Support for NEPAD blueprint may be weakened

The blueprint for Africa's development could be jeopardised by a lack of clear communication on key issues, an analyst told IRIN. Press reports this week suggested that US $6 billion in international aid could be jeopardised by the lack of a coherent and clearly communicated commitment to a political governance peer review mechanism under the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD). This followed recent statements by one of NEPAD's champions, South African President Thabo Mbeki, that political governance review was the jurisdiction of the African Union (AU) and that NEPAD would focus on economic performance. Mbeki later backtracked and the NEPAD heads-of-state implementing committee said countries would voluntarily subject themselves to political peer review under NEPAD - but only until AU structures were set up to take over those functions. This prompted a letter from the current chairman of the Group of Eight (G8) industrialised nations, Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien, asking Mbeki to explain what exactly was to happen to the governance side of the peer review mechanism, a key factor driving G8 support for the programme. Mbeki's reply, circulated among diplomatic circles in South Africa, was reported by local press to have been a 'technocratic' obfuscation of the position of political peer review within NEPAD. However, Mbeki's spokesman Bheki Khumalo rejected this. "There's been an acceptance now that there will be comprehensive peer review by NEPAD until the AU structures are set up," he told IRIN. This, he said, was a clear position and the confusion around it was surprising. South African newspaper Business Day reported on Wednesday that Canadian Trade Minister Pierre Pettigrew warned in Johannesburg that G8 financial support to Africa was conditional on political peer review under NEPAD. "The US $6 billion is conditional on all NEPAD elements, of which good governance is a part and peer review is part of that. We recognise that NEPAD is the only initiative on the horizon that offers the hope of attracting significant international engagement in support of Africa," Pettigrew was quoted as saying. Ross Herbert, an analyst with the South African Institute for International Affairs, told IRIN that unclear communication on peer review was symptomatic of South Africa having encountered divergent views on the issue within the AU. "There's a wide range of views of how to do peer review ... they started out saying we [NEPAD] would do political peer review, not that NEPAD would do it for three years and hand it over to another body. Everybody knows there's uncertainty [regarding peer review], Togo's view of human rights will not be the same as South Africa's," said Herbert. The confusion could have arisen through the linking of NEPAD to the AU, two processes that were developed separately. The initial concept of NEPAD was that it was "not going to be something any old dictator could join to get the benefits, but a more narrow type of reformist club, this has now gradually shifted to become more inclusive until it is now completely hitched to the AU," Herbert added. In peer review NEPAD aimed to use the "carrot and stick: potential aid benefits and potential sanctions or condemnation from Africa to someone running off the rails". NEPAD was developed as an adjunct to the AU's predecessor, the Organisation for African Unity (OAU). The OAU was widely seen as ineffective in enforcing good governance and respect for human rights. "There are a lot of states that by no stretch of the imagination meet the standards of fair, democratic and clean governance [within the AU]," Herbert added.