So sang Kristofferson and Joplin after Bobby McGee left them heartbroken and bereft.
That may be true in the sense that relationships and possessions carry obligations which are fetters on your freedom.
Throughout Africa, freedom from colonial rule has led to continued corruption and tyranny, the destruction of agriculture and plunder of natural resources without regard for posterity and a disregard for welfare of the people, which will soon leave nothing left to lose.
In the supposedly more civilised ‘western world’, increased freedoms have led to the inability of governments to curtail or restrict the increasingly conflicted demands on the fiscus and the disempowerment of Police, Border Control and Armed Forces. Soon they too may have nothing left to lose, because everything is free.
But I digress.
I have recently done a course on What Works in Development Aid strategies
The course started off by saying that not many aid strategies worked because of the rip-offs by the empowered elites in recipient countries.
Somalis, Sudanese and Ethiopians are still starving after how many years and dollars of aid . In addition, because the development aid in health has been so successful, there are many more people doomed to hunger!
We are talking big money: $135 billion in 2014 spent by OECD countries alone!
The United Nations sustainable development goal number 1 is: to leave no-one behind by 2030. Cute, hey?
Perhaps consideration should be given to the existence of the development aid industry as a whole: from UN agencies, to government ministries, to universities to aid workers and supply chain operators – is it worth the significant expenditure of taxpayers dollars?
Should foreigners be intervening in sovereign states to prolong life expectancy in a world where natural resources are being depleted and destroyed by too many people?
Or is the development aid industry too entrenched to re-consider its roots. The disguise or suspicion of imperialism and market growth will remain.
Should we continue to shore up tyranny by removing the desperation of their populace, who eventually must be the authors of their own liberation? The alternative is the one that communism and agencies like the CIA instigated: arming people to enable them to confront abuses. Is the morality not the same?
The survival of our world is threatened by the wholesale destruction of our environment by unrestrained economies with burgeoning populations. The survival imperative is to safeguard resources. Economic and political interventions are apparently tenuous and entail the appeasement of tyrants for success, which is morally unpalatable.
Military intervention to impose and sustain appropriate institutions and practices is an alternative, but failed in Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Somaliland, Syria and is much more expensive and politically sensitive!
However, my putative rant hit a brick wall.
A little more research and thinking about the topic suggests that it is in fact very necessary expenditure:
- On average, the richer states spend only about 0.7% of their gross national incomes on aid (relatively insignificant)
- it curbs global spread of diseases
- it buys friends, allies and access to resources
- it provides markets…
- the aid industry employs many people at home and abroad; e.g.: in the US all aid supplies must be made in the US.
In 1990, 1.9billion (36%) of the the world population of 5.3 billion, lived in extreme poverty. In 2010, only 1.2 billion (18%) of the increased population of 6.8 billion, lived in extreme poverty. Aid is believed to have significantly contributed to this reduction in poverty and increased life expectancy and the eradication of a number of diseases.
It also definitely contributed to the 28% increase in population.
There are other secondary (or maybe primary objectives), like the renewed
scramble for Africa, illustrated by the numerous and significant projects
funded and manned by China.
It is ironic that China was one of the main supporters of the spread of communism in Africa, until its loss of credibility.
However, over 150 countries (of the 196 in the world) have committed themselves to the United Nations Development Programme’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals.
This is where our hopes lie, as signatories can be held accountable to their commitments.
Here’s hoping!
company of those that dislike such language. I always regret it, but this little streak of perversity persists.
ism, feminism and anti-feminism. Vitriol and profanity spew out!
d
Generally speaking, I believe that, if used, profanity should not be spoken in the presence of parents or children (or by them) or indeed, anyone who would be offended by it
nd justice are the virtues through which we decide what needs to be done; fortitude gives us the strength to do it and temperance tells us how to do it.
at least avoidance of peer pressures.
anges and complexities of our world today.
The first was the hunt for a Christmas tree. I seem to recall that there was some subterfuge required as pine and cypress trees in and about the town were council property. Daddy could not participate as he was a high panjandrum in the government, so it was up to Mum.
Carols by candlelight were held at the amphitheatre. Daddy who loved to sing, would sing protracted Noweeeeeeeels, much to the amazement of all in general and our acute embarrassment! There were a little crib and a live donkey: I always loved Away in a Manger thereafter.
n and service people like rubbish collectors. We carried wrapped sweets in the car to throw out to the Swazi children who would run along the side of the road calling out ma-sweeet, ma- sweeti!
n Christmas Eve we would be given orange bags as stockings to hang on the end of our beds for Father Christmas presents. We retired very early and awoke at about four a.m. to start investigating … soon rustle, rustle would turn to yips of glee and look what I’ve got’s.
e still managed to eat turkey with cranberry sauce and roast potatoes, wearing silly hats and reading silly jokes… then came the pudding, bathed in blue flame with glints of silver treasure. In the pudding, Mum had inserted sixpences and tickeys (threepence) which was big money – our pocket money was tickey a week.
begin again.
There are some very wild cards now in play in global politics. They are not who might be called gentlemen. I would call them loose 
cannons, who have abundant egos, few scruples and Messianistic delusions.
Then there are the others who are really nihilists and anarchists who have been fighting the world for some time.
right. Circle those wagons, don’t let any strangers near…
Two metres away from me a pink and grey galah has swooped onto the hanging basket which serves as a seed feed for our avian visitors. The first visitor of the day there is usually the beautiful 
Indian blue ring-necked parakeet, obviously an exotic escapee, who stridently whistles at us to replenish the dish with sunflower seeds.
coloured rainbow lorikeets who perch in the nearby cabbage tree like Christmas decorations shrieking and murmuring. They are tough characters: I saw one back down a magpie on our lawn, hop-charging it until it moved on. They have just chased off the galah which is a much bigger bird too!
ce or remarriage or death.
These are the iconic foodstuffs loved by all South Africans: biltong being strips of dried salted meat; boerewors the spicy farmers’ sausage without which a braaivleis is just another meal.
One of the most obvious targets of the political machinations deployed to rectify the apparent iniquities of the past has been rugby.
Simple in concept: everyone subordinates their historical differences to seek a common goal.
A thought that recurs since the Brexit vote and the Trump emergence is how the electorate has seized inappropriate vehicles to express their discontent. It seems democracy has failed to a great extent in the First World . It never succeeded elsewhere really…
