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As the aeroplane carrying Paul O'Neill and Bono crosses the Mediterranean and starts out over African airspace, the two make their first visit to the back of the plane, where the press are camped out in surprising comfort. The chartered 757 has enough room to allow each reporter to bag a row of seats.

Bono is looking unshaven and a blurry round the edges after spending the weekend dancing on tables at the New York stag weekend of the Edge, U2's guitarist. Mr. O'Neill, who has been at the less raucous surroundings of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development meetings in Bucharest, is neatly pressed.

Bono eases himself into his usual loqaciousness with a riff about himself and the Treasury secretary being the Odd Couple, a reference to the movie and TV show about a mismatched pair of housemates -- one tidy and one messy. Since he himself is untidy and the sort of person who leaves pizza boxes about the place, Bono says, the part of the fastidious Felix must be taken by Mr. O'Neill.

At the beginning of the trip, the two are keen to get on, and each nods vigorously while the other is talking. Bono starts off with a faintly contrived comparison between Ghana, the first country on the itinerary, and his native Ireland, both "coming out from under the hoof of colonialism." (The Republic of Ghana emerged from under the boot of the British in 1957, a few decades later than the Republic of Ireland.) This is mixed in with his repeated insistence that Ghana is "the birthplace of cool."

On Tuesday, the two are to visit a U.S.-owned data processing company in the capital Accra, which carries out data entry for medical and dental companies in the U.S. and enjoys a tax holiday from the Ghanaian government.

"Ghanaians are very sharp, elegant, smart people, which is why I think they will take to the new economy really well," Bono says. "The technology sector is exactly right for them. As an Irish person, I have seen what export processing zones can do. Irish people got the move on a lot of other European countries because of Gateway and Dell coming into the west of Ireland. Ghana could be that country in Africa."

Mr. O'Neill leaps in with his own contribution, saying that much of Ireland's success in attracting investment, can be put down to low tax rates -- one of his favourite subjects. The two go on to spend a lot of time ostentatiously agreeing with each other but at a somewhat tangential counterpoint.

Bono talks about the importance of education in Ireland's present, and Ghana's future, success. Mr. O'Neill agrees, adding that education in developing countries needs to be measured in terms of children passing standardised tests, not just numbers enrolled in school. "Going to school without learning something is worse than not going to school," he says. Bono agrees, adding that children need to be in school before they can pass the tests.

One concern expressed by some Ghanaian non-governmental organisations is that the model for Ghana's development, based on trade liberalisation and export promotion, brings little benefit to the rural poor. Bono acknowledges such critiques, but adds that it is not for him to tell the Ghanaians how to run their economy.

"I do not agree with micro-managing southern hemisphere economies from Washington. I don't think secretary O'Neill does either. Rather oddly, we agree on this." On cue, Mr. O'Neill agrees with him. "I know it can't be done," he says.

And so, on this note of insistent consonance, the trip begins.

One of the main concerns for the days ahead is whether the Ghanaians can live up to the extraordinary billing Bono has given them. "Ghanaians are cool," he says. "Kofi [Annan, we presume] is one. They look jazz."

© Financial Times, 2002. All rights reserved.

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