Africa's new elite

I was surprised to read David Smith ( Africa's burgeoning middle class , 26 December) give such uncritical attention to La Cité du Fleuve in Kinshasa, which most Congolese view as a vast vanity project for a tiny elite who have grown rich through a dysfunctional economy. When I was in Kinshasa in 2010, the billboards for this bizarre development were treated as a joke by ordinary people rather than as an emblem of a new distribution of wealth to a national bourgeoisie. The "optimism industry", those in finance, consultancy and private equity, have an interest in encouraging talk of prospects for profit in Africa, when the numbers indicate two long-standing and problematic trends: a continuing reliance on commodity exports and no marked increase in consumption through diversified economies. Alongside low agricultural productivity, food security and climate change, the picture on the continent is mixed, at best. But it won't get better so long as complacency about growth (and poverty) remains so prevalent. A central issue is whether those countries that are doing "well" now through natural resource booms use their supposed strength to tax properly, build regulatory frameworks that hold companies to account and ensure sustainable job-creation, and environmental protection. The signs are not encouraging. Taimour Lay Glasgow