In Saturday’s National Post, there was an excellent interview with Dambisa Moyo, which provided a very good explanation of why aid to Africa has failed and should be abandoned in favour of the free market. The best quotes, in my opinion:
… try to raise a teenager to be an engineer or a doctor or to really contribute to the global society when you are constantly being told you are poor, you’re inefficient, you need a handout. This is not a formula for success. It is a great disappointment that, by and large, celebrities use their platforms to basically push a negative story…
So I believe it would be a much better use of Mr. [Stephen] Lewis’s time to actually agitate for the things that can meaningfully put a dent in poverty across the African continent instead of pushing a strategy that means that, in another 50 years … your children and your children’s children will basically be paying for my children and my children’s children to go to school and get health care.
The emphasis is mine. Methinks I may need to pick up her book.