Once upon a time Africa’s identity in global history lived beyond the shadows of disaster, chaos and ill-fated images of life. A continent so rich in every mineral and natural resource imaginable, suffers the most devastating of life’s handouts. Of course, there are bright spaces in Africa. Many more than the propaganda and the biased economic agendas will want you to believe but let’s face it; the problems in Africa is way beyond agenda-setting and socio-economic agenda. In as much as I am careful to say that not every country in Africa is drenched wit the problems of poverty and war, for some weird reason, it is the most vivid image of the continent.
I read an interesting article, thanks to the research fellow Mirabel; that Africa poor because of war.
The article had a bunch of facts supporting the assertion but it ultimately based its reasoning on countries like Sudan, Sierra Leone Liberia and Rwanda. On the flip side, 4 out of 54 countries will not be a sound statistic to make a logical argument.
‘Fifteen years of conflicts have cost Africa about $300bn between 1990 and 2005. This is equal to the amount of international aid received during the same period.
And the continent loses an average of around $18bn a year because of armed conflict.’
The questions of where the arms come from, who is behind the armed conflicts and why the countries that fight actually wipe themselves out, are all questions that will leave more questions than answers. Well Mirabel, I think war has done a tremendous disservice to Africa as a continent and especially the countries that had suffered the direct hit. The United Nations are too busy fixing economic glitches in Asia and Europe, so something tells me that they will not be zooming in on the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty anytime soon. Please tell Leornardo DiCaprio that 'Blood Diamond' wasnt enough to get the world's attention, so he might want to consider a sequel. This time please find a role for Jessica Alba;- thats a personal request.Until then, the Dark Continent is on some journey, hopefully to a peaceful boulevard.
17 comments:
I don't think we can say 'Africa is poor' simply beacuse of war. Certainly war wages a great affect on the economical affects of a country. However, Rwanda is a prime example of how a country can 'develop' after war. When a leader actually cares more about his or her people, then simply the amount of money he or she can pocket, things tend to be more positive. In short, corrupt leaders, colonization, war, and poor educational infastructure help to cause the ugliness of some unfortunate nations.
The People of Africa are poor because they are poor-that's it. War is no more the cause of poverty in African than it is the cause of America being rich. Why do we westerners complain so much? Why do we get mad when their poverty is blamed on our slavery and colonialism? We should feel lucky.
If Africans were to take control of their own wealth we would be dealing with the most powerful economy in human history with the world's greatest supply of oil.
the Colonials not only robbed it of its resources, kept the native ignorant and illiterate. Walked out for their own financial reasons, leaving the countries in chaos, corrupted the new masters, leaching through parasitic symbiotic relationship, further dividing, manipulating, selling arms and military hardware to start tribal wars and neighbor war. Creating a terror of hunger starvation, rotten to the core infrastructure, untreated diseases and destabilization.
AfricaMyrdal's theory of 'Economic development and underdeveloped regions' summarizes Africa's poverty. The vicious cycle of poverty is dominant .Rostow and Friedman(1960,1967) respectively, explained the stages at which developing countries should initiate economic development and even suggested strategies. Political chaos, greed and corruption, poor technology and research, unfair trade with West, neo-colonialism and American sponsored wars are culprit.
I think it is not only war that makes Africa poor, though it is the major cause, but brain drain and HIV/AIDS which kills a great number of african experts.
You made a veeeeerrrry good point. . .I have to help you fclarify that for the dummies that still didnt get it. . . When you say Africa, you are refering a continent and not a nation, but the Western media nowadays refer to Africa when they are discusssing a country in Africa. Most countries in Africa are however poor because of war but because of bad leadership and external profiteering from developed world, who control the external.
Yes,there was slavery and colonialism as well, but time has passed and the continent should be looking ahead and mapping out the way forward and not parroting the refrain "how the West exploited us". If care is not taken we'll be singing that refrain till the year 5077AD.
Secondly, Africa just cant seem to learn the trick of copying the success of others.Next is bad leadership. Bad? Abominable!
The so called rich countries are responsible for financially and militarily supporting one if not both waring parties because of hidden greed in African resources
Wars and conflicts are ignited by those powers who know that they would have a positive return from a negative situations.
Unless we answer the reasons behind the conflicts in Africa we are going to blame the african masses wrongly.
Africans are generally the most peaceful and resilient people in the world; but still why all the wars and conflicts. A few bad apples have spoiled the rest and unfortunately the west is using the misfortune to promote its owm imperialist ideals
In Africa the post colonial dispensation came into being at a time of ideological conflict between capitalism and communism, which created fertile ground to exploit the African legacy of tribal division. This has created society's that use politics as a pure power game, with a winner-takes-all attitude by those in power.
Africa has got countries which have never seen wars for many years but the rate of poverty is still very high. I believe poor governance is a sole cause. The topics on this blog is very neat. You must have a lot of time on your hands bro
Facts are bitter,we say, africa's poverty is mainly a result of the so called big powers. I say this because of their policies. They give and take away the big percentage. The policies of the world bank and IMF forexample do not give africa governments determine what they truely want as our leaders.
Big powers are behind this, exploitation of our resources and through multi-national financial institutions. I believe big powers are the agents for the war so that they get market for their weapons and serve employment in their countries War in Africa is caused by big powers who conflicts African leaders for their benefits
lack of education leads to lack of proper understanding leads to lack of proper protection leads to mass exploitation leads to warring countries leads to poverty leads to lack of education leads to lack of proper understanding leads to lack of proper protection leads to mass exploitation leads to warring countries leads to poverty leads to lack of educa......
do i really need to continue?
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