Chairperson, I'd like to start on a personal note, mainly because of the Afro-pessimism that has come from some of our speakers here. I am quite surprised that, on a day when we are celebrating the unity of Africa, what comes across so strongly in some of the presentations is Afro- pessimism, which is really not about the Africa I know.
On a personal note, I've spent 10 years of my life in countries north to us. I've spent 10 years in countries such as Zimbabwe, Tanzania, Zambia and Kenya. I know those countries very well, and what is being described by some of our people here is not the Africa I know; it is the Africa that is imaged in the newspapers and in media and so on.
Two weeks ago I was at a conference in Rwanda. Rwanda is a country that experienced enormous genocide not long ago. But, in Kigali, I was in a conference with 130 people from Africa, with some from Europe. I travelled all over Kigali, and the Africa I saw in Kigali is not the one that is being described by some of the colleagues here.
I regard myself as very much a part of Africa. I've lectured in universities in Ethiopia, in Cameroon, Senegal, Ghana, Nigeria, in Uganda and Kenya - right across Africa - and what I experienced in those universities is not what some people are describing here today. Africa is a wonderful continent. When I phone my children in the United Kingdom, we speak Swahili - it is the language of our family.
So, I'm not a foreigner in Africa, and no African should be a foreigner in South Africa - that is the lesson we must get here today. We belong to Africa, which is a wonderful continent. Surely, we see distortions here and there - the monstrous leaders that emerge here and there, where Africa has seen Idi Amin, Mobutu, and other butchers in other parts of Africa. We have a problem with our neighbour here, who I won't name. So there are problems, but let us a get a good picture and a balance of where we are located. It is a continent so rich and powerful that we must celebrate what is really there, and not the stuff that the media foists upon us, even if they would sometimes reflect reality.
What I have to say today is that, even in Europe, and globally, there is a new concern about Africa or a new interest. Partly, this is because of the poverty in Africa, the Millennium Development Goals of the UN, and immigration into Europe. Many Africans are fleeing to places like Paris, which is now a predominantly black city. London is now also a black city. There is this problem now that Europe is experiencing of immigration by people who flee poverty in their own countries. Partly the concern in Europe is about climate change, because it is now realised that what happens in the continent of Africa affects the people of Europe and the United States of America. Partly it is because of Aids, a disease that travels across continents and partly also - let us admit - it is a problem of terrorism, which has a place in certain African countries, and which of course becomes a base for the whole world.
So there is a concern that is manifesting itself in a rather interesting phenomenon. That is that the world, the Organisation for Economic Co- operation and Development, the G8, and other forces like the European Union are now saying: "We must increase aid to Africa so that there is more money on the ground," because - as the hon Pheko was clearly correct - they said, Africa has been robbed and looted of its resources, and indeed continues to be so. The G8 and other countries are saying: "Let us re-examine the way the rest of the world supports Africa, but let us re-examine the way that aid flows."
Now I personally have been to a number of conferences in Europe and in Rwanda and elsewhere around this question of aid effectiveness, and what the North is saying to Africa is: "We will increase aid, but let us do it in a way that the aid is effective". So something rather interesting is happening as there is a dialogue between the G8, between Europe in particular and people in Africa, of which I have been a part. And, by the way, to indicate and confirm my not being a foreigner in Africa, I am the chairperson of a network of Members of Parliament across the whole of Africa, and our network is within Nepad, and now it is concerned primarily with the question of aid flowing from Europe to Africa.
What we are saying is this: We want increased aid from the rest of the world to Africa, but we want it to be monitored so that even when it is on budget - as is the case in South Africa, and by the way, we are the recipients of R10 billion for over six years from the European Union - it is going to our Treasury. We, as Members of Parliament, including ANC MPs in the Finance committee are saying: "We want to monitor that aid so that it does not only belong to the Minister of Finance and the Treasury, but to the nation."
We are saying the same thing across the whole continent. Let us monitor aid, and ensure that, where it is on budget, namely budget support, it is used for the poor, because that money does not belong to the Minister of finance in Sweden, Norway or the Netherlands, but to the taxpayers of those countries. So aid is a transfer from the people of Europe to the people of Africa, and not from the executive of Europe to the executive of Africa, because that is where things go wrong. So, colleagues, let us celebrate what is becoming a new partnership between Members of Parliament in Europe and Africa in which I am involved quite heavily. We must ensure in this House that aid is properly monitored and accounted for in this Parliament, and not merely treated as a transfer between some Minister somewhere and the one here. We want to monitor this process, and we also want that that aid which comes to Africa should also come to the parliaments of Africa, because they are not as empowered as we are, although we are not as empowered as we would like to be. We are saying that the proportion of aid which goes to Africa must also go to support the parliaments of Africa so that they can become democratic, so that some of the complaints that members have articulated here today about the lack of democracy and so on can be addressed. You cannot have a democracy if a parliament has no finance, and if all the money is controlled by the Minister or the treasury.
So we are saying to the donors in Europe, who are operating on the basis of goodwill, because the taxpayer in Sweden is motivated by the very best motives when he or she says a portion of my salary can go to the poor people of Africa, "Ensure that that transfer also empowers the parliaments of Africa so we can have genuinely multiparty parliamentary democracy on the continent of Africa." I also want to - by the way - say that this idea of a partnership between Europe and Africa around the question of aid transfers has now been accepted by influential sectors of the European Parliament, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, the IPU, which met in Cape Town and passed an excellent resolution on this, and by a number of other people who are now coming on board and saying yes, it is a very good idea that this transfer of funds from taxpayers in Europe to poor countries in Africa should go through the parliamentary process and the principle should be approved by all of us. This is a way of cementing perhaps a new opening for Africa in Europe and a new understanding about our role, and so, please, colleagues let us not be Afro-pessimistic. It is a wonderful continent, and it is so rich. I love it, and I even speak Swahili. I thank you. [Applause.]
Debate concluded.