‘Vampire states in Africa are sucking the life blood out of our nations’, Ghanan George Ayittey said during his address to international academics and experts at the recent Technology, Education and Development conference in Tanzania, ‘and that is why Africa’s begging bowl leaks.’
According to his thinking, it leaks from corruption, capital flight and over dependence on food imports. In the 1960s, Africa was self-sufficient in foods, fed itself and exported from its agriculture.
Africa today is made up of cheetahs, he went on, and hippos. The cheetahs are the go-getting young, that new generation who are angry about the state of Africa, and those who are trying to change. The hippos, well, just look at them! They blame colonialism for what has happened since the 1960s, when the facts suggest it is not colonialism but themselves who are responsible for the denigration of their respective countries.
‘The question Africans should ask themselves’, he continued, ‘is this: are you a cheetah or a hippo?’
Post colonial leaders have failed their people, he says, and he calls them ‘fou-fou heads’. I have no idea what a fou-fou head is, but I would not dream of calling a Nigerian one, much less a head of state. Still, President Yar’Adua seems to think there are a lot of fou-fou heads around him who he is enjoying getting rid of. Perhaps he is in agreement with Mr Ayittey.
A British woman at the airport ahead of me was found to have $6,000 in cash on her.
‘My husband insists that I travel with an emergency fund,’ she explained. The two customs men looked at each other and smiled,
‘Is your husband Nigerian?’ At the airport, you are handed a notice saying ‘There is currently no restriction on taking money out of Nigeria’, as if almost encouraging this rupture of the nation’s wealth, which everyone knows stems from corrupt practises somewhere down the line, and maybe at every stage in the line.
Africa has two problems, rats and the governments. They are not governments, continues Ayittey, but ‘vampire states’, that suck the lifeblood out of their people. Africa’s problem is its governments and its governments are its problem. People who think the problems stem from colonialism are wrong, for colonialism would be taking an entirely different tack.
A country that reminds me continually of Africa, despite its trying desperately to become European, is Turkey. Recently I was at a school prize giving. As soon as their own child received their certificate, the parents left. They didn’t even clap other children receiving certificates. In Europe and even more so America, we have a big thing about celebrating success, and it doesn’t really matter whose success it is. The success of all our children is what will make our country great to live in in the future. This selfish inward looking attitude seemed to sum up all that is blocking progress in Turkey. Every citizen matters. Every citizen matters equally: this is the principal of democracy.
African countries have, since colonialisation ended, adopted a modern approach to their economies, and they have done this very quickly. The traditional ways of running market economies, and the largely informal ways of markets which are mainly local and very successful, especially in areas where the climate is unpredictable, have been downgraded and almost lost. In a sustainable economical project in Jos, one of the arms of the project is to encourage local people to find their old methods once more through narrative and exploring their traditional cultures while some people are still alive who remember them. This is enabling local people, especially women, who traditionally ran the markets, to realise ways to re-establish local economies, and work their way back out of the recent plague of localised poverty. Run mainly by local people, this project has not tried to impose any external solution on this community. This isn’t colonialism, but local inspirations for local solutions which are sustainable.
The masses of aid sent to Africa by well-meaning groups has been largely wasted. It is one thing where there is a disaster or a war, and where outside help is clearly needed, and in this kind of situation Nigeria has itself been very active in sending economic and army assistance; and quite another to use foreign aid to shore up corrupt economic governmental management. This is why Africa begging bowl leaks. Reliance on aid, which is largely accepted throughout modern Africa, is a form of colonialist attitude.
Well meaning projects in Nigeria such as the education reforms for every primary school age child to be in school, start off well and then realise aid can be obtained for these projects. Consequently government funding dries up, and the infrastructure never improves. All projects which improve life for people become temporary again. The building up of Nigeria’s infrastructure needs to be certain, reliable, long-term, and locally managed.
Communities need to develop further in a sustainable way, based on traditional communities and including, though not exclusively, agriculture and traditional industries, locally produced exportable goods such as Shea butter products which are much sought after in Europe and the USA, and expanding areas such as eco-tourism. In some countries such as Malawi, this is starting and shows signs of being successful.
‘We can take Africa back,’ concludes Mr Ayittey, ‘one village at a time.’ The best thing is, every person who begins some kind of small project, making their own clothes in Gandhi style, or producing some simple marketable item which funds their daughter’s schooling, is creating the basis for the New Africa, the Africa that works, and is truly independent. However minor one’s efforts may seem to be to begin with, each person can feel empowered and confident that they, not the seemingly powerful fat-cats, are the foundation stones of the new Nigeria.
982 words
©Jill Rees
25 August 2008
Tags:
Africa,
George Ayittey,
Jos,
Leadership Abuja Nigeria articles 2008,
Nigeria
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