President Obama in his first trip to Africa South of the Sahara delivered a straightforward speech to all the people but especially to the leaders who for the past fifty years have been in control and whose policies have brought untold economic hardship and misery to the people. This was his first visit to the continent as President and the first visit of an African-American president. The speech was given in the Ghanian parliament to a selected group of parliamentarians, but broadcasted throughout Africa and the globe.
I understand the choice of Ghana was certainly motivated by the country’s democratic rule, stability and progress but again arguably due to the discovery of oil and the need to sign juicy contracts with the now oil rich nation.
Much of what President Obama had to say we already know as Africans. He has delivered a speech that encapsulates the negative and positive aspects that we know about Africa, ranging from corruption to peaceful elections, from war to peace, from tribalism to entrepreneurship.
In a nutshell, President Obama is well appraised on what is going on throughout the African continent as his speech clearly demonstrates. He has articulated many issues that are familiar but what is different is the actions he proposes that deviate from his predecessors. This is what Africa has been waiting for from the leader of the free world - a new direction and attitude from the US on Africa.
He is asking us, as Africans, to take responsibility for our destinies as individuals and communities. He is asking Africans to finally do the right thing and live up to their full potential and greatness. Indeed, is such a thing possible? Can we do the right thing as he has asked? I certainly hope so! YES WE CAN fellow Africans! It’s time for new beginnings and time for a new Africa!
However, it must be said that no amount of money can solve Africa’s problems! African can be self-sufficient by the kind help of the western countries. It would start from when Africa is given the bargaining power on their exports, when Africa is given a fair share of its investment and resources, when Africa is involved in international policy making, when African resources are given to their own natives to manage and also when African leaders think about the continent rather than their selfish interest. The just past world BOSS, the UN secretary General was a Ghanaian and by his kind involvement in some few international decisions, we could all realized the impact it made on the continent with aid and investment. He was single and could do just a little.
When we look as the fiscal heavens created by corrupt leaders and supported by wealthy but corrupt nations too, which have in a great way impoverished developing nations, then, there are several unanswered questions. When you examine the dysfunctionalities, there is so much questioning.
Areas like Jersey, Monaco, Geneva, Munich, London, Delaware etc are among the top ranking places where illicit funds are kept and banking transactions made in almost no respect with basic legal and moral banking principles like not accepting money from doubtful sources.
Right now, the West makes it easy for idiots to steal money and hide it. That is at the bottom of our problems. I know that these rogues find other places, for example Mugabe is hiding money in Hongkong. People like the late Nyerere or Mandela who did not steal money were quite comfortable living in their countries after handing over power. Also, if a president goes abroad for treatment, it should be given a lot of shame and publicity, or denied all together. If they cannot do this, they can make it possible for us to sue the relatives and estates of African rulers and freeze their accounts until good governance is restored. If these things happen we can begin to have accountable governments.
There is a bank in Washington called Riggs Bank where a lot of these presidents and their friends hide stolen money. This is published information. The tyrant of Equatorial Guinea hides money there.
If Obama's words are to mean anything thieves must be challenged.
President Obama should make it possible for his country to sign agreements with other African countries so that bank accounts and assets of all Africans especially those holding positions of responsibility or who have held positions of responsibility to be tracked at anytime.
For some time now, rich but corrupt countries holding stolen funds have always refused to collaborate with countries from where the funds have been stolen on the pretext of complicated legislations.
The answer is simple: The host countries always want to own the money and other real estates gotten from embezzlers. That is why funds belonging to thieves like Mobuto, Abacha, Bongo etc have been virtually owned by host countries.
The speech for the most part was well received by the attendees, except when Obama addressed the issue of corruption.
Here are some key excerpts of the speech:
ON AFRICA'S IMPORTANCE:
I do not see the countries and peoples of Africa as a world apart; I see Africa as a fundamental part of our interconnected world - as partners with America on behalf of the future that we want for all our children.
ON COLONIALISM AND RESPONSIBILITY:
It is easy to point fingers, and to pin the blame for these problems on others. Yes, a colonial map that made little sense bred conflict, and the West has often approached Africa as a patron, rather than a partner. But the West is not responsible for the destruction of the Zimbabwean economy over the last decade, or wars in which children are enlisted as combatants.
In my father's life, it was partly tribalism and patronage in an independent Kenya that for a long stretch derailed his career, and we know that this kind of corruption is a daily fact of life for far too many.
ON GOVERNANCE:
Development depends upon good governance. That is the ingredient which has been missing in far too many places, for far too long. That is the change that can unlock Africa's potential. And that is a responsibility that can only be met by Africans.
ON CORRUPTION:
Repression takes many forms, and too many nations are plagued by problems that condemn their people to poverty. No country is going to create wealth if its leaders exploit the economy to enrich themselves, or drug traffickers can buy off police... No person wants to live in a society where the rule of law gives way to the rule of brutality and bribery. That is not democracy that is tyranny, and now is the time for it to end. ... Africa doesn't need strongmen, it needs strong institutions.
