From Casablanca to Cape Town

Adel Darwish reports on the EU-OAU conference held in Cairo.

The imbalance between warm words and cold realities became increasingly evident as the summit brought together 67 leaders from Europe and Africa. The two day meeting highlighted not only the gap between very rich and terribly poor continents, but also the wide divergence of opinion on how best to tackle Africa's problems. 

Not only did the priorities of African leaders differ from those of their European counterparts, they also differed sharply from one African nation to another. However, the first item on the agenda for all African leaders, from Egypt to Angola, was a desire to share concerns over Africa's mounting debts. Africa, already the poorest continent, owes the rest of the world a staggering $375 billion. This amount is equal to three-quarters of its GDP and nearly four times its annual exports. 

The EU could and should be more helpful by directing more investment to the African continent 

About 30 African governments spend as much per person in servicing debts as they do on health and education combined and the number of countries falling into arrears is increasing. Falling commodity prices have exacerbated the problem. The exception is oil, but with the exception of Algeria, Egypt, Libya and Nigeria, most African countries must import, at rising prices. Poor levels of international investment further compound the problem - only one per cent of the world's private investment goes to sub-Saharan Africa. Africans claim that this meagre share fails to reflect their progress. 

Left wing and liberal voices joined together in calling for the cancellation of Africa's debts. Others argued that the corruption which led to the problem has not been eradicated and said cancellation of the debts was not, at this time, an answer. 

Some economists at Cairo declared that many African countries are working hard and making good economic progress. The EU could and should be more helpful by directing more investment to the African continent, they said. 

There is certainly some truth in that opinion; the signs are that decades of decline are coming to an end in many places as a result of the imposition of new measures. Population management programmes are paying off in a number of key states. The continent as a whole has seen annual economic growth of over three per cent in recent years, and 13 countries have achieved five per cent or more. Most of them have also liberalised their economies. Another important indicator, African economists point out, is that the average gap between official and market exchange rates shrank from 45 per cent in 1991 to just five per cent last year. 

From Europe, the view is somewhat different. There is a desire to help Africa economically, European leaders say, but there were also strong hints that the Europeans regard Africa's economic problems as symptomatic of an historic disease, namely widespread corruption and misrule by dictators. 

The famine that struck Ethiopia was a poignant reminder of Africa's tragedy. In a dramatic plea, Ethiopia's foreign minister accused Europe of waiting ''to see skeletons on screens" before agreeing to send aid to drought-stricken citizens of his country, currently threatened with famine. The EU's development commissioner responded by saying that Europe is mobilising aid, but in Brussels strong fears exist that relief efforts will be hampered by the simmering war between Ethiopia and its equally destitute neighbour, Eritrea. 

The war - said to be costing both sides around $1 million a day- is hindering western efforts to send relief supplies to those dying of starvation. It was EU efforts that persuaded the two sides to let relief agencies use their ports and transport lines to feed famine stricken people. 

However, development aid, as a proportion of the EU economy, has fallen by a third in the past decade as donor governments decided too much money was ending up in the wrong pockets. The flow of aid and investment will not open up again, European experts and commentators agree, unless governments create the confidence to attract it. 

Libya's Colonel Muammer Gadaffi took the opportunity of the summit to meet with EU president Romano Prodi. The meeting was seen to be another important step towards rehabilitating the black sheep of the international community and part of Mr Prodi's personal attempt to help to bring the Colonel back into the wider international community. Mr Prodi was criticised by European leaders last December when he invited the Libyan leader to Brussels, a meeting that ultimately, failed to take place. 

The EU wants Libya's official acceptance for the full participation of both Israel and the Palestinian Authority in the Euro-Med dialogue and an undertaking that no attempt to block the Middle East peace process, will be made by the Libyan leader. 

Europe renewed its promises to consider the debt issue 

The Colonel used his first international appearance since last year's lifting of UN sanctions against Libya, to upstage the others. ''Stop looking at us as slaves,'' he demanded. ''We need water pumps, not democracy.'' 

Whether they are by now too used to Colonel's tantrums and banner waving, to take what he says seriously, or for more cunning reasons, European leaders seemed to be completely unfazed by his remarks. He even found himself courted by some European leaders eager to take advantage of oil-rich Libya's rehabilitation. They include Germany's chancellor, Gerhard Schroder, France's president, Jacques Chirac, Spain's prime minister, Jose Maria Aznar, and Ireland's prime minister, Bertie Ahern. 

Only a few days before the conference Colonel Gadaffi gave his analysis on America's change of heart. "The Americans made a smart move," said the Colonel commenting on the US State department sending a delegation to Libya in March and declaring it safe for US citizens to travel there. "They sent this delegation after long years of boycott and the rise in oil prices." 

On a more serious note, there was a positive mood of reconciliation. Morocco's King Mohammed, like his father before him, is an advocate of a greater EU role for his country, but unlike his father he had a meeting with Algeria's President Abdelaziz Bouteflika to attempt to sort out long-standing differences between the two. 

The isolated military ruler of Sudan, Omar Bashir, made use of the gathering to cosy up to Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak. Cairo has long been hostile to Sudan's harbouring of armed Islamists accused of terrorist actions in the region. 

Observers noted the warmth by which attendants greeted President Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria who won a national vote to replace military dictatorship. The presence of Senegal's outgoing president Abdou Diouf, who lost a democratic election, was another signal to show that, despite the continent's poor image, democracy is making headway. 

But there were other reminders of Africa's endless strifes. Absent were the leaders of Ethiopia and Rwanda, who may have preferred not to risk encountering their respective enemies, the leaders of Eritrea and Congo. Given the big issues, the huge gathering with conflicting interests, and non clarity of an agenda the Cairo Declaration - the summit's agreement on a 110-point charter was something to applaud as an historic achievement. Written, predictably, in vague and watered-down fashion, it covers a wide range of concerns from trade to aid to human rights to the return of African artefacts displayed, or hidden in European museums. 

There was vagueness on the EU side too. Europe renewed its promises to consider the debt issue. And in his concluding remarks, Portugal's prime minister, Antonio Guterres, said that Europe now "fully understood what the burden of debt means to Africa." Good stuff if he meant it, now the EU should put its money where its mouth is.