Nelson Mandela Children's Fund, Chief Executive and Trustee, Sibongile Mkhabela's Opening Address at the Plenary of the 20^th European Foundation Centre's Annual General Assembly (AGA) and Conference:  Fighting Poverty: Creating Opportunities, held in Rome, May 14-16, 2009.

The European Foundation Centre (EFC) is a platform whose concern for the poor and the need to fight poverty is nothing short of a call for human solidarity.  It deserves worldwide support in its fight for the restoration of the dignity and respect of the most weak and vulnerable members of our societies.

The EFC is an association that has grown from seven European Foundations, on its establishment in 1989.  It now boasts over 230 members including community and independent foundations as well as corporate funders, plus more than 60 associated organizations.  This is proof that the EFC was founded by exemplary leaders and visionaries that were driven by a mission to advance the cause for socio-economic development and growth.

I am honoured to have been invited to share my personal and institutional humble experiences, reflections and thoughts on fighting poverty during and after the apartheid period in South Africa.    

There can be no denying that the world is in a terrible state today.  We must admit that something is not working. The chronic state facing our world forces us to assess anew our intentions, behaviour and attitudes as leaders of our people and development professionals. Answers for old and new questions are demanded from us. There are growing doubts to the means and ways of fighting poverty that result from conferences and seminars, our collective experiences in the field, and mountains of documents and agreements made among world leaders.

Sadly we are often caught off guard.   We are still not adequately prepared to respond in situations of conflict, poverty, disease as well as women and child abuse including trafficking and rape.  All these are on the rise rather than on the retreat.  Where are we failing?  Have we arrived at a shared understanding of poverty and its causes?  What are we learning and how sound is our analysis? What options and choices are we making as we think, plan and act in the fight against poverty? 

Pope Benedict XVI's admonition to those who care to listen and brave to hazard the answer certainly strikes a positive tone to our work at Nelson Mandela Children's Fund (NMCF).  The pope argues that one of the areas that require attention in programmes for fighting poverty, which once again highlights its intrinsic moral dimension, is child poverty. When poverty strikes a family, the children prove to be the most vulnerable victims.  He warns that almost half of those living in absolute poverty today are children. He further points out that to take the side of children when considering poverty means giving priority to those objectives which concern them most directly, such as caring for mothers, commitment to education, access to vaccines, medical care and drinking water, safeguarding the environment, and above all, commitment to defence of the family and the stability of relations within it. When the family is weakened, it is inevitably children who suffer. If the dignity of women and mothers is not protected, it is the children who are affected most.

 The NMCF is just one example where some of the intense conversations regarding poverty, children and strengthening the fabric of families and supportive social networks are happening.  We are proud to be associated with similar initiatives that are growing in Sub-Saharan Africa.  We are also encouraged by the fact that our Northern partners are significant participants in these initiatives. 

Local philanthropy is one of the areas that we are exploring as part of an alternative development agenda.  Until and unless local communities, including business, government and civil society, can mobilise and direct their own resources we cannot defeat dependency and loss of self worth among our long-suffering people. We need the discerning ability to distinguish new alternatives and formulations to development theory and practice from the old and tired approaches and associated entrenched relations.   

It is with this in mind that debates taking place among Global Community Foundations is encouraging. What should not be lost sight of though is that community foundations are of Northern origins just as is the case with cooperatives.  The Latter have since been extensively tested with satisfactory results.   The issue is that there are risks that are attached to trying and replicating the same without sufficient understanding of local realities. Voluntary mutual-help and communal structures emerging in Africa and South Africa in particular are all clearly presenting themselves as viable tools for building families and communities.

 Coming back to the issue of fighting poverty today, the very nature of a broad definition of poverty means that the debate about its causes cannot be bound to states and colloquial boundaries in an increasingly globalised world. If lack in one's space is to be truly and permanently removed, the entire system with its complement of ideas and values about the world needs should not escape attention. Poverty is as much a result of the systems and power relations within which the world operates.

Only when the ideas, language and values that underpin and nurture poverty are grappled with can the environment be altered in a meaningful manner. The aim of our discourse and actions must be to alter the reality of communities constructively and significantly. Consequently this complex nature of poverty needs relevant and imaginative responses from philanthropic organizations.

 We need to transcend mere amelioration of difficult circumstances and confront the root and branch behind poverty in order achieve its successful eradication.  Central to our strategic positioning is to enhance our direct relationships and development work with and for the communities. For community foundations, this strategic positioning should see them embracing community organizing and directing social action for the promotion of social justice and human rights.

Ultimately community foundations should lend renewed agency to indigenous initiatives and help them to become part of the mainstream socio-economic development.

Role of Foundations

Years ago there was some agreement that development is ‘teaching people to fish' rather than giving them fish. Soon we realized that the dam was private property.  We now know that the earlier question is "who owns the dam and why". 

