HDR lays bare major political and human development challenges

Many West African nations risk falling far short of developmental targets they and other UN member states have pledged to achieve by 2015, according to the 2002 Human Development Report (HDR), released on 24 July by the UN Development Programme. The report, which establishes a link between politics and human development, also shows that the region faces a major challenge in the area of civil and political rights. The 189 UN member states have set themselves the target of eradicating extreme poverty and hunger as part of a set of Millenium Development Goals (MDG) to be achieved by 2015. Other goals include achieving universal primary education, promoting gender equality and empowering women, reducing infant mortality and ensuring environmental sustainability. Progress on millenium development goals The report found that, of 21 countries in or bordering on West Africa, only Ghana and Nigeria had been able to halve the proportion of its people suffering from hunger - one of the MDG targets. Another 10 were on track, one was slipping back, another one was lagging, while three lagged far behind. There was no data for four countries. None of the West African countries for which data was provided had achieved the target of ensuring that all children can complete primary education, the report showed. Four were on target; six lagged far behind. Six countries were on track towards eliminating gender disparities in primary school, but six others lagged far behind. Cape Verde was the only West African nation that had managed to eliminate such gaps in secondary education. Two others were on target, one was slipping back, while seven lagged far behind. Another objective the world’s nations have set themselves is halving the proportion of people without access to improved water sources. Four West African nations were on the way to achieving this target, one was lagging, while four were far behind. The region was still far from achieving another key target, that of reducing infant mortality by two-thirds: Two countries were on track; three were slipping back or lagging and 15 were far behind. Civic and political rights The report notes that in the 1980s and 1990s, the world made “dramatic progress in opening up political systems and expanding political freedoms”, with 81 countries taking significant steps towards democracy and 140 of the world’s nearly 200 nations holding multiparty elections. West Africa is no exception: the 1990s saw many elected governments replace military or one-party regimes. However, the region still has a long way to go towards ensuring full enjoyment of political and civil rights, according to subjective indicators of governance published in the HDR. This indicators - provided by independent sources such as Freedom House, the International Country Risk Guide and the World Bank Governance Indicators Dataset - refer to 2000 in some cases and 2001 in others. They include civil liberties, political rights, press freedom, and law and order. The concepts measured to gauge enjoyment of civil liberties were: freedom of expression and belief; freedom of association and organisational rights; rule of law and human rights; and personal autonomy and economic rights. The report had such indicators for 20 of the 21 countries. There were none for Liberia. Only three West African nations were judged to have offered their citizens full civil liberties: Benin; Cape Verde and Sao Tome and Principe. Another 15 were partly free, while Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea were judged not free. Seven countries did not provide their citizens with free political rights: Cameroon, Chad, Cote d’Ivoire, Equatorial Guinea, The Gambia, Guinea, and Mauritania. Variables on which the assessment was based included free and fair elections to offices with real power, and freedom of political organisation. Others included significant opposition, freedom from domination by powerful groups, and autonomy or political inclusion of minority groups. People in five countries - Cape Verde, Benin, Ghana, Mali and Sao Tome/Principe - enjoyed full political rights, while the remaining eight countries were partly free. Benin, Mali, Sao Tome/Principe, and Senegal enjoyed freedom of the press, interpreted as media objectivity and freedom of expression. There was partial freedom in six countries, while the press was not free in 10 others: Cameroon, Chad, Cote d’Ivoire, Equatorial Guinea, The Gambia, Guinea, Mauritania, Niger, Sierra Leone, Togo. Law and order was assessed by measuring concepts such as legal impartiality and popular observance of the law. Of the 14 countries for which scores were given, only one, The Gambia, received a good rating, while the others were either poor or borderline. And where rule of law was concerned, of the 19 countries for which data was available (there was none for Liberia and Sao Tome), 15 fared poorly while three performed tolerably. [For the full report, go to http://www.undp.org/hdr2002/]