Oh my dear Africa

Middle of April already, seriously?! I say it all the time but damn, where is time in such a rush? Been a while, I hope the universe is smiling on you all.  Its funny how when you are in fixed employment, its so easy to find time to write blogs etc. nowadays, all my free time is spent thinking about what next or what ifs J, you would think that I would have a whole lot more free time doing my own thing, but nah man!

So anyway at the beginning of the year, I read a book called “The book of negroes” an absolutely engrossing read about a young lass and her ordeal through slavery, this was followed by viewing the movies “Django Unchained” and “Lincoln”, then there is the constant daily reminder of the effects of apartheid on our beautifully divided land.

Now whilst reading the book and watching the movies, I found myself thinking what on earth gives one man the right to come to another man’s land and shackle him and sell him off or do with him as he pleases? What gives him the right?! What gives people the right to invade another’s land and colonise them? But I guess power and preying on the minds of the weak. The part of it that angers me is that a nation of many let the few run amok and do as they wish. And now we sit here and say poor Africa and Africans, but that’s because we still let this continue. Now there are no guns that rule over us, nah man, but we are just as weak, we allow leaders with no inkling of what it takes to drive an economy or a people nor any true desire to do lead, lead us. We have failed our beautiful land and ourselves and will continue to do so.

I tend to have this conversation quite a few times with my pops and some mates. But I get bored and tired of hearing about “its because of colonialism or its because of apartheid” I am in no way trivialisng the crippling effects those 2 events had on the continent and its people, more so apartheid, because it made a lot of people ‘stupid’, starved them of decent education, which unfortunately will leave a legacy in our land for years to come. But as I said I am tired of hearing about its because of that, because it happened. Now we have our land back. Many might argue that but now we do not have the capital. True, but we have the land which gives us some power with regards to making the rules, right? We as a continent need to stop relying on the west to save us, let’s save ourselves. Let’s build ourselves up, even if slowly to become a continent of equals because truth be told they laugh at us, hell we laugh at us.

I hear things like Swiss Chocolate where in Switzerland do they grow cocoa? English Tea, can England grow tea? Italian Coffee, in which Italian region are beans grown might I ask? Nigerians buying petrol at astronomical prices when they are amongst the worlds top oil producers. We have the resources, it’s not like those that need the raw materials will be doing us a favour by getting it from us. So perhaps we stand tall and say guys lets be reasonable we cant have this poverty and ‘un-industrialisation’ (clearly a made up word, but you get my drift) any more in these here parts.

I was in Singapore last week so thought i’d hop on over to Malaysia just out of interest. Malaysia got its independence on in August 1957, it has a population of 29.6mil, size of 330sqm for a constant period of 50 years, it achieved a GDP growth of 6.5% and its GDP (PPP) is $492bn, unemployment rate is 3.2%, poor households 3.8%. Ghana has a population of 25.2mil, size of 239sqm, independence March 1957 GDP83.18bn, unemployment of 11%, poor households 10%

Both countries were colonized, climates are exactly the same, in terms of natural resources I think Ghana might have more resources than Malaysia. It’s a phenomenal city Kuala Lumpur, there are definitely elements of poverty, but from what I saw, this was so overshadowed by the order of things and the very evident industrialization. I was amazed. So what happened? Well in 1991 the former prime minister outlined a vision 2020 wherein, he detailed the plan to make Malaysia a self-sufficient industrialised nation, and then went about IMPLEMENTING these plans. Another thing about the country is its largest trading partners are its Asian neighbours. That right there should be the blue print for the African Renaissance right?

Someone please tell me what commodity we don’t have on this continent? Yes perhaps we don’t have the know-how, but we ‘import’ it on our terms. We build our neighbours instead of letting them know that we are better than them, because we are the only ones with a good road system and fancy, almost first world mining expertise. We build our people so they can be those engineers who build fancy structures. It’s not like we don’t have people with smarts? Many of our teachers, doctors, engineers, bankers, scientists, are seen to be amongst the best in their field but many prefer to ply our trade elsewhere, because our own continent doesn’t provide an environment for us to do the best we can. From where I sit, I believe the political will is lacking. It seems that most of our leadership structures serve themselves first and this perpetuates the cycle, we will continue to sell off our continent to the likes of China and India.

My pops keeps giving me the argument that the powers that be will seek to continue to sow divisions in our continent if we try to do something for ourselves which is contrary to what is to their benefit, he cited the examples of Zimbabwe, Libya, Mubarak, Nyerere, Lumumba, Sankara, Kenyata, etc. which is fair point, but a lot of these presidents were deposed/killed by their own people funded by?? But that’s besides the point, if you create an environment where the majority believe that you are working for their benefit and opportunities are ever present, whom of your people would want to harm you?

Perhaps it is I who lives in a fools paradise, but I long for this paradise to be this land from whence I hail!!

Oh Africa!!!

Happy birthday to you all…

Take care my good people