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House International Relations Subcommittee on International Operations and Human Rights, Statement on Afghanistan: Congresswoman McKinney
November 2, 2001 The Honorable George W. Bush Dear President Bush, I write concerning the budgetary provisions for Development Assistance to sub-Saharan Africa for Fiscal Year 2002. Your administration has requested $789.4 million for sub-Saharan Development Assistance, which is more than four million dollars less than the assistance that was allocated for Fiscal Year 2001. At the same time, the administration has sought an increase in funding for International Military Education and Training Programs. As you know, Development Assistance is a crucial component of our foreign aid to Africa. This assistance meets important needs in its focus on economic reform and grassroots development. Furthermore, it includes the Child Disease Survival Programs Fund. Unfortunately, American assistance to sub-Saharan Africa has decreased in the past decade, even as poverty, war, and the AIDS pandemic plague the Continent. Economics professors often use guns and butter as examples of competing products on their graphs in the classroom. The analogy is appropriate to this case. If the people of sub-Saharan Africa receive more guns than butter, it would turn into a situation that would be a travesty for your Administration and one that I believe you will soon regret. Mr. President, by reconsidering this insufficient budget request and providing truly meaningful foreign aid, you have the opportunity to increase humanitarian assistance and with it the stability of sub-Saharan Africa. I thank you for considering a truly just foreign aid package to sub-Saharan Africa and pledge to support such a package in the House of Representatives. Sincerely,
Cynthia McKinney ### |
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