By Erastus El Grande
The dream of a United State of Africa will forever remain an illusion to be pursued but never attained.
Africa is the richest continent in the world that can and is feeding
the whole world but failing to feed its own people. Coup d'états are an
everyday thing on this continent. It's either that or leaders rule long
enough to become a form of living archaeology!
Africans can't even produce guns to kill each other but prefer exporting their minerals and riches to buy those guns.
So what is the way forward, you ask me?
I tried to scratch my head for answers but it is like trying to
figure out how to get to the moon with a bicycle. For this dream is
virtually impossible to realise. Some even tried ethnic cleansing but it
didn't work.
As PW Botha is credited with a 1985 speech: “Blacks are good in
nothing else but making noise, dancing, marrying many wives and
indulging in sex. Let us all accept that the black man is the symbol of
poverty, mental inferiority, laziness and emotional incompetence.'' He
also said that “Black is the raw material for the white man.''
I liked the idea of the late Muammar Gaddafi who turned Libya into a
country that even Europeans envied living in. It was Gaddafi's dream to
provide fresh water for all Libyans and to make Libya self-sufficient in
food production. His idea of the Great Man-Made River Project that can
quench the thirst of all Libyans for eternity was his great speech at
the UN General Assembly 2009, in New York.
Meanwhile the World Bank has a policy of water privatisation and
full-cost water pricing, with one of its former directors, Ismail
Serageldin, stating: “The wars of the 21st century will be fought over
water”.
Then there was our neighbour Robert Mugabe. It seems he is the only
independent leader now left. He gave back the land to his people. Then
again the imperialists did not like that. A blanket of illegal sanctions
was thrown on what was once the bread basket of Africa.
NB: A good dose of self-introspection rather than the endless blame
of ‘imperialists' might just help get our continent to where you suggest
it should be, don't you think?
0 comments:
POST A COMMENT