Imagine this scenario: despite the severe rainfalls, our reservoirs are losing water at an alarming rate and the workers there know that it is largely due to structural defects in the construction of those reservoirs and the pipes leading from them. The government decides to hold a conference and experts travel from around the world at our expense to inform us about the perils of global warming, the wonderful qualities of water, how life cannot exist without it, etc, etc without once mentioning the main cause of the current water wastage. Treaties are then signed with meaningless agreements about peace, goodwill, and harmony between nations and a firm commitment is made that another expensive conference will take place in a couple of years' time to monitor 'progress'.

This is exactly what happened at the SADC conference last week. A conference devoted to the eradication of poverty skirted around the real issues that condemn 45% of the people living in those countries to survival on less than Rs30 per day, and instead put forward senseless generalities as its statement of principles. According to Rama Sithanen, the only way forward is croissance economique... suivie d'une amélioration de la distribution des richesses et des revenues.The sheet music provided by the monetarist Pied Piper was swiftly followed by similar tunes from our African leaders who all waxed lyrical about the terrible shame of poverty whilst wondering quietly whether the lobster thermidor would be the appropriate accompaniment to the fine and expensive Chablis afterwards. And none of them mentioned the C word, the biggest cause of poverty in the SADC countries; yes, corruption, the main growth industry in the SADC countries and which has stunted any growth potential in most of Africa, became the taboo word at this conference attended largely by people whose personal wealth was amassed at the expense of the hundreds of millions of people they are now pretending to help.

Let us start with the first in the queue to enjoy our luxurious hospitality: King Mswati III of Swaziland, who was crowned king in 1986 when he was 18 years old. He is Africa's last absolute monarch, and a royal decree in 2002 stating that it was no longer permissible to take pictures of His Majesty alighting from his car may give you an indication of his democratic credentials. The purchase of the car in question, a Daimler Chrysler Maybach 62 costing Rs 18 millions,prompted protests at his profligacy in a country enduring food shortages and the highest HIV/Aids infection rate in the world. Seventy per cent of the population live in absolute poverty and unemployment is 40 per cent. Swazi men have a life expectancy of 39 years and women only 35 years. In 2001, he introduced a sex ban on teenagers and declared that he would lead from the front and abstain from sexual intercourse; two days later, he admitted that he had broken his vow and fined himself one cow. He then took a 17-year-old as his ninth wife…The king's extravagances include properties around the world, frequent royal travel with huge entourages and a pledge to build each new wife a palace at a total cost of Rs 450millions. Pressure for political reform erupted in 2002 after he tried to buy a Rs 1.5 billion jet for his personal use while 275,000 Swazis were facing starvation because of drought.The Swaziland Chamber of Commerce reported that the full cost of the jet was actually Rs2.5 billions — one third of the country's annual budget — after pilot salaries, fuel, landing fees and an anti-missile system that the King wanted were taken into account. The same year, Swaziland's Court of Appeal judges resigned en masse after the Government refused to accept the court's rulings limiting the King's power to govern by royal decree.

So, it was gratifying to see him last Friday evening with Navin Ramgoolam pledging to do everything he could to eradicate poverty; and he did it with such a straight face too…

We have also had the pleasure of the company of President Jose Eduardo dos Santos of Angola, a country that has repeatedly been dogged by allegations of massive corruption and mismanagement. Recently, Transparency International ranked Angola 142nd in its 2006 Corruption Perceptions Index survey of 163 countries. Similarly, the International Budget Project, the independent nongovernmental organization that measures government budget transparency, reported that Angola was one of the most opaque countries for budget transparency in its 2006 survey of 59 countries. In 2004, Human Rights Watch documented how the government could not account for approximately Rs 120 billions between 1997 and 2002, an amount that was almost equal to all of the social and humanitarian spending in the country during that time. Last November, the Executive Board of the IMF reiterated its concerns over Angola when it said that the board "urged the authorities to tackle deep-rooted governance and corruption issues in the extractive sectors and expressed serious concern that progress on these issues is stalled" in a statement following an annual review of the economy in consultation with the government. Still, let us hope that President Dos Santos had a wonderful time in Paradise Island and one can only pray that all that serious thinking about poverty did not put him off his food.

