America’s latter-day romance with Africa: Eureka! That was the cry that Africans let out when Barak Hussein Obama was first elected into the White House as President of the United States of America. Africans were literally overjoyed that one of their own, a black man is mounting the saddle as president of the most powerful nation on earth. Never mind that Obama is what we call a half-caste and had never lived in Africa. The fact that his father was a Kenyan and African societies being largely paternal made the continent regard him as firstly, a Kenyan, and then an African- America. Since the collapse of the erstwhile Soviet Union and the concomitant cold war together with the gradual disintegration of communism, America has emerged as the sole super power on earth. America is regarded as about the richest country in the world being the largest economy; it also has the biggest military force amongst all nations. And in a world where might appears to be right and money rules the world, you can well expect that most nations, African countries in particular want to be in the good books of America, nobody wants to incur the wrath of the world’s self-appointed policeman. Apart from being overtly proud that the world’s foremost citizen is their son, Africa expected that Obama would be courting it and bring the good life to it; just like in African culture where the son that has made it, caters to the needs of his parents, lifting them up to a new level. President Obama embarked on his first official tour of Africa, visiting some few countries which was more like a stop-over visits in 2008. That tour left out the two most powerful countries in Africa —- South Africa and Nigeria. The next rounds of tour did not come until 2013; still Nigeria was excluded, for whatever reasons. Any talk or dealing with Africa has to include Nigeria as its arrowhead. Nigeria is, going by the known indices, the most influential country on the continent. Nigeria accounts for one-fifth of Africa’s total population. It is not just the most populous country on the continent but also the most populous black nation on earth; one out of every five black persons on the globe is said to be a Nigerian. With the recent rebasing, it is now the largest economy in Africa, overtaking South Africa. Whereas the South African economy is seen as being driven mainly by whites (white South Africans), the Nigerian economy is propelled and maintained primarily by Nigerians themselves, blacks. That is why it is surprising that the new economic group comprising of leading developing economies does not include Nigeria. Am referring to the block with the acronym BRICS ——Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. Nigeria should definitely be in that group because our economy is now larger than South Africa’s. We should also note that the richest man in Africa is a Nigerian – Aliko Dangote. It was last year that Obama mooted the idea of a US-Africa leaders summit .That proposal came to fruition this year when the first summit was held last month, August, in Washington DC with President Obama as chair. Its theme was ‘investing in the future’. It was preceded by a round-table conference with some 500 youths, Africa’s future leaders. Officially, all African leaders were invited to Washington except three. They are Omar Bashir of Sudan because he is wanted by the International Criminal Court for ‘crimes against humanity’ (ironically the world’s self-appointed policeman is not a signatory to the treaty which it is trying to enforce); Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe (for confiscating white lands and redistributing them to the black indigent population?) and Eritrea’s president. However, all three countries were duly represented by other officials. Whereas three African leaders were not permitted to attend the summit because of the so-called human rights issues, three others stayed back to tackle the Ebola virus disease in their countries. They are presidents of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone. That America is now seeking to actively engage and forge closer links and friendship with Africa appears to be an afterthought. Generally, US presidents cared little about Africa; many of them did not know how the map of Africa looked like, much less the names and number of countries that make up Africa. In any case and because of our historical backgrounds, Africa has closer ties with Europe than America. Our first sets of leaders were educated mainly in Europe. It was later that we began to be fond of American style education and being educated in America became a vogue sort of. During the cold war era, many Africans detested America for its unbridled capitalist system. Till this day, many Africans still consider the International Monetary Fund (IMF) sponsored economic reform measures which are rooted in American capitalism as a contributory factor to weakening of their country’s currencies, which brought in its trail other economic problems. America is the largest shareholder in the US-based IMF. When one reflects on what America exports to the world or Africa, one’s first thought goes to pop culture and Hollywood, and of course, military hardware, being the largest manufacturer of sophisticated military equipment. But towards the end of the 20th century, America became famous for something that greatly impacts the new way of doing things — computers. America pioneered the computer age. That is a positive legacy America is giving to the world. But the smart Chinese took over flooding our markets with cheaper Information, Communication and Technology (ICT) products of all sorts. Apparently, America senses that Africa’s mentor (our colonial master Europe) and Africa’s new bride China, are having a greater chunk of the African market and therefore, it needs to catch up. Hence, its latter-day romance with Africa? Obama says the new partnership America is seeking with Africa is unlike the one with our old and new friends. Hear him, “We don’t look to Africa simply for its natural resources…. We simply don’t want to extract minerals from the ground for our growth … I see Africa as partners with America on behalf of the future we want for our children. That partnership must be grounded on mutual responsibility and mutual respect.” Good talk, you would say. He appears to be following up his words with the ‘Power Africa’ initiative, a five-year plan that seeks to provide electricity to a good number of Africans. Nigeria is to get some 30 per cent of this project. Electricity is the live-wire of modern-day living. This is, therefore, a commendable initiative if …. If we do not have the IMF style conditionalities attached to it. •Ikeano writes from Lagos Original link Read More goo.gl/w0lwxY (y) ✍comment ☏share
Posted on: Tue, 09 Sep 2014 00:26:49 +0000
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