April 25 2000

Abuja, Nigeria - African Leaders today called on the world to cancel the debt of poor and heavily indebted countries to enable them to fight the poverty caused by malaria.

The leaders were gathered in Abuja, Nigeria, for the first ever summit on malaria.

The African heads of state signed a declaration calling for at least one billion US dollars a year to be made available to the Roll Back Malaria movement in Africa to help achieve its aims of halving malaria deaths by the end of the decade.

By the end of the two day summit up to 750 million dollars extra funds were already promised to be made available. Funds were identified by Canada, UK, US, the World Bank and other sources.

The summit declaration also called on development partners to invest in malaria vaccine development in Africa and strengthen research.

Summit host, His Excellency Olusegen Obasanjo, President of Nigeria, in his closing remarks said: "Today we have begun to write the final chapter of the history of malaria.

"We have raised the hopes and expectations of our people - we must not let them down. We cannot afford to let them down. May malaria be rolled out and development rolled in in all African countries."

The Plan of Action includes a structure to tackle malaria at all levels from the whole of Africa to the smallest village community with an emphasis on simple but effective technologies, in the home, implemented by public, private and voluntary groups.