Armando Guebuza is the President of Mozambique. As the interior minister of the newly independent country in 1975, he helped drive out almost all the white settlers and people
of Indian origin. Eight years later he oversaw the roundup of "undesirables" in Maputo, who were forcibly shipped to remote areas where many died. Over the past decade he has made a fortune by becoming a "stakeholder" in large companies by providing foreign investors wanting to do business in Mozambique with a well-connected partner. Some investors have complained that it is the only way to do business in the country. Guebuza says there is no contradiction in his switch from revolutionary Marxist to becoming one of the richest men in Mozambique. And who can blame him? Many of our own revolutionaries in Paradise Island have magically transformed themselves into millionaires/billionaires once we had allowed them to servi nou pei.

It is a tragedy that a combination of abundant natural resources and a history of autocratic and unaccountable government has resulted in several SADC countries becoming virtually synonymous with corruption. Sub Saharan Africa is the only region of the world where poverty has increased in the last 25 years; and despite recent progress in democracy and human rights in a number of African countries, corruption remains one of the biggest challenges throughout the continent. Enormous natural resources in a number of countries have proven too tempting to some elites and international business concerns.

Perhaps our rulers in Paradise Island have mislaid their moral compasses completely; otherwise, how come they do not see the glaring incongruity and putridity of discussing a soul destroying issue like poverty in the ostentatious grandeur of five star hotels, and with people who are largely responsible for the poverty of their own citizens? No effort was spared to inflate King Mswati III's already massive ego, and his 40th birthday was celebrated with the expected extravagance at Legends Hotel and at the State banquet whilst the vast majority of his people have to survive on less than Rs 30 per day.

Why do our leaders insist on deluding themselves that wasting vast amounts of taxpayers' money on conferences attended mostly by self important leaders with a natural inclination for cupidity and graspingness will somehow boost their prestige on the international scene? Berenger spent nearly a billion rupees on gathering the political pygmies of the world for the SIDS conference and we are still waiting for someone to highlight its achievements, apart from the obvious one of making luxury car showroom owners very rich.

One can almost condone the SADC conference if it was really a result of a quid pro quo with the Clinton Global Initiative for the provision of free AIDS anti retroviral drugs. But the lack of any reference to the evils of corruption must lead one to the conclusion that this was another gross abuse of taxpayers' money and the pampering of egos that show scant regard for real poverty, and even less regard for good governance and proper accountability.

Mahatma Gandhi once remarked that "Corruption and hypocrisy ought not to be inevitable products of democracy, as they undoubtedly are today." This SADC conference will be remembered for the complete absence of discussion and resolutions on the former and a nauseating dollop of the latter. How can Sithanen talk about 'decent housing' when not even one Firinga type house has been built since 2005 to accommodate the poor and the homeless? But then he was probably referring to the extremely decent housing that some politicians of all parties can apparently purchase for cash in Kensington, the most expensive borough of London where the average price is Rs 75 millions…How can these so called leaders justify the scandalous decision to ignore the tragedy in Zimbabwe and to condone the evil, undemocratic, depraved actions of that totalitarian martinet, Robert Mugabe? Imagine the reaction and spluttering expressions of outrage of these hypocrits if it was a white man causing such havoc and misery on the black folks of Zimbabwe.

The whole thing leaves a bitter taste in one's mouth; a sensation that none of those attending the conference would be familiar with, and even if they were, the copious amounts of fine wines would wash the taste away leaving nothing but gleaming smiles and platitudes about the awfulness of poverty. It is like watching parasites engorging themselves to satiety on the emaciated corpse of poverty and then having the effrontery to demand second helpings.

No wonder the windows in their limousines are heavily tinted; it must really spoil their appetite when they drive past poor people with empty looks in their eyes, and looking for anything to assuage the pangs of hunger in their stomachs.
And they don't want poor people to see the look of utter disdain on their faces as they understand all too well that just one week's per diem for a minister, or senior Civil Servant, etc (or for the poor Governor of the Bank of Mauritius on a salary of Rs 10 per month apparently) on an invariably useless mission is more than sufficient to build a brand new house for the homeless.

The Rs 18 millions spent on that disgusting display of monumental egos at the SADC conference by Ramgoolam would have provided at least 50 homes for our citizens in dire need of decent accommodation. The Rs 1 billion spent on the SIDS conference by Berenger would have allowed 3000 families to at last enjoy what every one else considers to be the natural human right of shelter.

And these are the same people who will tell us that there is no money for doing what is right and decent for those amongst us who exist in terrible living conditions.

I am not an evil person, but I hope all these parasites suffer from rampant diarrhoea for the rest of the week; at least one would hope then that being permanently locked up in their toilets might stop them from thinking of new ways to fritter our money in such a spectacular and pointless manner.

R.A.J.
Email: servipei@yahoo.com