Aid, NGOs, and Poverty in Africa (A thread)

(Extracted from President Isaias' 2015 interview)

"Most NGOs in Africa are engaged not in ending poverty, but in the 'management of sustainable poverty'. Aid is treated as a business enterprise. They are a source of employment. (1)

Many businesses have cropped up just to administer food aid. Even so-called no-profit organizations, they are 'no-profit' in name only. This is a big distortion: turning something good as 'Charity' into a 'Profitable Business'. (2)

After decades of aid, poverty in Africa has not diminished. In actual terms, it is increasing. Sometimes the work of NGOs is actually contributing to deepening poverty.

Mind you this does not mean that all NGOs are bad. There are some good ones. (3)

Even from our own experience during the armed struggle and afterward, we know there are few NGOs who are sincere and dedicated toward helping others.

Besides being a profitable enterprise, Aid harms when NGOs start to duplicate and 'replace' the functions of government. (4)

In underdeveloped economies and countries, it takes quite a while to be able to build a strong government that possesses fully functioning and effective capabilities that can mobilize the people and resources towards bringing about real development. (5)

Developmental capacity is not something that can be built overnight. It takes not just a decade but a lot more time than that. These so-called NGOs have contributed toward aborting the development of effective government in post-liberation & transitional societies like ours. (6)

That is because they are replacing governmental functions such as policy making, project implementation, which they see as part of their business enterprise.

So instead of government developing capacity, they effectively become the government. (7)

They start to rehire retirees. They create employment opportunities for those West who could not find gainful employment in their own countries (West). As a result, government capacity is crippled. (8)

In fact, in many African countries, it is not hyperbole to say that NGOs have become the government!" (9)

(Translated by Daniel Ogbaharya)