One of these devastating realities is that 19,500 Africans will die of AIDS during the three days that the leaders meet. Meanwhile, over those same three days African nations will send the G-8, and their wholly owned subsidiaries, the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, an estimated $123 million in debt service payments, money that could be used to fight AIDS.
Like the "Survivor" game on TV, the global G-8 game is also for money — but it is rigged from the start. While the all-stars on the CBS reality show try to avoid starvation in hopes of winning $1 million, the millions of people starving around the world who face real challenges finding clean water, health care and education have no million-dollar reward at the end of this game. On the contrary, the poorest of the world pay more in debt service than they receive in aid on debts that have already been paid many times over.
If the G-8 game is a reality show, Malawi is an example of the reality of life and debt in Africa today. Malawi is the 12th poorest country in the world. Sixty-five percent of the population survives on less than a dollar a day, 60 percent will not likely survive to age 40, and 43 percent do not have regular access to clean and safe water. One in seven adults in Malawi is infected with HIV/AIDS.
Meanwhile, Malawi spends 21 percent of its budget servicing debt, an amount equivalent to Malawi's total expenditures on education, health, science and technology, and agriculture combined. Resources that could fund Malawi's fight against AIDS are instead sent to the G-8 and the IMF and World Bank in the form of debt service payments.
The people of Malawi are paying the bill for their own oppression. Much of Malawi's debt was accrued when the G-8 nations supported and made loans to Hastings Banda, a brutal dictator who claimed that he fed his opponents to the crocodiles. In 1994, Banda's rule ended and the first government of Malawi's now multiparty system introduced universal primary education and increased health spending by 50 percent — only to be forced by the IMF and World Bank to cut government spending and pare the education and health budgets back to Banda levels.
IMF policies have also been blamed for Malawi's 2002 famine, when the government was advised to sell off grain stocks, leaving the country defenseless against the worst famine since 1949. Malawi is just one example of many of the devastating effects of the G-8 game, in which only the survivors meet on Sea Island. A handful of African leaders will be invited to the island for a session or two, but Malawi is not among them.
If the G-8 reps can't agree on Middle East policy or Iraq, they might try to talk about economic challenges to fight AIDS and meet development goals. However, the G-8's success must not be measured by additional rhetoric. People around the world who are barely surviving demand real action.
The G-8 can help to build a better, safer world by meeting the challenges of the global economy. The G-8 must instruct the IMF and World Bank to cancel 100 percent of the debt of impoverished countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America. Forced by the global Jubilee movement and thousands of protesters encircling G-8 summit sites in Europe to address the issue, the G-8 took the first step toward this goal at the 1999 Cologne G-8 summit with a commitment of $100 billion in debt relief.
Two things have become clear since the G-8 addressed debt in 1999:
• Initial debt relief provides money that has been saving lives.
• It has been too little, too slow and for too few countries. African nations still spend almost $15 billion a year in debt service, and need $10 billion a year to fight AIDS. Do the math.
It's time for the survivors of the global economy to take the Drop the Debt Challenge. If not, there will be no immunity; the global community will vote all eight leaders off the island.
Marie Clarke is the national coordinator of Jubilee USA Network, the U.S. arm of the international movement working for debt cancellation for impoverished nations.