[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: George W. Bush (2008, Book II)]
[November 12, 2008]
[Pages 1360-1363]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Remarks at the 2008 Bishop John T. Walker Memorial Dinner
November 12, 2008

    Thank you, Frank, and thanks for this 
great honor. I accept it gratefully, but it ought to be offered to the 
American people.
    Laura and I are thrilled to be with you. I am 
always a better man when my wife is by my side.
    I want to thank Jules Coles, the 
president of Africare; Maria Walker, the widow 
of Bishop John Walker. I was thinking coming over, ``Let's see, I'm 
George Walker Bush''--[laughter]. I don't know, what do you think? 
[Laughter] Anyway, Madam--Ms. Walker, thank you very much for joining 
us.
    I want to thank the members of the Africare board of directors for 
this honor, but more importantly, for the work you do in Africa.
    I thank my friend, Congressman Don Payne, who's one of the leading--[applause]--the leading 
authorities in the United States Congress on African affairs. I'm 
pleased members of my administration have joined me and Laura here tonight.
    Henrietta Fore, Administrator of 
USAID; the head of the Millennium Challenge Corporation, Ambassador John 
Danilovich; the U.S. Malaria Coordinator, 
Rear Admiral Tim Ziemer--thank you for 
coming, Admiral.
    I'm pleased to be here with Lloyd Pierson, President and CEO of African Development Foundation; Ron 
Tschetter, Director of the mighty Peace 
Corps.
    Laura and I have the privilege of hosting 
Bill Frist and his wife Karyn at the White House tonight. Make sure you make your 
bed, Senator, but we thank you for coming.
    I want to thank members of the diplomatic corps. We are proud you 
are here tonight.
    I'm in pretty good company when it comes to this Humanitarian 
Service Award. Jules said, ``Man, you're 
hanging out with some good folks.'' Last year's award winner went to--
recipient was President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia, a great woman. Last year's dinner speaker 
was, in fact, my wife Laura. And frankly, knowing 
both women, I am not sure which is a harder act to follow.
    I really am glad Laura is here because our 
work in Africa--and I say our collective work in Africa--is a labor of 
love for us. Laura and I have been to Africa a lot. She has worked in an 
effective way to help promote education and health. Our girls 
Barbara and Jenna 
have done a lot of work to help promote dignity on the continent of 
Africa, particularly with those folks living with HIV/AID. I am proud of 
their work, and I'm proud of the work of millions of our fellow 
citizens. It is amazing to me that when you go to Africa, the number of 
Americans you meet who are living out the universal call to love a 
neighbor like you'd like to be loved yourself, who are hearing that 
admonition that to whom

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much is given, much is required. America--[applause].
    I appreciate those who support Africare. I thank you for your work 
in caring for orphans in Uganda or fighting polio in Angola or 
resettling refugees from Sudan. I thank you for the work you do in 20 
nations on the continent of Africa. And in that work, you are carrying 
out the vision of the man we honor, Bishop John Walker.
    When he was a young clergyman in the sixties, he traveled to Uganda. 
He was welcomed in the homes of people who needed his message of love. 
That experience convinced Bishop Walker that Africa's greatest treasure 
is not its spectacular scenery or natural resources, but it is the 
determined spirit of its people.
    Bishop Walker understood that disease and poverty and injustice are 
great challenges. But he also knew that the people of Africa have the 
talent and ambition and resolve to overcome them. And frankly, that has 
been the heart of our policy toward Africa. We do not believe in 
paternalism, we believe in partnership, because we believe in the 
potential of the people on the continent of Africa.
    I've had a lot of uplifting experiences as the President. And one of 
the most uplifting experiences has been to witness a new and more 
hopeful era dawning on the continent. Over the past 8 years, it's been 
moving to watch courageous Africans root out corruption and open up 
their economies and invest in the prosperity of their people. The United 
States stands with these leaders as partners and friends and allies in 
hope through the work of the Millennium Challenge Account.
    On my trip to Africa this February, I joined President 
Kikwete of Tanzania to sign a 5-year, 
nearly $700 million Millennium Challenge compact, which will help build 
up Tanzania's infrastructure. And as part of this compact, Africare is 
helping to extend electricity to homes and businesses in some of the 
most remote areas of the country. My fellow citizens need to hear what 
President Kikwete said. He said that the Millennium Challenge program is 
a ``source of pride, making it possible for the people of Tanzania to 
chart a brighter future.''
    Notice he didn't say, making it 
possible for the American people to chart a brighter future for 
Tanzania. He said, making it possible for the citizens of Tanzania to 
chart their own future.
    It is uplifting to see people freed from hunger and thirst. And I'm 
proud of the fact that the American people have supported programs to 
help feed tens of millions of people on the continent. And I appreciate 
the work of people here in Africare for helping on that work. Your 
organization has partnered with our government to address the lack of 
clean and safe drinking water. This is one of the greatest challenges to 
development in African nations, and through your efforts this evening, 
you're helping to overcome it.
    On a way--one way our country is working with African governments is 
to provide safe water through private-public partnerships, and one such 
innovative program is called the PlayPumps Alliance. Mr. Dale 
Jones of PlayPumps International is with us 
today. You probably may not have heard of PlayPumps Alliance--it's kind 
of hard for me to say. [Laughter] But here's the way it works: PlayPumps 
are children's merry-go-rounds attached to a water pump and a storage 
tank, and so when the wheel turns, clean water is produced. Laura and Jenna helped to get one of 
these new pumps moving during their visit to a Zambian school. As the 
wheel spun, children on the merry-go-round shouted and laughed with joy. 
At the same time, they helped to keep their friends in good health.
    There are innovative ways to express the compassion of the American 
people on the continent of Africa. And I want to thank PlayPumps 
International for being one of the innovators.
    On my trips to Africa, it has been uplifting to see people 
fulfilling their God-given

