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Opinions of Monday, 14 August 2023

Columnist: Robert Dambo

Africa is in a sorry state

A file photo A file photo

The 21st -century African leaders are unintelligent and bereft of ideas, they lack pragmatism and realism. They are chiefly egoistic and selfish, seeking the welfare of themselves and their families against the larger interest of society.

African leaders are thieves who do not only steal for themselves, concubines, friends, and families but they are also stealing for their unborn generations to continue to lord over the less privileged in the society to meander their ways through the leadership of monocracy to deliver substandard leadership.

African leaders are accursed, with a chunk of the natural resources; gold, diamond, cocoa, cobalt, magnesium, timber, and hydroelectric power. Instead of these resources being a catalyst for growth, development, and economic independence, has not seen the right-thinking leadership to put these resources to judicious use to achieve accelerated economic growth and development.

Dubai which is a desert place has the right-thinking leadership who have turned the desert land into a place of dessert where tourists visit to drink tea and they are making millions of dollars from this site of attraction of man-made sceneries against our natural tourist sites.

Africa is bedeviled with the leadership of rhetoric and these parrots do a presentation of fine, well-rehearsed, and the stealing of sweet speeches to sway voters by engaging in political equalization and blame games.

Looking back now, Africa should have long been beyond aid but the preachers of Africa beyond aid are even aided on the platforms they preach their ear-itching sermons, and the colonizers are not bothered because these leaders are weaklings who would go cup in hand to beg for aid.

The Western part of Africa continues to experience political instability as a result of poor leadership and management of scarce resources for the benefit of many. The western part of Africa is the richest in terms of natural resources but these resources are exploited against the interest of the people.

Many are hungry whilst few are full and as a result, the youth are rising in arms and cudgels against poor institutional structures and governance. The maladministration has been the incentive for a military takeover to assuage and ameliorate the living standards of the people.

The democracy of Africa ought to have been crafted in the norms and social conditions of the people instead of adopting the hook line and sinker Western form and systems of administration.

It is worrying why the majority of the youth of Africa who are in the youthful bracket with productive capacities are trooping to the various embassies to look for visas to work in miniature jobs that pay better than the prestigious jobs in our part of the world.

Something ought to be done to address the huge brain drain we are currently experiencing lest we want to wake up one day to old men and women who lack the oil to keep the continent functioning.