By Ken Afor
The United States Government has pledged $225 million worth of investments to support growing democracies still facing autocratic rule.
This move will be unveiled on Wednesday by the US Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken and Samantha Power, head of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) during an event at the ongoing United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in New York.
Details revealed that about $110 million will be invested in private-sector projects in Nepal after the country exited a civil war in 2006 where more than 17,000 lives were lost.
The funding for Nepal made possible by the US International Development Finance Corporation will be invested in micro businesses and in the country’s transportation sector.
Elsewhere, about $145 million will be injected to some US government funding programmes aimed at supporting job creation and public finances.
Major US donors including Ford Foundation and Rockefeller Foundation, will be supporting civil society groups, rural electricity projects and climate projects in Moldova, Tanzania and Zambia.
“The United States is dedicated to ensuring that democracy delivers for all,” USAID said in a statement.
The assistance aims to “deliver essential services and bring about tangible progress for citizens in countries experiencing democratic openings,” it said.
The investment is a follow up on the “Democracy Delivers” project launched by Blinken and Power last year in the heat of the Ukraine war even as Russia and China are looking for a safe haven to establish their ideologies.
It would be recalled that Russia signified interest in supporting the military junta in Niger aftermath the July coup.
Also, a similar incident occurred in Sudan in 2021 and two after the country is still in war.
