Monday, October 25, 2004

Now it's time for John to copy and paste every article in the Global Policy Forum that uses the word "salami"!

Mobilizing Finance for Nation's Future
This Day, Lagos
March 4, 2002


Sourcing of funds to finance projects has been a key variable in Nigeria's developmental efforts over the years. But since the September 11 attacks on the United States, it has assumed a global concern with the industralised nations realising that poverty in the Third World is a threat to world security. This was the focus of a talkshop organised in Lagos last week. Adeniran Adedokun was there.

In making a point at an event last Tuesday, Mr. Isaac Aluko-Olokun, head of the New Partnership for African Develop-ment (NEPAD) nearly got physical. It was at the 'National dialogue on Financing for Development', held at Golden Gate Restaurant, Ikoyi, Lagos. The dialogue was packaged by Econet Wireless, BusinessDAY and the United Nations Information Centre (UNIC). The objective was to prepare Nigeria for an international conference on the same subject scheduled for Monterrey, Mexico, later this month.

The respected economist's anger was directed at Dr Doyin Salami, one of the major speakers at the event and indeed anyone who punches Nigeria's desperate moves at securing debt forgiveness and foreign aids. The older economist was angry that Salami suggested that Nigeria did not need aid from any developed country. Whether it comes in the name of Official Development Assistance (ODA), which is a percentage of the Gross National Product (GNP) of donor countries or in any other garb that may further commit the country.

Aluko-Olokun argued that the country needed ODA and indeed any other form of aid that was available to the developing world. He said 30 nations depend on the ODA and that Nigeria was very qualified to benefit from the facility. While he agreed that the country was not a resource- scarce one, he noted that Nigeria's debt profile was bigger than what she should face settling if there was an opportunity for forgiveness. He also noted that Mexico once got a substantial part of its foreign debt forgiven.

"We are truly not a resource scarce country, but Africa is owing debts that run into about $250 billion and it is not just sustainable. We are not saying that forgiveness is the only option, but it is surely an option that we must explore". He maintained, insisting that current efforts at the renewal of financial aids to developing countries was a direct consequence of the September 11 plane hijack incident in the United States.

Aluko-Olokun, who evidently has confidence in the current administration's efforts at achieving economic recovery, missed the point Salami tried to make.

Salami, Director of Programmes at the Lagos Business School, presented a paper on mobilisation of domestic and foreign financial resources in which he tried to convince his listeners that Nigeria's greatest problem was bad governance. He identified with the United Nation's objective of halving "extreme poverty" by the year 2015. This the UN hopes to achieve through improvements in social amenities and raising standard of living. Improvement in health care delivery and education would be important factors towards this end.

For the success of the plan, Salami said that a country's per capita income would have to grow at the rate of five per cent per annum and pointed out that on the contrary extreme, Nigeria's per capita income declines at a 0.3 per cent since 1992. This, amongst other factors, does not indicate that Nigeria was ready for the UN vision.

Since he was talking about finance mobilisation, the presenter noted that: "the challenge is more domestic. It is about getting our policies right" he advised saying further that economic policies in Nigeria were in a mess.

Salami noted that there were enough resources in the country for investment even as he conceded that foreign investment was a good means of turning an ailing economy around. But the situation in Nigeria makes it difficult for those who have resources at home to invest let alone Nigerians resident abroad and foreigners.

He explained that the situation that has caused so much devaluation of the naira also makes it more profitable for people to move their resources out of the country rather than invest in the uncertainty that the country has become. He advocated for good governance which has eluded Nigeria for close to two decades as a first step towards development. Good governance, the presenter noted, would ensure that the country was not governed arbitrarily but by rule of law. A corollary to this, Salami said would be a reduction in corrupt practices and the entrenchment of conditions that would be favourable for investments.

"A society that will attract investment must present conditions that are predictable, coherent and stable", Salami said and noted that Nigeria lacked all these. He cited examples in the country's economic policies where we never had harmony between fiscal and monetary policies. This situation, he pointed out also increases inflation and leads to inappropriate exchange rate.

