The speaker at our July meeting was Helen Magombo, who advises Oxfam on development policy. She spoke chiefly about the impact of policy decisions on her home country of Malawi. Her view? “We need to get more sassy, more radical” on aid. We need to push harder to ensure that aid money goes to the right places.
Right now, said Helen, there are huge transparency issues around aid. A lot of money actually goes to UK-based companies, which means it never reaches the Malawian economy because it never leaves the UK economy. She is fighting for the proposed 0.7 % target, which would mean that 0.7% of the UK’s national income is spent in aid. But just as important as the amount itself is how much of it goes to the country being aided.
The 2010-2012 UK aid withdrawal had a huge negative impact on Malawi, said Helen. It happened because of a diplomatic spat, but the effects were devastating. (The UK is Malawi’s largest direct aid donor.)
One of the questions from the floor was “What do we [as Westerners trying to help] get wrong?” Helen suggested that groups like WDM in the UK need to connect more with similar groups in Africa and other countries. We shouldn’t assume that a poor country doesn’t have a thriving voluntary sector.
She also busted the myth that an aid-dependent country equals a country where people don’t work: “In Malawi, people are getting up from 3am trying to make a living.”
Helen now plans to return to Malawi and stand for election to parliament.
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