Africa: Groups Push Donors to Honour Pledges
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The Nation (Nairobi)
5 September 2008
Posted to the web 6 September 2008
Njeri Rugene
Accra
Lobbyists have teamed up to push for honouring of donor pledges as a forum aimed to make development aid more effective came to a close here on Friday.
"The world will be watching to ensure that all donors implement the Accra Agenda for Action and go further to make aid more responsive," said Oxfam International Mr Robert Fox, Oxfam head of delegation said Thursday evening: The stage is set for important improvements in the way aid is delivered. The Accra Agenda needs to be backed by urgent action if it is to live to its name."
However, NGO's such as ActionAid voiced strong criticism against major donors.
Lenders were accused of contributing to a near collapse of the talks because of rigidity and lack of transparency and accountability.
"The Accra Forum is heading for failure, largely because of the intransigence of key donors, particularly the US, Japan and the World Bank," said ActionAid policy analyst Jesse Griffiths.
The organisation dismissed as "meaningless" a commitment document endorsed by donors and ministers from developing countries for action.
Some of the pledges by donors in the 32 paragraph Accra Agenda for Action include a commitment to eradicate poverty, to deliver and account for development results, deepen participation of NGO's in management of aid "as independent development actors" and to increase the value of aid.
But ActionAid dismissed the document as lacking concrete actions saying it was "couched in woolly language on important issues that had 'repeatedly' been raised by recipient countries and the civil society."
Ghananian President John Kufuor asked participants to come up with "bold and ambitious" resolutions to minimise obstacles to aid effectiveness.
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"The forum should work to remove the systemic indignities of permanent aid through social and economic empowerment of recipient countries," said Mr Kufuor.
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