Africa needs partnership with the West, not kindly or fickle charity

Africa should no longer be seen as a charity case requiring endless handouts from superior Western economies, the Provincial of Jesuits in East Africa is to argue in a lecture tonight.

Delivering Cafod's annual Pope Paul VI Memorial Lecture in London, Fr Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator, suggests that a partnership is now required.

While he says that aid has helped Africa fight diseases he said the world should move away 'from treating Africa as an object of charity addicted to aid towards engaging the continent as a partner'.

Quoting journalist David Blair writing in The Tablet he says: 'The world may not have noticed, but most of Africa has spent this century gradually hauling itself out of poverty.'

In the lecture, due to be given tonight, he suggests a new set of principles to assist Africa's transformation and development.

Watch Fr Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator's lecture below or read the lecture here.