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Friday, 28 August - Thursday, 3 September 2015 ISSUE 594
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It is in our national interest to promote prosperity and security
UK’S AFRICA POLICY By Jon Benjamin
The British High Commissioner in Ghana in an address to students at the Legon Center for International Affairs and Diplomacy speaks on the subject of the UK’s Africa Policy and to discuss how much Africa matters to us and why Africa has been, and will remain, central to Britain’s foreign policy objectives. On top of the current economic challenge, we have lived through a very demanding decade and more in foreign policy. Perhaps the greatest challenge has been the perverted ideology that drives Islamist or jihadi extremism, defeating which is clearly a generational challenge. Defeat it, we will. But for now, ISIS continues its brutal campaign of murder and repression across northern Iraq and Syria. Growing insurgencies in Libya and Yemen threaten further instability. Boko Haram in Nigeria and its neighbours; Al Shabab in Somalia; and other extremist groups in the Sahel all threaten security, including ours and Ghana’s. In concrete terms, the three main themes of UK Foreign Policy as: Firstly, safeguarding Britain’s national security by countering terrorism and weapons proliferation, and by working to reduce conflict around the globe. We do that in part by maintaining the UK’s global role,
as an active permanent member of the UN Security Council, the EU, NATO, the G7, the G20 and the Commonwealth and other key parts of the international architecture. Secondly, building Britain’s prosperity by increasing exports and investment, opening markets, ensuring access to resources and promoting sustainable growth, including by connecting our economy to the world’s fastest growing markets. The UK has always been an open economy that thrives on trade. So, we will prosper when we build strong relationships with other countries that are prospering. How does Africa fit in? Returning though to the purely governmental sphere, we believe that an active and activist UK foreign policy must have Africa at its heart. Many of the world’s fastest growing economies are in Africa. Africa has vast human and physical resources and enormous potential. At the same time, parts of Africa are still wracked by abject poverty and crushing conflict which we seek to make a contribution to solving – not least as we also have a historical and moral responsibility to this continent, given our colonial past. That is why, for example, we came to the aid of Sierra Leone, both when its democracy was subverted in the 1990s and, recently, when it was ravaged by Ebola. That is why the UK has been the leading international player in combating sexual violence in conflict, Female Genital Mutilation, early and child marriage,
The British High Commissioner in Ghana,Jon Benjamin
and the disease of malaria which still kills each year so many multiples of those who have died from Ebola. All of these scourges affect Africa disproportionately and Britain wants to be a major player in addressing them – it is the right thing to do. But more widely, our Africa policy means that we need genuine partnerships with African countries. Our shared history, family and cultural connections mean that we are committed to partnerships with African countries, through the good times and the bad. Africa is important to us because African communities are also part of
the fabric of the UK and what happens here affects us. There are over 40,000 UK nationals living in Nigeria; 10,000 here in Ghana, 4,000 in Sierra Leone. 500,000 Nigerians and 90,000 Ghanaians live in the UK, though the respective Diasporas are much larger when you factor in the second and third generation populations who are now UK citizens. We think that there are over a quarter of a million British citizens who claim Ghanaian heritage.
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