“Africa is not a great place and may not be for a long time to come, simply because the actions and spirit of most of its leaders point towards a pathetic future not a destiny of prosperity.” That’s what a biting editorial in yesterday’s Ugandan Daily Monitor says, on the occasion of Ugandan Independence Day. The article goes on to say that about $148 billion per year – a quarter of total African GDP – is lost each year to theft and corruption. (This figure is attributed to the Stolen Assets Recovery Initiative, although it seems to come from an African Union report dating from 2002.)
The editorial goes on to say: “The loot is safely and profitably banked or invested overseas – with full awareness of western governments and donor agencies – at the expense of social programmes including healthcare, education, infrastructural development and poverty alleviation.” And the conclusion: “That is why one must be either very naïve or dishonest to still speak of a bright future for this continent as was envisaged at the dawn of independence.”
The conclusion is perhaps overly pessimistic, but it is certainly true that as a simple matter of economics, if informal “transaction costs” attributable to corruption exceed profit margins, it is impossible to trade profitably. In other words, if the level of corruption is sufficiently high, widespread poverty is a guaranteed result. Development cannot succeed without driving out corruption.
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