Official Bank Sites Related Information Multimedia July 19, 2006—Tackling corruption, improving the business environment, trade and giving support to countries who’ve suffered through conflict are some of the key ingredients to helping Africa move ahead. That was a key message delivered by World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz in an address to the 7th Leon Sullivan Summit in the Nigerian capital, Abuja. Wolfowitz also praised Nigeria for its reforms and urged the country, as well as other nations in Africa, to continue to press on with reform, saying it was needed to spur private sector investment in the continent. “Sustaining reform is absolutely critical, “he said. “Nigeria is facing a crucial election here next year. It’s very important that whoever is the next president carries on this momentum of reform.” While describing Africa as a continent on the move, Wolfowitz said it still faced big obstacles, including HIV/AIDS and malaria. “A million children, most of them in sub-Saharan Africa, die every year from malaria,” he said. “That’s about 3,000 a day. Think about that one. That’s the number of children dying every day from malaria and malaria is a preventable disease. It can be eradicated in sub-Saharan Africa and it must be eradicated here. “ Wolfowitz said it was clear “governments in Africa respond to their people and people in Africa are demanding change.” Wolfowitz told the audience, which included African political and business leaders, that good government policy was essential to achieve success and encourage the private sector. Citing the example of South Korea, which he described as one of the success stories of the world, Wolfowitz said government policy “makes all the difference.” 
World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz and Nigeria's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, at a meeting with Nigeria's Economic Team during a visit by Mr. Wolfowitz to Abuja to attend the 7th Sullivan Summit.
© World Bank / Tony Nwosu “And it makes a difference in very many ways. One of those ways is bad policy gets in the way of the private sector and good policy gives the private sector, private businessmen and private individuals the opportunity to realize the fruits of their own creativity, their own intelligence and in doing so, to create jobs and opportunity for other people,” he said. Wolfowitz said the evidence Africa was a continent on the move was in the economic data. “Africa last year grew at 5% continent wide and that’s a pretty decent number,” he said. “More impressively to me, there’s some 15 African countries, in the last 10 years, that have had sustained positive growth rates of four percent or better over a 10 year period.” Wolfowitz said that two of the best performers in that group – with economic growth rates between 8 and 10 percent – were Mozambique and Rwanda. He said Rwanda had been through one of the most terrible genocides since World War Two and Mozambique “had been through years of civil war.” “There’s been a big change in the area of security and Rwanda and Mozambique have demonstrated what people who’ve been ravaged by war can do when they finally have peace. Tanzania and Burkina demonstrate the great advantages of countries that have enjoyed peace through their history. And Liberia, where I’ll be visiting later this week is a country that does finally have a chance, because it does have peace. Wolfowitz said if Ethiopia could achieve peace, “Ethiopia with peace would no longer be the poorest country in the world.” And he said four or five years ago there were 16 wars on the continent, with that number now down to six. The Bank President also praised efforts to stamp out corruption, and told how in meetings with African Governors of the World Bank they’d all spoken of the need to “improve governance and fight corruption.” And he praised Nigeria’s success in getting back $500 million – money looted by former to help the country’s people. Wolfowitz also spoke of the dynamism of the private sector, and said he’d seen in Tanzania firsthand at a bed net factory, a public private partnership, just how the private sector was helping governments deliver services to the poor. He also stressed the Bank’s commitment to help improve infrastructure in Africa. “Rwanda and all other African countries need reliable power supply. That’s a big challenge in Tanzania and we’re going to work to help the Government of Tanzania fix that.” Wolfowitz also called on African nations to further their efforts to do away with cumbersome regulations and said there was a need for the international community to provide more assistance quickly to post conflict countries, like Liberia. |
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