Between Donors And Govt, Foreign Aid is Lost Along the Way.

(From The Monitor (Uganda) - AAGM)

Byline: Andrew Mwenda

We need to understand the reasons as to why the twin agendas of increasing aid and cancelling debt have not helped Africa out of poverty. Again, the experience of Uganda has important lessons. One lesson is that increased aid and debt forgiveness are not an incentive for better loan management on the part of borrowers.

The other lesson is that the international aid industry is not a neutral and altruistic agenda by the west to help poor countries. There is a lot of self-interest on the part of the donors, which distorts aid effectiveness.

In the first lesson, immediately Uganda's debts were forgiven, the government of Uganda now had the resources to buy a jet for the president whose cost of maintenance is Shs40m per day, Shs1.2b per month, making it 14.4b per year. This is equivalent to building 2,050 UPE classrooms, or training 1,250 doctors per year, etc. But it goes only to maintain the …