Zimbabwe

Lord Chidgey Excerpts

Wednesday 11th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

My Lords, I will certainly take that point away and bring it to the attention of colleagues; it is very important. We do our utmost to ensure that our bilateral aid, for example, does not go through the Government of Zimbabwe or their agencies directly. We work primarily through multilateral organisations, notably United Nations agencies. The noble Lord is absolutely right: the economic crisis in Zimbabwe is very serious indeed. We are disappointed that the staff-monitored programme agreed with the IMF has gone off-track. Our focus at the moment is on mitigating the worst impacts of the economic crisis and concentrating on the most vulnerable Zimbabweans.

[Lord Chidgey (LD)]

My Lords, the US ambassador to Zimbabwe, Brian Nichols, has stated that the Government must implement a market-based agricultural policy, fully liberalising the trade in grains and paying farmers on a par with the cost of imports. He added that the Grain Marketing Board was allocating subsidised grain to millers, who were selling it on the black market in neighbouring countries. This corruption costs the Zimbabweans in both food and treasure. What measures are the UK Government taking to support the US plans for a market-based economy and to make sure that UK aid is not lost through corruption?

[Earl Howe]

The noble Lord makes some extremely important points. As I mentioned, DfID Zimbabwe operates under a strict funding policy whereby no UK aid money passes directly through the Government of Zimbabwe. We work through multilateral organisations, notably UN agencies, international NGOs and the private sector, to deliver our UK aid projects. Apart from immediate aid, it is important that we also focus on enabling Zimbabweans to help themselves in the longer term on a more sustainable basis. In particular, DfID has two programmes supporting agriculture in that sense, enabling infrastructure to be developed.

Algeria

Lord Chidgey Excerpts

Monday 21st January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Chidgey]

My Lords, we support the Prime Minister in the calm and measured response that the Government have given to this crisis. Of course, we join with the Minister, the Prime Minister and the whole House in expressing our sympathy for all those affected, particularly our British families who have lost, or who are still awaiting news of, their loved ones.

We face a serious situation developing in Algeria and throughout the Sahel. The emergence of Islamist groups such as AQIM has been long foreseen. The advent of the Arab spring has unfortunately created an environment, through porous borders and the like, in which extremism can now more readily flourish across the region. What specific measures are the Government taking to ensure that the African nations engaged through the AU, ECOWAS and the UN have full access to effective EU training and support for counterterrorism actions? What measures are the Government taking to develop an international security protocol to protect the personnel and the assets of the companies working in difficult conditions in these remote regions?

Finally, what specific initiatives, and with whom, are the Government taking in the Sahel to enable the underlying economic exclusion—unemployment and poverty— fuelling the unrest to be tackled? I appreciate that at this stage it may be difficult for the Leader to comment in detail, but can he give us some indication of when we might get that sort of specificity?

[Lord Hill of Oareford]

My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Chidgey for his support. I will need to follow up some of his specific questions over time. Currently, the broad approach is becoming clear: the need to emphasise the importance of the Sahel and for us to up our efforts in working with a range of interested parties, whether through the EU or with other individual states; to address both the security issue but also the kind of economic issue to which my noble friend refers; and recognising that political and military solutions need to go hand in hand. We must address some of the underlying issues to do with poverty, which act as fuel for people who recruit and feed on those grievances.

Libya

Lord Chidgey Excerpts

Monday 21st March 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

My Lords—

[Lord Chidgey]

My Lords—

[Lord McNally]

My Lords, shall we hear from the noble and gallant Lord, Lord Craig of Radley, first?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Reid, asks an immensely good question. He is right to say that it might be for the long term, and none of us can say at this stage what the long term is. We have taken decisions over the course of the past few weeks on the need for a no-fly zone and we have constructed an international alliance. We will wish to maintain that and to get other countries to provide military assets. If we are successful in doing so then there is every reason to believe that the pressure that is being brought on the regime will prove a success. I think that all noble Lords listening to this exchange will have different views about what “long term” will mean. We will have to see how these events unfold before we can take a final decision on what the longest-term commitment from the United Kingdom will be.

[Lord Chidgey]

My Lords, if we are to learn the lessons of Iraq, is it not essential that, during the operations currently under way, we do everything that we can to protect the power stations, the water supply, sanitation—all the public sector infrastructure? In that context can the noble Lord tell us whether our cross-government stabilisation unit—not just DfID but also, across departments, the FCO and the MoD—is at the heart of the medium and long-term stabilisation planning? Is the stabilisation planning feeding into the decision-making now? We learnt from Iraq that it has to be a current process, not a past idea. Finally, will the UN lead stabilisation efforts in the medium and long term? We should play our part but, clearly, this needs to be an international concern.

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I agree with my noble friend that this is a concern. Of course, what has been happening is that it is Colonel Gaddafi and his troops and other armed forces who have been causing such difficulty and damage to electricity and water supplies, particularly in the town of Misurata. It is no part of the coalition’s objective to try to degrade those kinds of not just economic but humanitarian assets.