Keep your £9m aid... you need it more than we do

A MALAWI campaigner has told Scotland to keep its 9million African aid cash - and use it to improve conditions here.

Top journalist Mabvuto Banda was stunned to see the levels of booze and drug abuse during an eight-day trip north of the border.

He said the number of people who die daily from booze-related illness in Scotland is comparable to the number of people who die from HIV or Aids in Malawi.

Malawi ... nation has a high child mortality rate

Malawi ... nation has a high child mortality rate

And Mr Banda, from The Nation newspaper, said the cash pledged should remain here to fund our battle with the bottle.

He said: "If the Scottish Government put more funds into preventing alcohol and drug abuse, many lives would be saved. After all, charity begins at home."

Mr Banda joined a cop patrol in Aberdeen, where he came across four drunk and aggressive teens at 4am.

He said: "I am shocked that children are gallivanting at this hour. This wouldn't happen in my country unless something was terribly wrong."

He also visited the Parkhead Youth Project and Greater Easterhouse Alcohol Awareness Project in Glasgow.

Mr Banda said: "I applaud the Scots for supporting Malawi, where the maternal and child mortality rates are amongst the highest in the world.

"But I don't see why Scots should be funding less urgent issues, like gender equality, when the people of Scotland need the money to sustain local initiatives addressing the country's serious alcohol problem."

In 2005, then-First Minister Jack McConnell pledged 3million annually.

Scottish ministers have recently committed 4million to a development programme in sub-Saharan Africa.

This will more than double to 9million by 2011.