Did anyone say "disillusionment"?

"The conclusion is unavoidable: under the pretext of making aid more effective the Paris Declaration project is a form of collective colonialism by Northern 'donors' of those countries in the South that (because of their weakness and vulnerability and psychology of 'dependency') may allow themselves to be subjected to it at the Accra September Conference," writes Tandon.

...the list of lapses is rather long:

- Only one-fourth of the World Bank's aid to Mozambique is given as programme aid (the rest is through individual projects), and only one quarter uses the country's own financial and procurement systems.

- France finances aid to Mozambique by recycling Mozambique's debt service.

- The European Court of Auditors found that "only one-third of the European Commission's technical assistance projects have been or are likely to be successful."

- Spain has tied its debt relief to Honduras to implementation by Spanish companies, institutions, or organisations.

- In Malawi, donors have set up 69 project units parallel to government systems, and 30 of these are run by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).

- Donor transparency is still poor -- both USAID and France were found not to be transparent about their aid in Sierra Leone and Mali respectively.

Article in IPS on the Third High-Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness (HLF3) to be held in Accra tomorrow.

- In Mali, the World Bank conditions its aid on privatisation of the public sector (telephones, electricity, railways and cotton). This is turn influences other donors."