By Edward Chisanga
The ignored, yet perhaps most deciding factor
After reading comments about Zambia’s failed attempt to install its citizen, Samuel Maimbo into the post of African Development Bank President (AfDB), allow me to offer a dissenting view that seems to be overwhelmingly absent in the other assessments.
The beginning is that although largely dominated by foreign shareholders, election of President of the AfDB seems to follow the African Union model (AU) of regional rotation even if this may be unwritten. While external shareholders like the US and other rich members may prefer merit, for example, that they may continue to vote for the same country’s representative in the next twenty years, as long as he or she delivers, there’s always the AU’s mindset that each member country must ‘enjoy’ the leadership of the organization by having its own citizen.
Since its formation in 1964, I see Rwanda, Morocco, Senegal, Zambia, Malawi, Ghana, Tunisia, Sudan and of course, Nigeria, the outgoing as previous holders. No country then has held it twice. This may be accidental, but I doubt. And this list of former holders is open to the public. All African countries know about it.
So, while some may argue that the rules of AfDB selection of its President have nothing to do with my view, that it’s purely merit, I see loopholes that point directly at the possibility of political influence. I see that eventually, a point comes when member states can easily group privately, at regional, neighborhood or some partnership level to gossip and say that Zambia was once President, why should we have it again?
From what I read, at one point, the Zambian candidate trailed behind the final winner. He was number two, and some may argue that my point is hot air. ‘How come he was almost number one?’ At this point when he became number two, it’s possible that, that’s when the point I’m making worked. I simply don’t see Tanzania, Malawi, Mali, Benin or any other thinking country want to vote for a Zambian to have the position two times when their own citizens have not been even once.
If we had trusted some civil servants who’ve worked in international or regional organizations (and we’ve many in government today), and respected their advice, they’d have explained to government how strong the point I’m using here stands among Africans. They know very well about
More importantly, is the AfDB really performing?
The flamboyantly dressed and vocal outgoing AfDP President, A. Adesina, making his last swan song statement said, “When I was first elected in 2015, the Bank’s capital stood at $93 billion. Today, it has grown to $318 billion. This expansion enabled unprecedented financial support to African countries, with $102 billion approvals over the past 10 years – accounting for 46% of all approvals since the Bank’s inception in 1964. I earnestly gave Africa my heart, my mind, and my all.”
Yet, the correlation, on the one hand, between six decades of AfDB’s life, nine former Presidents and so much capital of $318 billion, and performance, on the other hand fail completely to meet high expectations of the suffering citizens in the continent. Just how’s it possible that nine former Presidents of the bank, and so much money injected in it have, for sixty years failed to industrialize Africa? Instead of giving his heart, mind and all, the outgoing President in a bowtie and others before him should have given their head. Head and heart emit different results.
The AfDB is an elite organization, only known to those who’ve been to school. But even they don’t benefit from it. They may understand what it is, how it works but not what benefits it emits to them. So, the bowtie man can say whatever good words he wants. He’ll say he accomplished a lot. But, what do villagers in Nigeria, Ghana, Zambia and all the fifty-five countries in Africa say?
And as usual, it’s the same more ‘keeping up appearances’ you see and hear in African leaders than the desired outcome. They sing about outputs such as increased capital but say little or nothing about results. Their Heads of State and African public media too are preoccupied with statements like, “Meet the people vying to lead Africa’s top development bank,” instead of what they’ll do, and what past Presidents have done for poor citizens of Africa. Are Africans really interested in assessing what these people have done for Africa, and whether a decision is necessary that we no longer require them?
Below in Figure 1, I present a graph showing performance trend of Africa’s real GDP and real GDP per capita from 1964 – 2023. At the height of increased AfDB capital and swagger, my findings do not show a strong correlation between the lending given to the continent and its economic performance. I particularly draw the attention of the reader to the trend of real GDP per capita which directly affects individual African citizens. For almost sixty years, each individual annual growth has always been below 4% while GDP growth is largely below 6%. But most of it has also been many episodes of negative growths for the real GDP per capita. Is that the Africa you want?
The answer to the foregoing question: Is the AfDB performing lies in how African governments are using the funds to develop their countries and the continent. And of course, too, how the AfDB secretariat is using these resources to support governments. I’ve often heard from some officials working for the bank that their daily hotel stay costs much more than what other international organizations pay for their staff.
And each year, these stays are not few. Can African citizens have free access to these costs to see how much is being spent on the secretariat and how much this percentage is of the total capital that the outgoing President in a bowtie crows about? And, again, please give us the correlation between this amount and outcome or the final benefits to poor street kids of countries that have been Presidents of the AfDB before.
It’s disappointing that African government’s main role in the bank is to simply float their nationals to become its President while financial ownership belongs to the outside. The question is: if you don’t contribute financially to the AfDB, why do you want to lead the organization? Where’s your integrity in simply wanting to benefit without corresponding contribution?
Concluding
The difference between the AfDB and Asian Development Bank is that while the former has excelled in reinforcing the “keeping up appearances,” its counterpart in Asia doesn’t have to explain what it does, or has done since its creation in 1966, almost the same time as the African one. Today, driven by the Asian bank, developing Asia, even excluding China is seriously competing with giants like the US in technology in general, and in particular, in global trade in electronics, manufacturing and inward FDI flows. The final outcome is that developing countries in Asia have massively reduced hunger and poverty while in Africa measurements of success continues to rely on outputs.
Finally, perhaps the main shareholders like the USA and other developed nations should take over the Presidency of the AfDB and drop Africans from running it. What0s the point of continued keeping up appearances for people who’ve failed us continuously?
