EFL
Bob Geldof astonished the aid community yesterday by using a return visit to Ethiopia to praise the Bush administration as one of Africa's best friends in its fight against hunger and Aids. The musician-turned activist said Washington was providing major assistance, in contrast to the European Union's "pathetic and appalling" response to the continent's humanitarian crises. "You'll think I'm off my trolley when I say this, but the Bush administration is the most radical — in a positive sense — in its approach to Africa since Kennedy," Geldof told the Guardian. The neo-conservatives and religious rightwingers who surrounded President George Bush were proving unexpectedly receptive to appeals for help, he said. "You can get the weirdest politicians on your side." Former president Bill Clinton had not helped Africa much, despite his high-profile visits and apparent empathy with the downtrodden, the organiser of Live Aid, claimed. "Clinton was a good guy, but he did fuck all."
Well, I'd disagree with the good guy part.
| But Bill said he was. He wouldn't lie to us, would he? |
Lord Alli, the aid activist who is accompanying Geldof on the trip organised by the UN children's aid agency Unicef, echoed his praise of the Bush administration. "Clinton talked the talk and did diddly squat, whereas Bush doesn't talk, but does deliver," Lord Alli said.
| Better start polishing your resume, Lord. They're gonna toss you out of the NGO club for those remarks... |
This is the Irish musician's first visit to Ethiopia since the 1985 Live Aid concert that raised $60m for famine victims. With his compatriot Bono, of the rock group U2, Geldof has become a leading figure in the campaigns for debt relief and trade reform. He and Bono met Tony Blair in Downing Street last week to ask the prime minister to put Africa's Aids pandemic on the agenda of the G8 summit. The non-governmental organisation, ActionAid, expressed surprise at Geldof's comments. "Bush's increased aid comes with harmful loan conditions," its USA policy officer, Rick Rowden, said. Justin Forsyth, Oxfam's director of campaigns and policy, said Geldof's remarks "shouldn't be taken out of context ... Bob Geldof rightly highlighted that the Bush administration deserve credit for dramatically increasing US aid for HIV programmes in Africa. Salih Booker, executive director of Africa Action, a Washington-based NGO, said Mr Clinton's Africa rhetoric was often hollow, but that he deserved credit for pushing through an African Growth and Opportunity Act, which is supposed to give certain countries access to US markets.
| It's worked wonders. You can buy all sorts of things now, from, ummm... |
But Geldof was adamant that the EU was the greater villain for delivering just a small fraction of Ethiopia's staple needs and refusing, unlike the US and Britain, to supply any supplementary foods, such as oil, which give a balanced diet. "The EU have been pathetic and appalling, and I thought we had dealt with that 20 years ago when the electorate of our countries said never again," he said. Warning that the "horror of the 80s" could return, he added: "The last time I spoke to the EU's aid people, they didn't even know where their own ships were. The food is there, get it here."
Bob Geldof is one celebrity who puts his money where his mouth is. |