," he said. "We must agree on what we can really deliver for Africa's people."

Mr Amoako has accepted an invitation to serve on the Commission which Mr Blair hopes will identify the global trends influencing Africa's development and propose effective policies to tackle the continent's problems.

Mr Blair has pledged that Africa will be a priority during the UK's presidencies of the G8 and the EU in 2005. Launching the Commission late last week, he told a press conference that Africa was the only continent to have grown poorer in the past 25 years, that its share of world trade had halved in a generation, and that it received less than 1% of direct foreign investment.

He said 44 million children could not go to school, and that millions were dying due to hunger, disease or conflict. Although it would be difficult to reach the Millennium Development Goals by 2015, he believed it was essential to try.

Around a dozen commissioners, including UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown and International Development Secretary Hilary Benn, will make recommendations on economic issues, education, conflict resolution, health, the environment, HIV Aids, governance and culture.

The Commissioners are politicians and opinion-formers drawn from developed countries and from Africa, including Ethiopia's Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, South Africa's Finance Minister, Trevor Manuel, and development activist and musician Bob Geldof. Others include former United States Senator Nancy Kassebaum Baker and Michel Camdessus who will represent France.

Mr Blair said the Commission would help to bring some key issues to "a decision point for the G8 and then the wider world."

Issued by the ECA Communication Team
Economic Commission for Africa
P.O. Box 3001
Addis Ababa
Ethiopia
E-mail: ecainfo@uneca.org.

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