AGOA, AFRICOM and Kenya topped US President George W Bush's six-day tour of Africa, writes Gamal Nkrumah Optimism is a powerful emotion. One used frequently by politicians, and United States President George W Bush is no exception. He made the most of being upbeat during his African tour this week. The African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) is marketed as a panacea for Africa's economic woes. The administration of former president Bill Clinton made much political capital out of AGOA. America, and especially the Bush administration, has a tendency to reinvent the wheel. The bottom line is that this has not been an extraordinary week for Africa. The immediate effect of Bush's African tour is anything but dramatic. Laura Bush, the American first lady, has been to Africa five times since her husband took office. This is Bush's second trip to the continent. It is too late for Bush to transform the international image of the US. The Bush administration is an outgoing one. So what is the significance of the timing of his African tour? And, why did he choose to visit mainly tiny, economically insignificant countries? These questions are partly answered by the manner in which the African presidents that received Bush fell over backwards to curry favour with him. They listened attentively to his romanticist message, and nodded politely in agreement. Indeed, some of the bodily gestures and welcoming statements of his African hosts appeared downright sycophantic. This was no trip for tough talk. After all, Bush paid visits to Benin, Ghana and Liberia in West Africa, Rwanda and Tanzania in East Africa. In his most outspoken remarks yet about the future of the continent, Bush very poignantly summed up his African vision, "we care when we see suffering." That simply did not wash. Only Ghana and Tanzania have populations of more than 20 million. The only rational explanation is that he intentionally visited countries that are best aping the American democratic system. What the five countries Bush stopped at have in common is that they are vibrant democracies, model democracies, by American standards. Thankfully, Bush did not provoke outrage, as is his wont, except perhaps in Tanzania where Muslims constitute a significant proportion of the population. Bush was met there by angry demonstrators who brandished placards that were extremely hostile to him and to the US. The paradox is that Africans are receiving Bush at a time when American economic prowess is on the wane, and the star of China is on the rise. Unlike America, China's aid and trade with Africa has no strings attached to it. China does not harp on good governance and human rights. China does business. Yet, Bush's hosts hoped, too, to do business with the world's largest and richest economy. Why are African countries unable to reap the benefits of globalisation like their Asian counterparts? "My country is also benefiting from the president's Millennium Challenge Account initiative as well as the AGOA, whose ultimate goal is to create the conditions favourable to economic growth in a sustainable manner in order to reduce poverty and build an emerging nation," Benin's President Boni Yayi said. Benin signed a $307 million deal with the Millennium Challenge Account. Yet, what his hosts politely declined to tell Bush is that the subsidies dished out to American farmers actually harm African peasants, indeed, ruin their chances of making a living. The Beninois economy is dependent on cotton exports. Cotton accounts for 40 per cent of the tiny West African country's gross domestic product (GDP) and up to 80 per cent of its exports. American subsidies to its own cotton farmers have caused untold damage to the Beninois cotton crop. Bush also tackled political matters. "In Kenya, we are backing the efforts of former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan to end the crisis," Bush noted at the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art just before his departure for Africa. "And, when we are on the continent, I have asked Condi Rice to travel to Kenya to support the work of [Annan] and to deliver a message directly to Kenya's leaders," Bush said at the Smithsonian. Note, symbolically significant, that leaders was in the plural. Indeed, Bush dispatched Rice to meet with Kenyan leaders, both government and opposition. "There must be an immediate halt to violence, there must be justice for the victims of abuse and there must be a full return to democracy," Bush explained. That reflects another problem. Democracy does not feed the hungry millions of Africa. Democracy furnishes a forum and a process by which frustration is vented, but it doesn't solve vital issues of economic survival. One ground for hope is that more African countries are growing economically at a galloping pace. That rapid growth, if it is indeed anything other than WB statistics, is neither due to democracy nor to American intervention. It is due in part to the massive influx of cheap Chinese consumer goods, greater stability of the continent, and even greater exploitation of the mineral wealth and the labour force. Part of the Bush agenda is to convince Africa that globalisation provides a substitute for economic mismanagement, whatever that means to the neo-cons. Bush's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) is a carrot of sorts. PEPFAR reflects another no less pertinent a problem: America still poses as the indispensable benefactor. Throwing money at AIDS sufferers seems to be Bush's way of saying "we care." Interestingly, the shining examples of "good governance" in Africa that the Bush administration so applauds are among the most loathed and feared by their neighbours. Rwanda, for instance. The regime of Rwandan President Paul Kagame is authoritarian, yet the West turns a blind eye and regards Kagame as one of its most important protégés. A debate that has exercised the great minds of the region for more than a decade is why Kagame has such an influence in Western capitals and why now Washington has trained 7,000 Rwandan troops and spent more than $17 million to equip and arm Rwandan troops in Darfur. In one respect at least, Bush's African tour is an eye-opener. Bush's trip to Rwanda, like that of Clinton before him, only reinforces the political influence of a country that far outweighs its size and economic potential. Oh yes, Bush just happened to visit the genocide memorial in Rwanda. There was much talk of helping those who help themselves. Bush's Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) provides funds for poor countries if they can come up with clever ideas. Few Africans are banking on the MCC, though. There is a consensus that only a select few will benefit from the MCC. Governments in contemporary Africa have a great deal of direct rivals, not least of whom are the NGOs. Civil society is the animating force in many an African country. Governments come and go, and the notion of one party monopolising state power is almost a thing of yesteryear. But the struggles to ascertain civil rights are still weak forces in many African countries. That is essentially because of prevalent and abject poverty. Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, Africa's first elected woman leader, was the focus of much US attention. For Washington, she stands as the symbol of hope, her country having been embroiled in a bitter and brutal civil war for decades on end, though just what her prospects are of producing a revival of Liberia's defunct economy are moot. For the US, Johnson-Sirleaf remains a pivotal figure in African politics because she symbolises change of sorts, while re- enforcing dependence on the West. She would not have come to power without US backing and her predecessor, Charles Taylor, who stood up against what he saw as Western interference in African affairs, now languishes in jail in the Netherlands, and is being tried by the International Criminal Court. Johnson-Sirleaf, on the other hand, has no qualms about furthering Western interests in Africa. She urged the Bush administration to make Liberia the headquarters of the controversial US-led Africa Command (AFRICOM) and as a veteran World Bank official, she is well acquainted with Western ways and perspectives, the new economic world order, and most importantly Pax-Americana. Incidentally, Johnson-Sirleaf is the only African president to offer her services to the US military. Johnson-Sirleaf is the ideal African leader as far as the Bush administration is concerned. Other preferred African leaders are Tanzanian president, Ghanaian President John Jufour and, of course, Beninois President Boni Yaye. The momentum behind the Americans in Africa is not what it was during the Cold War era. The war on terror, Africa's potential as a major oil supplier to the US (currently 16 per cent of US oil imports), and AFRICOM are the superpower's priorities in Africa today. The continent is no longer enemy turf, not even with Chinese competition for hydrocarbons and raw materials. There is also progress on the ground for champions of what is mistakenly called free trade, and there are no obvious socialists to be found. The botched handling of Africa's underdevelopment concerns is America's opportunity on the continent. Bush made smarmy speeches of little substance and even less consequence. Few understood what he was talking about, but most pretended that they did.
