THERE is a big push by the developed nations to alleviate poverty in Africa and indeed our own Chancellor Gordon Brown at a summit on Africa proposed the doubling of aid to Africa and the cancellation of the continent's debts.

These are very laudable aims and it is to be hoped that they bring much needed help to that troubled continent.

However, I was rather alarmed to read in my morning newspaper that King Mswait IIIs of Swaziland has spent £450,000 on ten new BMWs for his 11 wives and three teenage fiances

This is almost half of the amount that Swaziland received from Britain last year.

Swaziland is recognised as one of the poorest countries in the world and it surely has to be wrong that much needed aid is being spent on items which allow its ruler to lead an extravagant lifestyle at the expense of his starving people.

Any decent minded person will welcome extra aid to the poorer countries of the world, as I do, but surely there must be some system put into place that any aid given is to be spent on alleviating poverty and not on allowing leaders to waste it on luxury items for themselves.

COUNCILLOR D PEARSON, St Michael's Court, Blackburn.