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potential, thanks to a good education. The African Education Initiative 
was mentioned, but a part of that initiative is the fact that we've 
trained 700,000 teachers, distributed more than 10 million textbooks, 
and provided hundreds of thousands of scholarships to help girls go to 
school.
    In Liberia, I met a woman named Deddeh Zaizay, who told me that her husband had abandoned her and her 
three children because she was illiterate. Deddeh is learning to read. 
She proudly declared in front of the President of Liberia that she plans to go to college. And she has 
set her sights high; she wants to be the President of Liberia one day.
    I do not see how you can have a hopeful life if your mother and 
father is dying of HIV/AIDS or your baby is dying needlessly because of 
a mosquito bite. And so we have taken a strong stand against deadly 
disease. Through the malaria initiative, we've partnered with African 
nations to dramatically reduce infection rates and save lives. 
Laura and I saw the good work of the American 
people and the good work of Africare at firsthand in Tanzania's Meru 
District Hospital. New mothers bring their babies into the hospital; 
they have them tested for malaria and HIV. Nurses distribute bed net 
vouchers, where mothers can use to buy insecticide-treated bed nets.
    Laura and I met the mothers. I cannot tell 
you the expression of pride they had on their face when they held their 
babies up and said, ``My baby is healthy.'' Nothing more hopeful than to 
see the joy on a mother's face, realizing that her baby has escaped the 
scourge of the deadly disease of malaria. I thank all those in this 
audience and around our Nation who have helped this malaria initiative 
become robust and effective.
    And then, of course, there's the extraordinary story--stories 
related to PEPFAR. We launched the initiative in 2003; only 50,000 
people in sub-Sahara Africa were receiving antiretroviral treatment. 
Today, as was mentioned, we support treatment for nearly 1.7 million 
people in the region. Africare is making vital contributions to this 
effort. And with your help, people across Africa now speak of a Lazarus 
effect: Communities once given up for dead are being brought back to 
life.
    Laura and I have seen this miracle with our 
own eyes. I'm sure many of you have as well. She traveled to South 
Africa in 2005; Laura visited a PEPFAR-supported clinic for HIV-positive 
pregnant women. There she met Kunene Tantoh. When Kunene first arrived at the clinic, she virtually 
had no immune system left. But with the treatment she received, Kunene 
survived. Not only did she survive, 2 years later she was in the Rose 
Garden at the White House. She brought with him--she brought with her 
her son Baron. She wanted Laura 
and me to see an HIV-free baby. Baron is a reminder of the many lives 
that have been touched and saved by the compassion of the American 
people. And he represents the bright and promising future awaiting the 
folks in Africa.
    In our visits to the continent, we have been overwhelmed by the 
affection and gratitude that the African people show to the American 
people. Oh, a lot of people are out there saying: ``Why should I care 
about Africa? What good does it do me, Mr. President, for our Government 
to support Africa?'' Well, I'll tell you what good it does. One, it is 
in our national security interest that we defeat hopelessness. It is in 
our economic interest that we help economies grow. And it is in our 
moral interest that when we find hunger and suffering, the United States 
of America responds in a robust and effective way.
    I thank Africare for being on the leading edge of this 
transformative series of initiatives. I hope you feel as good about your 
contribution as I feel as good about our Government's contribution to 
doing what's right. I'm honored to receive this award. I am honored to 
be the President of the most compassion, greatest nation on the

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face of the Earth. God bless you, and God bless the people of America 
and Africa.
    Thank you all.

Note: The President spoke at 7:19 p.m. at the Washington Hilton Hotel. 
In his remarks, he referred to W. Frank Fountain, chairman, Africare; 
former Sen. William H. Frist; and Dale E. Jones, chief executive 
officer, PlayPumps International.