The situation described above, would not only lead from the country, he noted but will also discourage private participation in economic activities. He informed that while 78 per cent of expenditure in the country came from the private sector in 1990, it had diminished considerably by 2001.

He therefore canvassed for governance which will win the confidence of the country and reverse the current trend where four per cent of Nigerians control 50 per cent of the country's income.

As part of domestic efforts at mobilising finance for development, Salami advised that government must move out of production. He described the billions of naira spent on the National Electric Power Authority as an instance of the wasteful expenditure that government engages in and counseled that it should restrict itself to regulatory duties.

Government should also improve human capacity in the country. A more humane government, which cares about the welfare of its people and would strive to ensure the provision of basic amenities was what the country would need immediately to arrive with the United Nations in 2015, he said.

Salami also identified some external policy challenges for the country in its match towards mobilising finance. He noted that "we recognise globalisation and work together within regional blocs to ensure effective participation in opportunities being opened up".

He sought that Nigerians must realise how much the nation's resources have been squandered and accept that "we have no right and does not deserve to be poor," hence the country should stop begging for debt cancellation and insist on governance as a pre-requisite.

And here was the point Aluko-Olokun disagreed with. That anyone would contemplate that Nigeria did not deserve aid from the developed world was simply not acceptable to him.

But Salami was not the only speaker whose submission Aluko-Olokun did not like. He also picked on Osa Asemota, who came from Continental Trust Bank to present a paper on 'Debt relief, international financial co-operation and official development assistance'.

Their disagreement was on Asemota's premise that Nigeria was attacking its problem wrongly. The banker traced the history of the nation's indebtedness noted that it came to a head after 1985 when the country had about $20 billion debt that mostly went into based imports.

Asemota recommended that Nigeria should exploit its goodwill with the United States at the moment to increase trade and forget the idea of debt forgiveness. He expressed the opinion that the $28 billion, which Nigeria is owning financial institutions was "a small burden loan" which the Nigerian economy, if properly managed, could deal with. He also solicited for good corporate governance that would encourage endowed Nigerians and foreigners to invest in the country.

Then Asemota rattled Alhaji Bamaga Tukur who chaired the occasion in his capacity, Executive President, Africa Business Round Table a bit when he spoke of the refusal of officials of the federal Ministry of Industry, which Tukur once headed, to adapt progressive ideas that would revolutionalise the economy. He expressed concern at the attitude of these bureaucrats and advised that those in positions to influence such policies should be more forward looking.

Asemota rounded off his presentation with an indictment of the Nigerian entrepreneurs, who are said to have obtained loans to finance businesses but would not pay back as agreed. He indicated that foreigners than Nigerian were more faithful to the agreements and charged business executives in Nigeria to change their attitude.

Asked to speak on agriculture, he suggested that the country must engage in the commercial production of grains like rice, maize , soya beans and others. He lamented that three years into the Obasanjo administration "our President, who is a farmer has not made his impact felt, not even in poultry farming".

The last paper on international trade was delivered by Dr. Mary Agboli of the Nigerian Economic Summit Group. She attributed Nigeria's economic problem to over dependence on primary commodities. Like, the two other speakers, she said that the country should build capacity for effective and informed participation by domestic and foreign investors.

Mr Bolaji Balogun, Chief Marketing Officer of Econet Wireless, said his company's involvement in the programme as borne out of its belief in the Nigerian economy. He agreed with previous speakers that financial resources were abundant in Nigeria for investment. Balogun said that more than $600 million has been raised by the company since it came into Nigeria,with more than $400 million out of this raised locally, an indication that, with the right conditions, finance for development could be raised locally.

"You may want to ask what brings Econet Wireless into 'Financing for development', but we are also in the business of development," Balogun explain-ed. He noted that every dollar invested in the GSM industry generates oe8.

"Econet Wireless, a company owned 95 per cent by Nigerian investors, has harnessed the Econet Wireless International experience, core values and excellence, commitment and a deep affinity with the needs of the host community to bring positive change to the lives of Nigerians," he said further.

