The Foreign Service Journal, March 2003

32 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / M A R C H 2 0 0 3 On Crucial Issues: Disappointment Critical voices and analysis on Powell and U.S. poli- cy are easy enough to find and hear, for on the issues Africa considers most crucial, there has been disap- pointment. Debt remains a crippling burden for African nations and the U.S. is thought to be ducking the issue, especially with the failure of the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries initiative that was supposed to provide effective relief. And there is still what African leaders and civil society groups alike consider hypocrisy in U.S. policies, which helps sustain African suspicion of the American commit- ment. Let market forces prevail, Africans are told; end pro- tection and open up. But U.S. and E.U. agricultural subsi- dies continue to handicap African agricultural exports. There was also disappointment at last June’s G-8 meeting in Kananaskis, Canada. Though both South African President Thabo Mbeki and Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo came for a day that was to focus on a concrete commitment to African needs, they felt they walked away with little more than expressions of sympathy. But it’s the campaign against terror and the looming war on Iraq that gets the grade of “incomplete” on the Africa report card. Will U.S. Africa policy be defined by the requirements of these efforts in the same way the Cold War defined U.S.-Africa relations three decades ago? War, almost certain to be accompanied by oil price shocks, could have a devastating effect on fragile African economies. Already, despite their pub- licly expressed commitment to the U.S.-led war on ter- ror, in African nations there is simmering resentment at how crucial resources that Africans feel would be bet- ter spent on development assistance are being spent for the war on terror. U.S. policy in some parts of Africa appears to be determined more by the Defense Department than the State Department. In the end, what is Secretary Powell’s continuing role likely to be? In Africa he remains a kind of bea- con on the still uncertain seas of administration poli- cy. Africans would rather have him there than not there. At least with Colin Powell, they’ve got a chance, they say. F O C U S 2000 N. 14th Street Suite 500 Arlington, VA 22201 Telephone (703) 797-3259 Fax (703) 524-7559 Tollfree (800) 424-9500