The State of Africa

As I waited at Paddington Railway Station for my train to Cardiff en-route my return from Singapore, I went into WHSmith to browse the books and magazines (my favourite pasttime when I am waiting for flights or trains). A book entitled 'The State of Africa' written by Martin Meredith caught my eye, as I have always been interested in developmental issues across the world, as well as history and politics. I endeavoured to spend my first free weekend in Cardiff after the exams reading the book, and I have. It was a moving and sobering experience to just read the book, and I flipt page after page, finishing its 700 pages in 3 days. I believe I have never been so emotionally charged up reading a book before, and while that gives testimony to the writer's literary ability, I think more than anything, it left me amazed at 'the resilience which ordinary Africans confront their many adversities'.

The book chronologises the development of the African states through its 50 years of independance since the first few states attained self-goverment respectively from their British, French & Portugese colonial masters. Beginning with a brief introduction of how the continent of Africa was spilt up in the end of the 19th century Scramble of Africa by Western states to meet their own interests, the book goes into the individual struggles for independance by the various nationalist groups, before dwelving proper into issues after independance.

Many people in the world today have been campaigning for more foreign aid to be given to Africa, while many other people have also been insisting that aid will only be benefitial if there is proper governance in Africa. I also hold both opinions. However, after reading the book, then did I realise the massive complications and difficulties with which each proposition has to face.

The history of so many of the states, Ghana, Nigeria, Angola, Algeria, Ethiopia etcetc repeats a similar vicious cycle of 'opportunistic acts' disguised behind veils of religion, ethnicity, ideology. The nationalist successes only led to strongman dictatorships and idolization worship of people such as Nkrumah (Ghana), Selaissie (Ethiopia). Widespread repression, and more damagingly corruption was the result as the huge riches of natural resources of oil, diamond, gold all went into the pockets of the strongmen and their families. The next stage in most of the countries would then be the coups by the military to remove the strongmen who achieved independance. Yet, these military strongmen would only continue to govern in exactly the same way as those they had sought to remove (Amin in Uganda, Mobutu in Zaire).

Following this would be the breakup of full scale civil war when these military strongmen could no longer hold control over all the diversive factions in their states. This is where the picture got really bleak and almost hard to swallow. There are hundreds of cultural groups in Africa, with different ethnic linguo-cultures. Added to this is the division along the lines of religion with Muslims (especially in the North), Christians (a result of missionaries during the Colonial times) and the rural Africa religions. The states of Africa, divided along lines of Western interests paid scant regard to these ethnic divisions, therefor there were different major groups in each State and this would provide the setting for civil wars in countless states (prominently, Nigeria, Angola). Foreign interference during the Cold War period only led these wars to have higher casualty rates, become prolonged and cause more harm. Yet, the civil wars were much more complicated than just religious or ethnic divides. They were simply acts of individuals or groups who would use any opportunity and opening they saw to further their own interests. States would support rebel groups in other states, the US and France would support dictators, even extremist Muslims would help Africans against Muslim governments in some situations.

The book ends by describing the situations in the last 2 decades that I grew up having a rough idea of. The 1984 famine of Ethiopia, the Civil War in Somalia. The Genocide in Rwanda, Mandela's release from prison in S. Africa, Mugabe in Zimbabwe are significant examples. Reading the book sent shockwaves across me as I read about the acts of apartheid, the forceful evacuation of blacks from white towns, and only led me to truly marvel at Mandela's ability to forgive such acts. The planned genocide of the Tutsis by the Hutus, was equally disturbing. But more disturning was the fact that the French managed to support the Hutus in their refugee camps as the previous Hutu government had been friendly to them, or a US government refusing to accept that there had been genocide. The US support of Mobutu who was a clear dictator but anti-Soviet was also nothing short of hypocritical as far as their own democratic ideals were involved.

Staring at the facts listed at the end of the book, the picture is a really sad one. Do you know that 30 million Africans are infected with HIV?! 440 million Africans live on less than US$1 a day?! Given their original chests of gold and diamond, can you imagine the corruption and greed that has led to the situation today in which almost all the states are in debt?! The stark realisation that hit me was that the problems will not be solved by just foreign aid and simple foreign peacekeeping or monitoring. It is far far more complicated than that, requiring generations of education, common identification, understanding and eradication of corruption. This realisation only makes the achievement of China as a one-nation state all the more amazing, but China itself underwent a thousand years of sporadic wars since the Warring States to get to where it is today! With todays techonological and weapon advancement, hundreds of years of war would do no less but to wipe out the entire Africa.

As for me sitting far away in Wales, or Singapore, I guess I can only pray for the common African, that peace comes one day, and after that, a life of subsistence and sustainence. Compared to our desires of riches and repute, it is hard sometimes to realise that there are people that would be happy with much less. That is until reality gives us a hard, rude shock.