GOVERNMENT TODAY THE BLAME FOR AFRICA'S PROBLEM by Joseph Theophilus Kehinde

"Today's problems  cannot  be solved  at  the same level  of  consciousness that  created  them." Albert Einstein

  To think of it ,if our mentality as Africans either old or young is too see and sit back that government will always or even provide welfare; basic or social amenities, opportunities, and all other values as Plato's described it as foodies of life or what makes life essential and pleasing. Do you think government will organise programmes, seminars, symposia just to curb out poverty,crises-ridden ,ideological differences, sectionalism,pluralism,etc. As an individual you don't have to wait for government to do certain things because as an individual you must understand what democracy and accountability is. Africans generation is centered on people's whose mindset is to start doing and stop talking. Government will always complain  about colonialism and imperialism as the problem of African not knowing that Africa has underdeveloped Africa, ie, Africa is the problem of Africa. Obafemi Awolowo in his book "power politics and welfare politics" argued that our government today blamed the woes on colonialism, but colonialism left, then blamed it on military rule, but military rule left, who then should it be blamed on. He further argued that the problem is that African government can even sit down to discuss on how and the methods to carry our in curbing out the menace facing the country. All what they are concern is how to mismanage and steal government resources for their own selfish interest. When you tell the government to bring an idea to suit the progress of  africa economy, they bring idea that will benefit them because they are the elites. What makes  Africa's people angry is that Africa here is a resourceful blessed country with the availability of human, natural and geographical factors.

   African 40% of its revenue generation is not being utilized for the progress and development of Africa, but it is been taken away out of the country which makes African continent a beggar continent. Many African sees their government as the custodian of services, whose primary aim is to cater for the needs of the country. They are at the mercy of the government, because they see the government as a god. Most times government are called vampire's government, because they suck the vital many of the economy. Government today is the problem of Africa. They have hijacked welfare services as a common philosophy, in which they enrich themselves and exclude everyone else ie the populace.

    Government just focuses on the modern sector. And for a country to develop one must not neglect the traditional and informal sector because that is were the African's people are. In this, government who is suppose to protect the fundamental rights of the people but just focusing on it mindset externally. Event before the coming of the Europeans , what African traditional system operated was a free market economy. There were free market everywhere, people did not wait for their traditional chiefs to tell them what to do,because things were own communally (brotherhoodness) by extended families. They decoded what to do and not what the government is doing or about to do. Independence came, all form of practices then was now being westernized and government said the only thing that can be done is to bring the idea of socialism which later became an ideology. What a nonsense ideology. And the kind of socialism African practiced after independence was atomistic  in nature.

   In essence, it is now pertinent one must cross the river. Government should have a change both in and outside show, and also the problem of self-concept can be solved, because that is what troubles our leaders often. The idea of government which see investors as predators should stop. Investors should be allowed to invest in the country. Government thinks they can do it own their own,not knowing that corruption (fiscal and administration) has taken over their heads. So Africa can break forth , but it depends on you and I, never depend on government to do something or everything, but we should always have the mindset to always create something and to also understand the importance of taking risks. Government can't take risk to bring about a social-economic change but you can. Let go out to make a difference, not just a difference but a positive one,because government has made many differences but a negative and not effective one. Make a positive difference to your environment today.
#formidale legacy speaks

Dependency and Underdevelopment; The Future of Africa by Ohuche Stephen.

   

There  are  about 7  billion  people  on  planet  earth  and  over  5  billion  of  them  live  in nations  categorised  as  Third  World.  These  people  live  in  Africa, Asia,  Latin  America, the  Caribbean  and  the  Middle  East.  It  covers the majority of the human population as such, it cannot be ignored.

   The term "Third World" was first used Alfred sauvy an economist and a demographer in an attempt to describe various economic situation of different nations. He classified the planets into three worlds ;The First (USA, Japan  and  the Western  Industrial  Democracies,  the  first  countries  to  develop industrial  economies  and  liberal  democracies) world, The Second World (the  bloc  of  former  communist  nations,  that  included the Soviet  Union  and Eastern Europe…), and The Third World. The concept "Third World" have gained attraction from scholars, and thus have different definitions. 

