Seanad debates

Wednesday, 26 November 2003

Overseas Development Aid: Motion.

 

There are major political issues with which we need to deal and we are engaged with those. I have met President Museveni twice, when he visited Ireland and at a meeting in Tokyo not long ago. We went through all the issues regarding the Democratic Republic of the Congo. I would suggest that not just Ireland but the Dutch, the British and all of us who were present in the capital, Kampala, through our embassies have managed to exert influence and leverage on this government to do certain things. The obvious one was to withdraw from the Democratic Republic of the Congo. That has happened. There are issues of governance that we need to address. We are in there dealing with building up the police and the judicial system. This is a complex issue. It comes right to the heart of development and how we operate as a nation. Do we walk away from the kind of issues I mentioned earlier? That is a key point. I would find it hard to do that, but if that is what the Oireachtas wants, we will have to think about it. As we debate this issue today, I am satisfied, on balance, that the work we are doing is very valuable to the ordinary people who are detached from the political considerations and have nothing to do with these areas of controversy. I am satisfied we should be with them, as many Members have said.

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