United Sates-East Africa - President Barack Obama's proposed budget for fiscal 2012 includes sizable increases in funding for development, health, military and anti-narcotics initiatives in East Africa. The more generous allocations will be made within the context of a US foreign relations budget that the president seeks to shrink. In response to worries about the magnitude of the US budget deficit, President Obama is calling for a cut of nearly 7 per cent in the full range of American diplomatic and aid programmes.

The cuts include a sharp drop in development aid for some countries in Europe and Central Asia.

Assistance for those regions will fall 18 per cent while increasing by about the same percentage for sub-Saharan Africa.

The contrast between overall austerity and proposed funding increases for Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda highlights the priority the White House assigns to a sub-region deemed of strategic importance to the United States.

Jennifer Cooke, an Africa policy analyst with a leading Washington think tank, suggests Mr Obama may have calculated that a security-minded Congress will support increased assistance to East African countries.

The president is asking for "significant cuts in some places," notes Ms Cooke, director of the Africa programme at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies. "The countries he's choosing for increases are those likely to do well with the assistance."

Tanzania is the biggest winner in the Africa development section of the US international affairs budget that President Obama sent to Congress last week.

Spending on development projects in Tanzania will jump from $38 million in fiscal 2010 to $100 million next year -- assuming the US Congress approves the items submitted by the White House.

Kenya and Uganda would also see increases in development aid, from $79 million to $90 million in Kenya's case and from $72 million to $78 million for Uganda. All the East African countries are in line for significant increases in health programmes that include anti-Aids efforts.

President Obama is also calling for substantial new spending on programmes aimed at narcotics trafficking.

Kevin Kelley

The East African/22/02/2011