Cape Town — The business tycoon whose foundation this week published a new survey ranking Africa''s governments,– in which Liberia scored poorly,– has stressed that the statistics on which the study was based date back to 2005.
Mo Ibrahim, founder of one of Africa's telecommunications giants and the founder of the Mo Ibrahim Foundation, told allAfrica.com in an interview: "Don't forget this is data for 2005. When we have the data for 2006 and 2007, I think you will see changes."
Ibrahim also said it was more important to track a country's performance against itself over a period of years than to compare it to other countries.
"I think that what really matters here is where people are moving. You really need to see the index as a project in progress. The true value of this complete index will become very apparent before maybe five or seven years, when we can look back and see the development of data."
In the period covered by the survey, 2000 to 2005, Liberia was ranked among the 10 worst-governed countries in sub-Saharan Africa. A commentary released with the survey noted that the situations in these countries "highlight the long-running effects of conflict, suggesting the difficulties of rapidly improving political performance even with improved governmental institutions."
And even for the years 2000 to 2005, the survey, named the "Ibrahim Index of African Government," showed a mixed picture for Liberia when broken down into its component parts.
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The survey covered 48 African nations. In 2005, Liberia was ranked in 26th place for "sustainable economic opportunity", dropping from ninth place in 2000. In that year, it held 20th place for "participation and human rights,– but then dropped to 10th from the bottom in 2005.
In the other three categories in which countries were judged, Liberia scored poorly in relation to most other countries but made modest gains against its own record between 2000 and 2005.
On an index of 100, it improved from 31.6 points to 34.4 points for "human development." In the area covering the rule of law, transparency and corruption, the improvement was more dramatic – 21.2 to 32.2 points. Similarly in the "safety and security" category, where its performance moved up from 54 to 65.1 points in 2005, outscoring Kenya (62.9), Nigeria (62.8) and South Africa (61.1).
Clearly anticipating vigorous criticism and debate, Mo Ibrahim told allAfrica: "We're inviting every government and every institution in Africa to, please, if they disagree with any number, please correct us. Each number here is clearly defined –- where it came from, how to source each sub-category [of data]. We have 58 sub-categories. Maybe some people will suggest we should have more."
A comprehensive account of how the assessments were made is on the Mo Ibrahim Foundation website.
