Striding without a crutch

The struggling nation of Eritrea is doing something unheard of in Africa. It is turning down foreign aid. With a president who vows not to lead another "spoon-fed" African country "enslaved" by international donors, Eritrea, a tiny nation on the Horn of Africa, has walked away from more than $200 million in aid in the past year alone, including food from the United Nations, development loans from the World Bank and grants from international charities to build roads and deliver healthcare.

Eritrea can scarcely afford to say no. As one of the world's poorest nations, it has struggled to feed its people.

But President Isaias Afwerki, a former Marxist rebel who has led Eritrea since its independence from Ethiopia in 1993, defends the nation's exercise in self-reliance, even if it results in short-term hardships. He says it is crucial not only to the long-term survival of his country but also to that of his continent. "We need this country to stand on its two feet," Isaias said.

Fifty years and billions of dollars in postcolonial international aid have done little to lift Africa from chronic poverty, he said.
"These are crippled societies," Isaias said of neighbours whom he described as relying on donors rather than developing their economies. "You can't keep these people living on handouts because that doesn't change their lives."

Eritrea's self-reliance programme began a decade ago but accelerated sharply in 2005. Relying on its meagre budget and the conscription of about 800,000 of its 3.6 million citizens, the programme has shown promising results.

Measured on a variety of UN health indicators — including life expectancy, immunisations and malaria prevention — Eritrea scores as high, and often higher, than its neighbours, including Ethiopia and Kenya.

It might be one of the most ambitious social and economic experiments under way in Africa. But Eritrea is not receiving much credit. Instead, the government increasingly finds itself in the international doghouse, largely because of its poor human-rights record, isolationism and belligerent stance towards its neighbours and the West.

Borders sealed

In a world moving towards globalisation, Eritrea is turning inwards. The government has sealed its borders, halted most imports, expelled several diplomats and aid groups, and withdrawn from the leading East African inter-governmental alliance.

"It's like they have self-imposed sanctions," said one diplomat, who like many interviewed feared government retribution if identified. "They're turning into an Albania or North Korea."

The US is now threatening to make Eritrea even more of a pariah by adding it to its list of state sponsors of terrorism, alleging that Eritrea is supporting Somalia's Islamic Courts Union, an insurgent alliance that US officials say has links to the Al Qaida terrorist network. A recent UN report accused Eritrea of sending arms shipments to the Islamist fighters last year.

"They're creating a lot of problems in Africa," US Assistant Secretary of State Jendayi Frazer said, criticising the government's support for rebel groups in Ethiopia, Sudan and Somalia. In a diplomatic tit-for-tat, the US recently closed Eritrea's consulate in Oakland, California.

The Eritrean leader insisted that he was not trying to isolate his country but was trying to protect it from foreign influences that he said hurt developing countries. He said Eritrea would rejoin regional and global markets once it developed a manufacturing and production capacity and could compete on an equal footing. Until then, he added: "We say, leave us alone. Let us do our work."

Isaias insisted his country was doing fine without the aid. Education and healthcare are free, he said. Measles and polio have been nearly eradicated in the past two years and the childhood mortality rate has dropped by nearly two-thirds since 1995. Evaluating food production has been more difficult. Eritrea, with its hostile climate, has a history of famine. But Isaias said his cold-turkey approach to halting food aid was making farmers work harder, without increasing hunger or malnutrition.

"It [has] provoked people to do more to feed themselves," he said, predicting that Eritrea would produce an agricultural surplus in three years. "We are fed better than anyone."

Most agreed that food levels during the past two years have been stable, thanks largely to adequate rainfall.

"They're surviving on favourable weather right now," said one aid worker, "but there is no guarantee that will last."

A president stands his ground

Eritrea's pursuit of self-reliance is rooted in its 30-year struggle for independence from Ethiopia, first against US-backed Emperor Haile Selassie and then overthrowing Soviet-backed dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam.

Eritrea's president, Isaias Afwerki (left), an engineer who received his military training in China, has never forgotten that his Marxist-leaning rebellion received no help from any Cold War superpower. He has served as the nation's leader since it won independence in 1993.

"The Struggle", as it is called, permeates all aspects of society. In downtown Asmara, a statue of a giant sandal pays tribute to the country's freedom fighters, who wore shoes made from old tyres.

Eritrea's currency, the nakfa, is named after the rebel movement's former hideout. Government-issued statements end with the slogan "Victory to the masses".

Eritrea's distrust of foreigners and sense of betrayal by the international community heightened after a border war with Ethiopia that concluded in 2000. A 2002 independent commission ruled that Ethiopia should return the disputed Badme region to Eritrea, but Ethiopia has refused.

Eritrea blames the US and UN for failing to enforce the agreement. Isaias said the lack of resolution on the border has left Eritrea in limbo. When he took office, he was praised by the Bill Clinton administration as a new breed of African leader. In a speech before the Organisation of African Unity, he chastised an older generation of "Big Men" for failing to deliver on human rights and economic reforms. Now, Isaias is facing similar criticism.