I celebrated Africa Day, May 25, in Rome as a guest of my colleagues in the UN Millennium Campaign in Italy.  They have partnered with key social movements such as trade unions, academics, NGOs, Italy’s largest public media, MTV, and the city of Rome to form a grand coalition with African Diaspora and ItaliAfrica. Their aim is to build solidarity in Italy for the achievement of the Millennium Developmen Goals (MDGs) in Africa. They also urge the Italian government and people to honour their own commitments under the 8th goal of the MDGs.

Many of my colleagues were cynical about the trip. Could I persuade Italians and other G8 countries to do the right thing?  I am glad I decided to go because it gave me opportunity to form my own judgements on the condition of Africans in Italy and the potential for the new government in Italy to play a more progressive role in relation to Africa.

I was glad to see senior members of the government, high representatives of the European Commission and the European parliament at some of the meetings. I was particularly delighted that the energetic new minister for International Development, Mrs. Patricia Sentinelli, attended the conference, the rally and the concert. She hopes to move Italian policy in line with the best practice in Europe on international commitments.

However, I noticed that my African colleagues there had a similar kind of cynicism as my colleagues back home. Some of them even question why Italy claims that it wants to help Africa while some Africans in Italy are the poorest of the poor!

Their cynicism is not without foundation. They are very much aware that G8 countries including Italy dominate global trade, commerce, finance, global institutions, corporations and disproportionately use, misuse and abuse global resources. Against this stark reality, the rest of us look like poor tenants living on the fringes of the real estate of the G8 countries. Painful lessons from previous G8, EU, UN and other global summits lead to their sceptical expectation “not to expect anything at all.” That way they protect themselves against any disappointment. They do believe that there are many things the world’s most powerful countries can do about global problems, but they can no longer hold their breath that they will.

In the case of G8 the cynicism dates back to Gleneagles in 2005. This summit raised much hope that the richer countries were able and willing to start treating poorer people as fellow human beings in a shared estate that respects our common humanity with dignity, with fairer use and allocation of global resources for the common good. Old commitments such as those contained in the Millennium Declaration as translated into the MDGs were renewed while additional promises were made to fast track the end of the extreme poverty and hunger suffered by billions of people across the world but especially in Africa. They promised to reform global financial and trading regimes to facilitate fairer trade, write off odious debts of poor countries, and improve both the quantity and the quality and also the effectiveness of aid.

2005 was even declared ‘The year of Africa’ (thanks to that discredited and soon to be ex-PM Tony Blair of Great Britain) amidst optimism that the world would stop doing wrong to Africa. African leaders would start improving governance and increasing accountability to their own citizens. A buzz of activities could potentially but only briefly shut up the critics and cynics. Debt relief was provided for 14 African countries that were already in the HIPC initiative. Non-HIPC African countries like Nigeria had some of their debt cancelled while they paid off the rest (Nigeria paid back more to Britain in 2005-2006 than the global total of British Aid – therefore raises the question: who is aiding whom?). But the majority of the African countries unable to pay their debts are still waiting on bended knees at the G8 doors.

The volume of aid also increased in quantity, but old habits of tied aid, rewarding current favoured state leaders and withholding from those they disapprove of, lack of coordination but above all not meeting promises are still the practice. 2005 represented a high point in public awareness in the G8 countries and globally about these issues, forcing political leaders to take note and recommitting themselves to doing something. Today that awareness is lagging far behind all expectations. Aid levels are now falling because  G8 leaders are backsliding and retreating from their commitments.

And Italy is even the slowest of the Euro-15 group. The bulk of Italy’s aid is debt relief which means no new money. It is stuck at 0.20% of GNI instead of the 0.51 average of most of its Euro colleagues.

Of trade, debt and aid, aid is the weakest link, though the most visible politically. You can double, triple or quadruple aid, but without further significant movement on trade and universal debt relief the poorer countries of Africa, Asia and Latin America will continue to be trapped in the vicious circle of structural poverty induced and reproduced by the unequal terms of global trading regimes imposed by the richer countries through IMF/WB EU, and the WTO. These countries can trade their way fairly from poverty to prosperity. It is not aid that they need to develop, but a fairer trading system and opportunity to choose their own development model.

Most African countries produce what they do not consume and largely consume what they do not produce,  but the price of both what they produce and consume are determined from outside, by the EU, G8 and now increasingly China. Therefore Africa cannot be aided out of poverty without a fundamental reform of the unequal trade that is rigged against our producers, workers, professionals and domestic companies. Unfortunately but perhaps not surprising, this is the one area where the G8 countries, the EU and the USA have continued to conspire against the poorest peoples of the world in the stagnated so-called Development Round – Doha- negotiations in the WTO.

If the G8 wants to renew the faith of its own citizens in their leadership of the world and convince poor countries that they actually mean what they say the answer is very simple: Honour your own commitments. Africa does not need new promises but the fulfilment of old ones.

That’s my message to my Italian friends and progressive elements in government who are committed to a fairer world. Many of the social and political activists who care about international development are as frustrated with their countries’ long record of broken promises as we are with ours. The time to act is now. There can be no more excuses.

People in Africa do not know there is a new government in Italy because the policy impact of this change is not being felt yet. So far there have been only words, not actions. The country needs to show leadership in action. An immediate deed could be to stop the EU subsidy that makes it possible for Italian tomatoes to be dumped cheaply on the Ghanaian market, at a lower price than that of the local farmer. The Ghanaian farmer cannot sell at home and cannot sell in Italy. So where does he sell his tomatoes? Who buys them? The Italian farmer is not working harder than him but is paid by the EU to continue to overproduce while the Ghanaian farmer with his primitive hoes and cutlasses is surrendered to face “the market.” A market that is rigged against him. The farmer doesn’t need a new promise from Italy and the G8 but a fulfilment of old ones to end this trade injustice and right other wrongs.