Earlier in his welcome address, Mr Finjap Njinga, director of UNIC, explained that the dialogue was to prepare grounds for a national consensus on the Monterrey conference. He pointed out that the world has noted that the last fifty years have brought more poverty than wealth and that the rich nations have realised that the trend portends danger for the whole world. He explained that the conference in Mexico would look at ways in which the world should witness improved governance and economic management and urged the gathering to provide pragmatic solutions to the problems that face the nation.

This was re-echoed by Tukur in his opening remarks. The former minister lamented the poor state of most developing countries and urged participants at the conference to offer useful anticipation in advance of the conference, which holds between March 18 and 22.

The Finance for Development Conference was one of the direct results of the September 11 terrorist attack on the United States. After the attack, world leaders met to review trends in the world and established that the margin between poor and rich nations was indeed widening. They also agreed that it posed no peace for the world as the poorer nation would most likely continue to see the developed world as instrumental to their misfortune and resultantly, engage in spreading their problems through illegal migration and such.

That is besides the fact that they began to see the world as a global village where one country's poverty soon becomes another country's burden through lack of markets for finished good from comfortable countries, illegal migration, pollution, contagious diseases fanaticism and terrorism. They then agreed on some millennium goals that should halve "extreme poverty" in 13 years. This, a World Bank report noted, would cost a whopping $40 billion annually.

So the dialogue was to set a national agenda in motion, and that indeed happened. Participants agreed that a change of attitude in the governance of the country was a first step to the eradication of poverty in Nigeria and to that, even the external bodies like the World Bank agree.

Country Director for The World Bank in Nigeria, Mr. Mark Tomlinson stood up to hail the first two papers as not only brutally frankly but refreshingly different.

And recently, President of the Bank, Mr James Wolfensohn, released a document that emphasised on the need for nations that would benefit from the Millennium plans of the United Nations to think of more accountable ways of governance. The document that this was the only way to ensure that resources were judiciously utilised.

He noted that the challenges before the world in the next 13 years were daunting and that governments of developing countries would do well to provide trustworthy leadership that could confront the evils the world wants to battle.

Statistics reveal that there are about 4.6 billion people in the 63 countries that would benefit from the millennium project. More than 826 million are said to suffer from diseases that result from poor feeding. Eight hundred and fifty million others are illiterate while more than one billion lack access to good water. About 11 million children under the age of five die each year from diseases that are preventable while more that 1.2 billion people in these countries live on less than one dollar a day.

But the UN and Chief Economist of World Bank's Human Development Network, Shanta Deranya, also charged leaders of countries that benefit from the project to ensure effective management of available resources to, amongst other things, halve the number of people who live on less than one dollar, achieve universal completion of primary education and reduce maternal mortality rate by 2015. Achieving these goals is what the Mexico conference will discuss.


Exposed: Britain and America's
Merciless Secret Blitz on Iraq

By Robert Fisk

Sunday Independent (London)
February 21, 1999

With little publicity - and amid virtual indifference in western capitals - US and British aircraft have staged well over 70 air strikes against Iraq over the past five weeks, inflicting more damage than the pre-Christmas Anglo-American bombardment. And pilots flying out of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait have now received new rules of engagement which allow them to open fire on Iraqi installations, even if they are not directly threatened.

The air offensive has been carefully calibrated to avoid criticism or public debate - but coincides with Washington's renewed efforts to overthrow Saddam Hussein's regime. Iraqi missile sites have been attacked without warning and radar stations targeted solely because their presence - rather than any offensive activity - was said to menace American forces in the Gulf.

Just over two weeks ago, for example, US aircraft bombed a Russian-made CSSC-3 "Seersucker" anti-ship missile battery on the Fao peninsula which, according to a spokesman, "could have [sic] threatened shipping in the Gulf." Military sources say there was no evidence that missiles were about to be fired.