In conversation with a taxi driver a few days ago, the man said that though he brought home more money than his father and his grandfather before him; he experienced the reality of poverty more potently than either man. How the world around him was structured intensified the experience. 

To find a way out that bewildering experience, the key is to enter into partnerships that promise material deliverance. More than just lip service, this notion of partnerships is fundamental in the possibility of creating a new world that global forums often commit to declaration after declaration. The failure of governments to deliver on the United Nations' Millennium Development Goals is partly due to demonstrable commitment to bridge the gap between declaration and implementation. Governments in the developing world are often depended on developed countries to honor commitments and often these are not honored.

Civil society often displays the same power balance disparities in south-north engagement.   The donor partner often assumes the monopoly of human intelligence, who determines intervention strategies and to whom the "south" partner is accountable.   This of course creates a coalition between the NGO and the donor that often excludes communities on the ground or "beneficiaries" to the eclipse of solemn declarations.    

However UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, remains hopeful:  "Looking ahead to 2015 and beyond, there is no question that we can achieve the overarching goal: we can put an end to poverty. In almost all instances, experience has demonstrated the validity of earlier agreements on the way forward; in other words, we know what to do. But it requires an unswerving, collective, long-term effort."

For philanthropy to play a meaningful role in the eradication of poverty for full blooded democracy to be generally felt in society, it must of necessity affirm the knowledge that already exists amongst the affected and thus help to increase their perception of power to overcome their unfortunate circumstances.

This means recognizing that they, the affected, are capable to think and find a successful way out of their hardships if enabled with resources to do so. In this process, they need not be zombies that are thought for, spoken for and acted for but active participants of the humanizing act of development.

To overlook, the initial thinking capability of the needy to think their problems through, reduces them to objects of pity and consequently arrest genuine development. This therefore should be the departure point of fighting poverty. By so doing, so will those that are empowered develop a sense of the kind of opportunities that best respond to their unique needs and upliftment.

Fighting poverty has the potential to rid us of all the ills that stem from it. Conquering poverty holds the multiple benefits to rid society of hatred, conflict, instability and diseases.  In his 2009 message, Pope Benedict XVI reflected on the theme, Fighting Poverty to Build Peace, reflected on the 1993 message of his predecessor, Pope John II.

"Back in 1993," says Pope Benedict XVI, "my venerable Predecessor Pope John Paul II, in his Message for the World Day of Peace that year, drew attention to the negative repercussions for peace when entire populations live in poverty. Poverty is often a contributory factor or a compounding element in conflicts, including armed ones. In turn, these conflicts fuel further tragic situations of poverty."

 "Our world", Pope John Paul II wrote, "shows increasing evidence of another grave threat to peace: many individuals and indeed whole peoples are living today in conditions of extreme poverty. The gap between rich and poor has become more marked, even in the most economically developed nations. This is a problem which the conscience of humanity cannot ignore, since the conditions in which a great number of people are living are an insult to their innate dignity and as a result are a threat to the authentic and harmonious progress of the world community".

Taking cue from his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI writes: "In this context, fighting poverty requires attentive consideration of the complex phenomenon of globalization. This is important from a methodological standpoint, because it suggests drawing upon the fruits of economic and sociological research into the many different aspects of poverty. Yet the reference to globalization should also alert us to the spiritual and moral implications of the question, urging us, in our dealings with the poor, to set out from the clear recognition that we all share in a single divine plan: we are called to form one family in which all - individuals, peoples and nations - model their behaviour according to the principles of fraternity and responsibility".

If the theme of Fighting Poverty and Creating Opportunities is to be advanced with determined seriousness:

•·         The efforts of funds should not undermine local structures and indigenous NGOs

•·         Funds must act mindful of existing mechanisms employed by communities when confronting situations of poverty

•·         The aim is to formulate relationships which take into account and foster participatory and positive action on the ground.

•·         When dealing with the poor one should desist from stripping local groups of an important sense of agency. Only when local groups participate in the process and engage constructively with funding organizations can patterns of impoverishment be effectively challenged.

•·         At its most destructive poverty claims from individuals and communities the opportunity and scope to choose how to live. It is pivotal that funding organizations do not act in a manner that reaffirms the unspeakable loss of the ability to choose and determine the person's place with the society.

•·         What is suggested is that funding organizations and philanthropists seek to establish relationships with communities that are determined by mutual regard and equality. The top-down approach needs to be revised and replaced by engagement that begins on the ground and seeks to research, construct and to support appropriate local structures that tackle the situation of poverty.

The world has enough brain trust at its disposal to generate a menu of options for countries to choose what best suit their unique circumstances so as to craft a clear road map towards the creation of happier, safer and caring societies. Nothing less than global solidarity championed with the view of justice for all will guarantee our winning battle against poverty.