Helpful Irish input in the Seychelles highlights the positive role we play in developing world
SINCE I reached the age of 80 in 2006 I have travelled over 150,000 miles to almost 30 countries as a consultant or lecturer, usually on behalf of such bodies as the World Bank. Almost everywhere I have gone I have been impressed by the positive contribution that Irish people are making to developing countries – but nowhere more so than in the Seychelles, where I have been as a consultant on three occasions.
The Seychelles consist of hundreds of islands 1,000 miles off the east coast of Africa, spread over almost one million square miles of ocean. Only some of these islands are inhabited, by fewer than 90,000 people, who speak English, French and Creole.
This is a country that derives its external receipts exclusively from two sources. First tuna-fishing – including fees paid by other countries for the right to fish tuna in its waters; and, second, from high-end tourism. For the latter it is very well-equipped by its climate, its endless beaches and the dramatic character of its sometimes mountainous scenery.
As in so many other countries, for many years its government spent far more than it could afford and ended up in major financial difficulties. A new president, elected in 2004, faced the task of clearing up this financial mess – as well as tackling security problems.
President James Michel chose to turn to Ireland for assistance with this work – but not to the Irish government, because Seychelles is a middle-income country, and thus outside the range of our official aid programme. Instead the president asked an Irish security consultancy firm, founded by two former members of the Army, to assist with that side of his problems. Their effective performance soon led him to ask them to recommend experts in financial budgeting, customs control, education, police reform and training, and tourism. Moreover, training of public servants is now being undertaken by our Institute of Public Administration.
The IMF has declared itself very pleased with the progress made by the government in sorting out the islands’ budgetary difficulties, helped by the expertise of a former official of our Department of Finance, recently deceased.
The deputy commissioner of the Seychelles police is currently a former Garda chief superintendent, who, with some other former gardaí, is responsible for police training and for tackling a substantial local drug problem. Police handling of a riot several years ago has also been the subject of an inquiry by an Irish judge, whose report was very well received.
Aided by this very wide range of Irish expertise, remarkable progress in many areas has been made by a determined Seychelles president and government. Over the past year or so, however, their task has been greatly complicated by the impact of Somali piracy on the economy of the Seychelles. For although the Seychelles are up to 1,000 miles south of the parts of the Somali coast from which the pirates operate, the effectiveness of international protection on the major shipping route east of Aden has diverted these miscreants farther south, towards a huge area of the Indian ocean, including the Seychelles, where similar protection is quite impossible.
This has had a major impact on tuna fishing, reducing Seychelles fishermen’s catch by 80 per cent, although happily revenue from licensing foreign vessels has not been affected as these licence fees are independent of the actual catch. Moreover tourism income has been reduced by about 20 per cent.
The EU has agreed to pay some compensation for these losses, but these payments are routed through a UN agency within which France and Britain have considerable influence – which some in the Seychelles believe has been used to delay payments in order to pressurise the Seychelles to take on the arrest, trial and imprisonment of captured pirates. However, the Seychelles economy is badly placed financially to tackle these tasks. Meanwhile Irish ex-Naval and ex-Army officers are heavily engaged with the piracy issue as part of their security role.
I cite this example of the kind of valuable role Irish people can play in developing countries, where a combination of trustworthiness, good human relations and the skilful deployment of expertise – all free of the pursuit of a national self-interest – gives us a clear advantage vis-a-vis some other European states.
I know this advantage is sometimes seen in Ireland as being in some way associated with our neutrality vis-a-vis Nato. But few in the developing world know anything about our neutrality – or about Nato – so our success has nothing whatever to do with neutrality.
What very many worldwide do know about, however, is our unique European experience of colonisation. And that is why so many people in developing countries trust us to be non-exploitative and, in the proper sense of that now much misused word, “disinterested”.
This became very clear to me when, just before the start of our first presidency of the European Community in 1975, it transpired that on behalf of the community the (immediately preceding) French presidency had failed to secure agreement on a collective deal with the 46 former British and French colonies – known as the ACP (African Caribbean, Pacific) countries – and had left to our presidency the task of sorting out this mess – within the month of January 1975. I had to familiarise myself immediately with 50 outstanding negotiating issues and chair two negotiating sessions, the second of which lasted 60 hours, with only one short break.
The task was completed only seven hours late. And the process was hugely facilitated by the fact that the leaders of the ACP states knew that I was sympathetic to their needs – and was also able to negotiate in French as well as English. At the same time, because we had by then been members of the EC for two years, the other eight EC ministers had got to know me well enough to understand that I would not sell out their legitimate interests.
After that episode it was clear to me Ireland has a special role to play vis-a-vis the developing world – within the EU as well as in the UN.