By attacking Iraq almost every day while issuing only routine information about the targets, American and British officials have also ensured that their "salami" bombardment has provoked little or no interest in the press; newspapers now frequently carry little more than a paragraph about air strikes which would have captured front page headlines a year ago. Only when US missiles have hit civilian areas has the mildest criticism been heard. Even then, it has been muted because of fears that condemnation would support Saddam Hussein's own propaganda.

In fact, the most notorious incident - when an American AGM-130 missile exploded in a Basra housing complex - turns out to have been more bloody than the Iraqis themselves admitted at the time. Although initial reports spoke of 11 civilians killed in the 25 January attack, a total of 17 people died that day and almost 100 were wounded.

A United Nations report, compiled by Hans von Sponeck, the UN's humanitarian co-ordinator in Baghdad, states that two missiles hit civilian areas 16 miles apart, the first in Basra - where a woman and five children were among the dead - and the second in the village of Abu Khasib, where five women and five children were killed. In other words, most of the victims were children. A Pentagon spokesman admitted to the Basra attack, responding to the casualties with the words: "I want to repeat that we are not targeting civilians."

Saddam's own tactics - of provoking American forces and threatening their Gulf allies - has provided the US and British governments with reasons for its virtually hidden war against Iraq this year.

Having declared the Anglo-American "no-fly" zones in northern and southern Iraq invalid, his air defence batteries have fired at US and British aircraft; his warning to Saudi Arabia and Kuwait that they would face retaliation if they continued to allow American planes to use their air bases angered the Gulf states at the very moment when they were voicing growing concern about the attacks. An offer from Saddam of a financial reward for Iraqi crews who shot down raiding aircraft went unclaimed: his batteries are hopelessly inferior to American and British technology.

The air offensive began at the New Year with five American attacks in two weeks. On 11 January, US aircraft attacked Iraqi missile sites from bases in Turkey - an incident that coincided with an announcement that the Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, was to visit the Gulf. She was seeking Arab support for the continuation of UN sanctions, which have claimed the lives of tens of thousands of Iraqi children, and for Washington's plans to topple Saddam.

Almost daily air raids continued to the end of January, by which time British fighter-bombers were joining US planes. On 31 January, for instance, eight British and American jets were attacking "communications facilities" in southern Iraq.

A statement from the Americans on 4 February that US and British planes had by then destroyed 40 missile batteries - adding that this alone constituted greater damage than was caused to Iraq in the whole December air bombardment - passed without comment. Neither Washington nor London explained whether the attacks had UN backing - they did not - and Tony Benn's warning that the raids were creating a "culture of violence" went unheeded.

On 11 February, General Sir Michael Rose, a former UN force commander in Bosnia, condemned the offensive in a speech at the Royal United Services Institute."The continual TV images of the West's high-technology systems causing death and destruction to people in the Third World will not be tolerated forever by civilised people," Sir Michael said.

But his remarks were largely ignored. Instead, US officials continued their fruitless attempts to form a united Iraqi opposition to President Saddam and to find Arab support for their plans. Despite Iraq's threats against Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, the Gulf states were hostile to all such American plotting, fearing the break-up of Iraq into Kurdish, Sunni and Shiite Muslim states in the event of a government collapse in Baghdad.

When President Saddam threatened to strike at the Gulf states which permitted US planes to use their bases, Mrs. Albright issued another of her supposedly tough statements. Iraq would face retaliation if he dared strike America's friends in the region, she announced. But what retaliation? With Iraq suffering frequent military punishment, what could Mrs. Albright inflict worse than the current air bombardment? The US, it seems, has committed the same errors in the Gulf that Israel once committed in Lebanon.

Prior to 1982, Israeli threats of a mass invasion would cow Lebanese and Palestinians alike. But once the invasion took place - and once it was clear that Israeli troops could be killed in large numbers - the threat of an Israeli military offensive lost its power to create fear.

Similarly with the Americans. The Anglo-American attacks before Christmas were designed to "teach Saddam Hussein a lesson" for blocking arms inspections. But the inspectors never returned to Iraq, their top man admitted collaborating with Israel and the whole Unscom team is now virtually non-existent. The bombings did not humble the ghastly Saddam; indeed, they inspired him to dare the Americans into further military action.

