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Monday, July 21, 2008

Can Africa be salvaged... in my lifetime?

Africa as a continent fails in almost all positive metrics against any other continent... even Central & South America (I deliberately N. America as part of "America") which has seen its share of troubles over the past few decades including military juntas, hyper-inflation, etc...

S. America threw off the colonial yoke, suffered economic downturns, military regimes, etc but even they have surpassed Africa... by a distance... as of 2008... Whereas some part of Africa always has a famine every 2-3 years led by the superstar Ethiopia... I have never heard of a famine in America. Well, one in the recent past anyway.

Mexico with all its myriad problems and smaller oil & gas reserves than Nigeria beats Nigeria hands down!

Asia - even with laggards like Burma/Myanmar and Mongolia - has done much better than Africa. South Africa may be a 'performer' in Africa but barely makes the cut in Asia. Since 1990, many S.E. Asian countries have done much better than S.Africa including Taiwan, S.Korea, China, India, etc...

Japan's (or China's) economy is larger than the whole of Africa (including S. Africa and Arab Africa). Then there are the oil-rich gulf states, India, Taiwan among others... Even Russia is primarily Asian by land mass.

Would it be considered genocide if we (as Africans) lined up 90% of African politicians and shot them... dead... using an extra bullet just to make sure... Then bury them six feet under...

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Coldtusker you are sic..But that is what needs to happen have all of them ........

MainaT said...

Too easy
We the people have to change our mentality first and then we'll be ready to be served by politicians that can deliver.
We don't have standards and that is why bepople like Cyrus Jirongo, Ephraim Maina are MPs today.

coldtusker said...

Murigi... well, it seems you are afflicted by the same illness I have...

MainaT: Well, partly the rigging leaves the crooks where they are.

I believe in democracy but Africans are not ready for democracy. They are venal, tribalistic and stupid...

Why? They elect - or let them remain in power - the same idiots over and over... moreover they elect the crooks!

Chinua Achebe wrote on this in "A Man of the People"...

Oren_Licus said...

Ah yes, I remember A Man of the People...Chief Nanga is a perfect representation of your typical African politician: Charming, uneducated, tribalistic, corrupt and greedy...Too bad we don't have enough idealists like Odili and the lawyer (Max?).

I say the unenlightened masses are to blame as well - they're willing to die for their leaders (tribal) in the name of loyalty regardless of--pretty much anything.

Anonymous said...

MainaT: Amen

coldtusker:
I'm all African and I'm not stupid.
Tribalistic...is not African, but human. We shall always single each other out based on superficial differences as long as were are human. If it were not tribe, it would have been clan, gender, age, mental acuity...
I do not believe in democracy. Why? Because it is being peddled around as a panacea. Because all our problems - economic, nutritional, mental, emotional, educational... - are summarised into one little convinient diagnosis called Lack of Democracy. Let's block out the noise from the 'democratic' nations. Let them continue in their pursuit of this ideal. Let us block out the noise so that we can hear what comes from within us. Let us dig up our identity from wherever it was burried by these benevolent democracies. Let us finally have a contribution to make that is uniquely African. Let us understand that we haven't failed, but merely lost our way.

I'm tired of Africans being judged by merits that were imposed on us.