Last week, Nigerian pro-life activist Obianuju Ekeocha destroyed a BBC anchor’s claims that African women “need” abortion in order to get out of poverty. While the anchor cut Ekeocha off, claiming they were out of time, Ekeocha had more to say.
In response to last week’s Family Planning Summit in London, which saw Western nations such as the United Kingdom and Canada pledge millions towards pushing international abortion, Ekeocha compared the mentality of modern Western governments to that of their predecessors, which sought to impose Western values overseas through colonialism.
Western nations are “spitting in the face” of African freedom and democracy by attempting to overcome the will of the people with superior financial power, says Ekeocha. Such aggressive tactics represent an attitude of “cultural supremacy,” with Western nations behaving like “old colonial masters.” Sadly, pushing cultural values on the rest of the world is not a new approach for Western nations to take. Abortion pushing is simply a modern version of a very old and regrettable tradition.
Ekeocha explained that polls indicate “overwhelmingly that Africans hate abortion, abhor abortion, both women and men.” Despite this, Western pro-abortion activists insist that Africans must accept that abortion is not only a basic right, but a necessary tool to end poverty. Ekeocha, who holds a Master’s degree in biomedical science and a Bachelor’s degree in microbiology, contends that food, water, and education are more needed and desired by African women seeking to escape poverty.
But no, of course, we Westerners know better what Africans need than Africans themselves, right Canada? Right United Kingdom? Right Planned Parenthood?
Western governments and pro-abortion organizations seem to think they know, and have the right to impose, what is best for everyone, not only against the will of the people in foreign countries, but in many cases against the will of the people in their own countries. Anne Scanlan, Director of Education for the UK’s Life Charity, explained (in response to her government’s recent decision to spend £1 billion of foreign aid money on abortion and family planning), “This is absolutely shocking. A recent ComRes poll showed that 65% of the public oppose UK taxpayer money being spent on abortions overseas.”
As Live Action News’ Cassy Fiano recently noted, the efforts of Western countries to provide access to contraception and abortion in African countries may have little to do with empowering women, and more to do with eugenics. Danish politician Ulla Tornaes believes “[p]art of the solution to reducing migratory pressures on Europe is to reduce the very high population growth in many African countries.” Fiano writes:
Decreasing Africa’s population growth is a foreign and security policy priority for the Danish government, according to Tornaes. Many European countries have been grappling with high numbers of African refugees and asylum seekers, and so for Tornaes and other Danish politicians, the solution is evidently to prevent African babies from being born — even though asylum applications fell drastically from 2015 to 2016.
Despite the fluffy talk of charity and just trying to be helpful, it is becoming more and more obvious that pushing abortion on foreign countries is not what the world wants from the West.