To what purpose? Iraqi troops around Basra have been reinforced, although some missile batteries have been withdrawn from northern Iraq. In Baghdad, six more civilian deaths were announced - one in an air raid near Najaf on 10 February and five more (with 22 wounded) in southern Iraq five days later. On 4 February, a US official said that the "no-fly" zones had been "quiet in recent days" - a statement that came only two days after US jets had bombed the anti-ship missile base at Fao.

All of which proves that it is easier to start a war than to end one. Perhaps this thought has occurred to the US strategists pouring over their Serbian map co-ordinates in recent days - as they turn their attention from the Beast of Baghdad to the Beast of Belgrade.

Target timetable:

* 11 January US jets attack "missile sites" in northern Iraq.
* 12 January US planes attack "radar sites" in northern Iraq.
* 13 January Americans announce attacks on "radar bases" in northern Iraq.
* 14 January US jets attack "air defense systems" in Iraq. A spokesman says an F-16 pilot fired a HARM missile after his plane was tracked by Iraqi radar and an F-15 dropped a precision-guided bomb on a surface-to-air missile site.
* 24 January US attacks "missile installations" in northern Iraq.
* 26 January American attacks in both northern and southern Iraq. Air bombardments around Basra kill 17 people, most of them children. The US, acknowledging that one of its missiles went off course, says it is "not targeting civilians".
* 28 January Americans attack "anti-aircraft batteries" in northern Iraq.
* 30 January US strikes at six "air defense sites" around Mosul.
* 31 January British and American aircraft attack "communications facilities" in southern Iraq. President Saddam Hussein offers cash rewards to Iraqis who manage to shoot down American or British planes.
* 2 February US planes from the aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson in the Gulf attack a Russian-made anti-ship missile battery on the Fao peninsula.
* 2 February Iraq claims Saudi pilots have joined the air bombardment.
* 4 February US Defense Secretary William Cohen says Iraq is withdrawing missile batteries.
* 10 February Iraq says one man killed in Najaf province when US planes attack air defenses in the region and at Qar.
* 14 February Iraq warns Saudi Arabia and Kuwait of attack if they allow US and British warplanes to continue use of their air bases. Washington warns Iraq of "retaliation".
* 15 February Iraq says five people were killed and 22 wounded in air raids in southern Iraq.


US Hypocrisy clouding 'New World Order'
By Hodding Carter
The World Paper
March, 2000

Senator Jesse Helms appeared before the United Nations Security Council earlier this year to warn of US withdrawal from the world body unless it "respects the sovereign rights of the American people and serves them as an effective instrument."

His non-American auditors were reportedly shocked and outraged, but given recent history, it's hard to understand why. Rather than prediction, the North Carolina reactionary who heads the Senate Foreign Relations Committee was more nearly offering reportage. In a tumbling cascade of unilateral decisions, Washington has gone to great lengths over the past decade to distance itself from the UN's present work and future hopes. That was not what was generally expected following the end of the Cold War.

Less than 10 years ago, former President George Bush resurrected the idea of a "new world order." President Clinton came into office proclaiming an even more expansive vision for cooperation with and participation in the UN.

Facts have belied the two presidents' rhetoric. Not infrequently, the United States has, to use a term applied by the Washington Post in a related context last year, behaved like a rogue state when it comes to support of international organizations and obligations. Most notably, for years it refused to pay its back dues to the UN, and the sum owed is now over $1 billion despite a recent partial payment. That payment was the result of a compromise struck by the Clinton Administration with Senator Helms last year, involving a linked set of UN "reforms" and US payments.

It is not yet clear that the UN can, will or should agree to the conditions contained in the compromise. It is even less clear that the agreement would substantially alter the American right wing's long-standing hostility to the UN. Salami tactics-taking a slice now, a slice tomorrow and yet another slice the day thereafter-are as favored by Senator Helms and his ideological soul mates as the sledgehammer. In the meantime, the United States remains the organization's biggest deadbeat.