ON AID:
As Africans reach for this promise, America will be more responsible in extending our hand. By cutting costs that go to Western consultants and administration, we will put more resources in the hands of those who need it, while training people to do more for themselves. That is why our $3.5bn food security initiative is focused on new methods and technologies for farmers - not simply sending American producers or goods to Africa. Aid is not an end in itself. The purpose of foreign assistance must be creating the conditions where it is no longer needed.
ON HEALTH:
Yet because of incentives - often provided by donor nations - many African doctors and nurses understandably go overseas, or work for programs that focus on a single disease. This creates gaps in primary care and basic prevention. Meanwhile, individual Africans also have to make responsible choices that prevent the spread of disease, while promoting public health in their communities and countries.
ON CONFLICT:
Now let me be clear: Africa is not the crude caricature of a continent at war. But for far too many Africans, conflict is a part of life, as constant as the sun. There are wars over land and wars over resources. And it is still far too easy for those without conscience to manipulate whole communities into fighting among faiths and tribes.
These conflicts are a millstone around Africa's neck. We all have many identities - of tribe and ethnicity; of religion and nationality. But defining oneself in opposition to someone who belongs to a different tribe, or who worships a different prophet, has no place in the 21st Century. Africa's diversity should be a source of strength, not a cause for division.
Why no tough questions: Commentary
During his visit to Ghana, President Barack Obama laid out a U.S. policy that wasn’t any different from that of his predecessors. But because Obama’s father hailed from Kenya, and because blood –- African blood, especially -– is thicker than water, Africans exempted their son’s plan for the continent from the tough questions it warranted. To understand how important bloodlines are in Africa, we have to go back to May, when Obama announced his plans to visit Ghana. Euphoria gripped the continent so tightly that instead of talking about what kind of relationship Africa should have with the United States, we went after each other. We wondered why he chose Ghana. Kenyans –- who thought they had an inalienable right to Obama’s first visit as president –- complained that they had been snubbed. Nigeria wondered why Obama didn’t include the African giant in his itinerary. And, if you were Obama, wouldn’t you automatically pick the land that gave the world Nelson Mandela?
In sheer American fashion, Obama explained boldly that he picked Ghana because of the West African nation’s “democratic commitment.”
While Kenyans, Nigerians, South Africans and others were searching their souls, Ghanaians were preparing to do what we Africans do best: dress in colorful attire, sing, dance and chant in praise of presidents.
Although other African countries found their souls very quickly -– “democratic commitment” is such a clear message –- they couldn’t do so in time for Obama to add them to his itinerary. So they joined Ghana and made this “our visit” –- a visit to sub-Saharan Africa. After all, isn’t it blood that binds us, and doesn’t an African son belong to the village?
By the time Obama landed in Ghana, we were so unified by this son of Africa that we did not ask him to tell us what the real purpose of his visit to Ghana was, and how his new plan was different from that of his predecessors.
We agreed with him that, “Yes, a colonial map that made little sense helped to breed conflict.” But we failed to explain to him that many of the Africans who bring up colonialism do not do so to blame the West. That we have never denied that in Africa corruption exists in endemic proportions; that we mention colonialism for the sake of practicality; that we want the West to understand that a continent brutalized and looted for centuries cannot turn around in 50 years.
We want the United States to look at where it was 50 years after its independence. Were the African slaves free? Could women vote? Had the civil war even happened? Wasn’t corruption rampant in the new, free nation?
But rather than ask this son of Africa to look at history, we let him spit the same Western rhetoric that implies that any African who utters the word “colonialism” wants Africa to wait 200 years for a strong “democratic commitment.” Because Obama is of our blood, we let him continue to push the same flawed, condescending idea that every African is in dire need of water, food and medicine. “And that's why,” he said, “my administration has committed $63 billion to meet these challenges.”
Why did we cheer when he said that America will put more resources in the hands of those who need it?
We cheered when we heard Obama say that America “will put more resources in the hands of those who need it,” even though we know that most of that aid will end up in the hands of our not-so-democratically-committed African-born sons. We applauded when Obama said, “Wealthy nations must open our doors to goods and services from Africa in a meaningful way,” although it’s no secret that even if the entire world opened its market to Africa, most of us would have nothing to sell.
“There are wars over land and wars over resources,” Obama said. But his African blood prevented us from asking him whether most of those resources (diamonds) end up in the hands of Africans. What about that other resource that has caused so much havoc in the Niger Delta? Is it because in Nigeria, “the rule of law gives way to the rule of brutality and bribery?” Do the multinationals that give these bribes have any role in this war over resources? And, is there any likelihood that a newfound resource (oil) off Ghana’s coast pushed the country higher on the American chart of “democratic commitment?”
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