EU money in repressive regimes must be more carefully monitored for results
Posted, March 14, 2011 @ 00:00
Brussels, 14th March 2011 -- A hearing in the European Parliament today, chaired by Nirj Deva MEP, heard how the largest recipient of EU aid - Ethiopia - has an extremely repressive regime that provides little accountability for the EU funding that goes to it.
MEPs on the parliament's human rights and development committees heard from Human Rights Watch how the elections of 2010 were described by EU monitors of falling "short of international commitments" and how the 99.6 percent victory for the regime was linked to political repression and the impunity of its security forces. HRW also said that there is a lack of freedoms of expression, assembly and association. Independent media is either closed down or it chooses to self-censor in order to remain operative.
The European Commission confirmed that it has a development budget of €644 million for Ethiopia, with a large majority spent on food aid and basic needs. Mr Deva called on the commission to look again at what tangible results (schools, roads etc) the money was delivering, rather than simply spouting figures. He asked for an independent process of control to be carried out. He wanted to know how many schools, hospitals, kilometres of road are being built, how many students fed, how many sick treated and exactly how much money is being spent.
Speaking after the hearing, Mr Deva, who is European Conservatives and Reformists group development spokesman and vice-president of the development committee, said:
"We throw a lot of money at Ethiopia but we do not hear enough about the outcomes. It is right that the EU is supporting people there but we also need to be able to go back to our taxpayers and say that their cash paid for x schools, y hospitals and prevented z people from starvation. We measure inputs but not outcomes and in a country that is as oppressive as Ethiopia it is important to ensure that our money is never being abused by an authoritarian regime.
"With EU development assistance we should also demand long-term reforms from the governments to create stable democracies and functioning economies. We should be compassionate but we should also make it clear to the Ethiopian regime that we are not prepared to continue paying for their mistakes."