But if withholding money has been the most obvious indicator of American unilateralism, it faces stiff competition for pride of place. America's recent track record of nonsupport for international initiatives and treaties has been appalling. And while Senator Helms makes a convenient target for those seeking villains, the truth is that his erstwhile political enemies-beginning with President Clinton-have more than once either attempted to appease or march in tandem with the forces he represents.

Whether bipartisan or narrowly partisan in origin, the list of American assaults on the old world order-let alone a new one-is too long to repeat here. To mention a few, however:

The Senate's defeat last year of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, until recently one of the chief objectives of US diplomacy. Its rejection could all but kill further efforts to curtail nuclear proliferation, the most perplexing national-security issue in the new millennium. "If not Washington, why us?" is already the refrain of choice among those aspiring to nuclear-power status.

The Clinton Administration's rejection of the International Criminal Court Treaty, in large part because of Pentagon fears that it might ensnare US military personnel abroad. It was overwhelmingly endorsed by most other nations and, again, would achieve a goal leading American statesmen have long advanced.

The President's rejection of the International Treaty to Ban Land Mines, chiefly (or at least publicly) because of Defense Department resistance to anything that might threaten the safety of American soldiers stationed in Korea. Once more, the United States found itself all but alone, particularly among its long-time allies on an issue whose chief opponents were our erstwhile enemies.

Mr. Clinton's year-long opposition to the UN Protocol on Biosafety, a global treaty to regulate trade in genetically modified products. Proponents and opponents have valid points to offer. What is startling is the degree to which the United States was isolated on the subject, opposed by European as well as developing-nation governments.

The Administration's calculated decision not to pursue the goals of the Kyoto Protocol on greenhouse gases, which it signed at the end of 1997, until that cold day in hell that the current Congress approves it. Before signing, of course, the Administration pursued a sustained campaign against tougher standards at the time of the conference.

The last-second US agreement in January to a watered-down ban on drafting or enlisting 18-year-olds into the military, a concession which itself masked the reality that America is linked only with Somalia in its failure to ratify the underlying UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Finally, the United States has all but divorced itself from the arena of overseas development assistance. It devotes less than one tenth of one percent of GDP to that purpose, and if economic assistance to Israel and Egypt were eliminated, the percentage would be roughly half of that puny figure.

What does all of this mean, particularly when viewed in light of Washington's avid support of the new economic globalism represented by the World Trade Organization? How does it square with the President's repeated decisions, albeit after prolonged delays and dithering in each case, to intervene militarily in or against Haiti, Iraq, Bosnia and Serbia? Taken together, isn't it utterly inconsistent, without strategic focus or internal logic? To ask is to answer. The answer is yes.

The explanation is less clear cut, but not incomprehensible. The institutional UN and the idea of any supranational authority has always been anathema to American conservatives who were tugged into internationalism after World War II only by fear of the Soviet Union. Moscow's collapse freed them from even lip service allegiance to the internationalist paradigm, and Moscow's collapse happened to coincide with the domestic collapse of the Democrats-many of whom were genuine believers in a more established world system-as the majority party.

But if the Democrats and Moscow were imploding, American might was suddenly without meaningful check. Internationalism might be in decline, but unilateralism was in vogue. If others didn't like what we were doing or saying, they could lump it. If we didn't like what others were proposing, we would simply refuse to go along. As far as many Americans could see, there were no foreseeable negative consequences save angry rhetoric from foreigners with no appreciation for all that we had done for them. As Jesse Helms summarized their point of view in his address to the Security Council, "The American people hear all of this (criticism) and they resent it. And I think they have grown increasingly frustrated with what they feel is a lack of gratitude."

It is disturbing to contemplate what could happen when the bottom falls out of the American boom, as inevitably it will. High-riding America, now disinclined to support collective solutions to complicated international problems-unless written to the last word on Capitol Hill and the White House-will become frightened America, looking for scapegoats. Classically, the scapegoat of choice is always the foreign-the "they."