    Munroe  (2001),  Third  World  nations  refers  to people  who  were  not  allowed  to  participate  or  benefit  from  the industrial revolution despite the fact  that the sweat and blood of  these people  became  the  human  slab  on  which  the  foundation  of  the Industrial Revolution was laid. Though the third world countries during the colonial epoch were exploited for the industrial revolution but they didn't benefit from it, thus they are classified as underdeveloped or more recently developing nations. 

 

    Kwame  Nkrumah  (1965),  former  president  of Ghana  in  his  work:  Neo-Colonialism:  The  Last  Stage  of Imperialism  observed  that:  The  Third  World  Countries  would  not make  a  forward  march  towards  economic  independence  until  neocolonialism  or  neo-imperialism  was  vanquished.  To  give  credence  to this  assertion,  decades  after  political  independence  for  most  of  the Third  World  Countries,  they  have  remained  perpetually  dependent. What is Dependency? 

    Dependency  refers  to  a situation  in  which  a  certain  group  of  countries  have  their  economy conditioned  by  the  development  and  expansion  of  another  economy, to  which  the  former  is  subject. Dependency  refers  to  the  situation that  the  history  of  colonial  imperialism  has  left  and  that  modern imperialism creates in underdeveloped countries. 

    Underdevelopment is consequence of the Industrial revolution. Prior to this time levels of development was relatively equal, except for little variations. There was no naked exploitation of one nation by the other. Some countries have been experiencing development for over 250years (since industrial revolution).  In one of his works Paul Baran asserted that the search for external outlets to invest economic surplus is the cause of underdevelopment. Economic surplus is the difference between a country's production and consumption. A country can choose to save it or invest it, this investment thus leads to exploitation. 

    Underdevelopment  is  not  absence  of  development,  nor  the  absence  of human  and  natural  resources.  It  means  the  inadequate  or  insufficient level  of  development  in  the  Third  World  as  a  result  of  the  exploitation  or 

the  under-utilisation  of  their  human  and  material  resources,  or  a combination  of  both  factors.

    Africa's underdevelopment can traced back to 15th century with our first with the Europeans, though the continent was developing at a slow before then, but it was developing. This was when slave trade and other forms of barter trade started. In the second half of the 19th century, Europe had laid claim on virtually all part of the continent (Berlin Conference nov 1884- feb85). This was how the problem started. 

  

    They colonized Africa, in the course of doing so we started producing what we don't eat and eat what we don't produce. And at the end they granted us clientele  sovereignty  or  fake independence,  with the intention of making liberated African  states client states, knowing that African countries won't be able to survive alone, and this led to imperialism cum neo-colonialism. 

    Another reason for underdevelopment in Africa is the issue of debt. Bretton Woods Conference marked a very disastrous beginning in Africa. Though the IMF and World Bank were created in this conference to stabilize exchange rate and eradicate poverty during the post World War II, but they've also played a great role alongside London and Paris Creditors in causing of debt crisis in Africa. Before African countries started receiving loans in 1970s, the total debt was $1 2.5 billion but today Africa's debt is over $250 billion. All thanks to the high interest rate, and ineffective and ineffecient servicing of the debt. 

  

    Though dependency is basically only about external factors militating against development in Africa in particular and Third World Countries in general, but there also exist internal factors such as political instability, corruption, one party system/tyranny, absence of the rule of law and so. All these however needs to be tackled before any attempt can be made to tackle the external factors. 

 

    The only way Third  world  can  achieve  development  is  to  “delink”  their economies  from  their  source  of  exploitation  and  underdevelopment which  is  the  International  Capitalist  Economic  System,  and  chart  a  new path  to  development  which  should  be  built  on  socialist  principles  rather than  on  the  foundation  of  exploitation  of  one  country  by  another  which capitalism advances. 

     Kwame Nkrumah once asserted "The  Third  World  Countries  would  not make  a  forward  march  towards  economic  independence  until  neocolonialism  or  neo-imperialism  was  vanquished". To  give  credence  to this  assertion,  decades  after  political  independence  for  most  of  the Third  World  Countries,  they  have  remained  perpetually  dependent.

 By Ohuche Stephen Chijioke, a  Political Sciencist from Olabisi Onabanjo University