Confusing cause with effect, Washington could easily be stampeded into shredding its remaining commitments to international cooperation, economic as well as political and social. It happened before, in the period between the end of World War I and the end of Franklin Roosevelt's first term. It can, with the eager assistance of the Jesse Helmses of this country and the artful disengagement of its Bill Clintons, happen again.

Forget the worst-case scenario. Consider only the judgment of Stanley Hoffmann, a Harvard professor who has thought long and hard about America's role in the world: "The world needs a network of institutions that can monitor, supervise and enforce global standards of fairness and protection. The greatest danger to America is neither Vladimir Putin nor Saddam Hussein nor Osama bin Ladin. It is hubris."


In Bulgaria, 10 Years of Misery
By Blagovesta Doncheva
New York Times
November 11, 1999

Ofia, Bulgaria - We here in Bulgaria have had democracy since 1989. What has happened during these last 10 years? The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank are successfully devouring Bulgarian industry. They have insisted on the privatization of Bulgaria's plants and factories. In many cases, the Bulgarian government, which diligently follows the I.M.F.'s advice, sold these factories to powerful foreign corporations. And these corporations often liquidated the businesses (a new way to fight the competition!). What is the result? Hordes of unemployed workers, beggars in the streets, old people digging in rubbish containers for some rag or moldy piece of bread.

Our social fabric is falling apart. Before 1989, Bulgaria was a socialist state: free medical care and education for everyone. Mothers and the elderly received other aid and privileges. Now, since the fall of Communism, I see more and more children who have dropped out of public school. Their parents cannot provide them with shoes and clothes, never mind textbooks and paper. Things are no better for the elderly. In 1989, my friend's mother's pension had been about 105 leva a month. Now it is 46 leva a month, a little more than $24.

There are many people, especially those who are older than 30, who are not working. Nobody needs them; nobody offers work to them. The job offers in the newspapers repeatedly demand that applicants be no more than 30 years old. And even if you are under 30, what do you get? You have the chance to slave for 12 hours for next to nothing for a newly hatched business. In January, the last remnants of our socialized state will be taken away. The government will no longer subsidize train tickets for students, the elderly and mothers with children. This means that people will be forced to stay either in the towns or in the villages, which will hurt active pensioners and the unemployed. Now, they add to their meager family incomes through some occasional jobs in the towns, or they go to the village and grow vegetables and fruit for the winter in their fathers' gardens. It made economic sense when they were traveling by train at half price. After the new year, it will be senseless.

We are undergoing untold hardships, yet George Soros, the financier, eggs us on, telling us to open our boundaries, make ourselves an open society. But we in Bulgaria have learned the hard way what those pretty slogans mean. It means killing the industry that is managing to stay alive in Bulgaria. Turkish imports are flooding the market. Socks made in Bulgaria are selling for 1 leva; I have seen Turkish socks, selling for half a leva. So soon we will have only Turkish socks, and no jobs. Lots of low-quality food products and other goods flow freely into Bulgaria, undermining the efforts of local producers. I have a cousin who has a small farm with four cows. He hasn't been able to sell his calves for two successive years. He is crushed. The companies that buy veal explain that they prefer to work with the frozen meat imported from Greece at low prices, ready to be stuffed and turned into salami or sausages.

What is the West offering us in return for this misery? What is the great attraction for a foreign corporation in a devastated country? The cheap labor and national resources! So much for open boundaries. So much for an open society. I personally live in misery, but I can still manage. It is the sight of the old men and women digging into the rubbish containers that is breaking my heart. Before the fall of Communism, I and many others believed that the Communist government was lying about the United States of America. We thought all its warnings about America were simply propaganda. And from 1989 to 1993, I was a democratic activist. That was before I understood the true work of the I.M.F. or the World Bank or the transnational corporations and their policy of expansion. We fell for the seductive talk about democracy and openness. Now 10 years later, I wish we hadn't.


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