Connection Between African Leadership And Poverty

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Poverty is a world wide problem which affects a substantial population of the world but which is more prevalent in Africa. A huge chunk of the world’s wealth is in the hands of a selected few. Of all the factors that have contributed to poverty, leadership seems to be the worst and we are going to look at how that directly or indirectly affects the African continent.

The world has produced notable leaders who helped to shape the course of history and affect the lives of the governed positively. These leaders had the interest of the people at heart before they went into office and as such they put the masses first before self, making sure that the people enjoyed the dividends of governance. Such notable world leaders include George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill, and Mahatma Gandhi, to mention a few. Of all the leaders Africa had ever had, Nelson Mandela is the only one who is qualified to be counted among the world greats.

Most of the African leaders are not qualified to be called leaders because they don’t have the interest of the masses at heart: they came into politics for personal gains. They see politics as a place of investment where you put in everything you have saved to get into office and then steal everything the country has in order to reimburse yourself for what you lost during campaigns, and also save as much as you can for the future of your family, not minding what happens to the rest populace.

The problem of treasury looting, oppression, tyranny, insensitivity and intolerance for political opponents has remained the same amongst African leaders from the East to West, North and South. The kind of selfish leadership style they adopt has left virtually all African countries impoverished. Check the records of Late President Omar Bongo of Gabon, Late Idiami Dada of Uganda, Ibrahim Babangida of Nigeria, Late Sani Abacha of Nigeria, Late Gnasimgbe Eyadema of Togo, Frederick Chiluba of Zambia, Late Samuel Doe of Liberia, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Omar Al-Bashir of Sudan, etc and what do they have in common? I am sure you know it.

Leaders who have no deliberate plan to move their countries forward cannot make any positive impact on the lives of the governed. In the western world attempts are made to educate the people so they could be well developed and become useful to the country but here it seems that the less the people are educated the better for their leaders who want them to remain ignorant and never be aware of their rights so they would not stand up to defend their rights when trampled upon. When leaders make up their minds either by omission or by commission that their people should never be developed what do you expect? Poverty, systemic failures, illiteracy, hunger, diseases, backwardness, infrastructural decay and stagnancy would continue to be the lot of the people except leadership styles change positively.

The Return of President Umaru Musa Yar'adua

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President Umaru Musa Yar’adua left Nigeria on the 23rd of November 2009 for medical attention in Saudi Arabia and returned back to the country exactly 93 days later. But his period of absence from the presidential seat brought series of debates that almost tore the country apart.

Today the president is back in the country, what next? Has he been truly certified medically fit to continue in office as enshrined in section 144 of the 1999 constitution or is this a political game by the North to make sure power did not shift from their zone to the South-South? The president had maintained 92 days of silence and evasiveness but while the presidential delegation were on their way to Saudi Arabia as the last resort to ascertain whether or not he was truly fit to continue in office he suddenly sneaked into the country from his medical sojourn without the prior knowledge of his cabinet; not even his vice. Do you think things should be done this way min this 21st century? Is this how things are done in America, Great Britain, France, Germany, Italy, etc where the leaders are accountable to their citizenry? If not so, why is it always the opposite when it comes to Africa?

The Saudi authorities did everything to prevent the National Assembly members, the governors, and everyone that mattered from seeing our president as though the president were in captivity. If the president is strong enough to return to Nigeria today it means he was strong enough to at least say ‘hello’ to his ministers and lawmakers who had visited him few days earlier. One thing is not clear to me; why this ‘sneaking out and sneaking in’ of the president? The president belongs to all Nigerians and of course they have the right to know what is happening to him because the day he was elected into office he ceased to be the property of the North and became Nigerian property. This act of re-colonization of our country by a developing country like Saudi Arabia shows how helpless Nigeria has truly become. I do not in any way blame the Saudi authorities for treating us with levity; I blame our people who have refused to develop, otherwise why should we be going to Saudi Arabia for medical treatment?

Now that Mr. President has come back to his country what lessons did he learn from this situation? Is he thinking of reshaping the health sector of his country to look better than that of Saudi Arabia, or is he thinking of how to go back and enjoy the standard health facilities in Saudi next time he needs medical care? His actions and attitude toward our health sector would determine whether president has truly learnt any lessons from his health challenges. Mr. President should also remember that health care is part of his seven point agenda.

Lessons From The Coup in Niger republic

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Niger republic is one of the landlocked countries in West Africa. It is located on the Northern border of Nigeria, and it’s a member state of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).

Niger has enjoyed democracy for sometime now until the incumbent president Mamadou Tandja was forcefully removed from office through a military coup d’etat. Tandja has ruled the country for two consecutive tenures and instead of stepping down at the end of his second tenure he decided to alter the country’s constitution to pave way for his third tenure bid. This drew condemnation from everyone, including the ECOWAS and the African Union, but typical of most African leaders Mamadou Tandja cared less about the consequences of his action and refused to shift grounds. ECOWAS reacted swiftly by suspending Niger from her fold.

Tandja rode on, crushing all oppositions and protesters who dared raise their voices against his illegal constitutional alteration. He held tenaciously unto the reins of power. He had managed the economy of the landlocked country without accountability. Niger happens to be one of the few countries in the world that are endowed with Uranium, a mineral useful for nuclear fuel/nuclear weapons. The mining of this natural endowment has not reflected positively on the lives of the citizenry.

However, the military junta struck, ceased power and took Mamadou Tandja hostage. Surprisingly, the people we thought should condemn the coup d’etat rose up in its support. Why did they do so? They felt it was better for the military to come and salvage the situation than for President Tandja to set a bad precedent for their nascent democracy.

Few days before the coup the ECOWAS newly elected chairman, the acting president of Nigeria, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan had declared that ECOWAS would have zero tolerance for coup in the Sub-region. Now that the ‘Khaki boys’ have taken over power in Niger will ECOWAS live to its threat or will it be forced to eat its words? How do they intend to rescue the democratic structures in that country? It looks like they may be compelled to tolerate the military junta and negotiate with them to conduct a credible election as soon as possible.

This situation would have been averted were it not for the greedinesss of the president. African leaders should learn to be up and doing so that the political instability and incessant coups in the continent would be a thing of the past, especially now that military regime is no longer a fashion in other parts of the world.

Is Africa Truly Jinxed? (Part 3)

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Africa may be jinxed if that is what we believe her problem is; but even if that is the true situation, we can still do some things to break this jinx as I am sure that the progressing countries of the world would have also remained in self pity if they had not done anything to help themselves

What should we do?
What are the things Africa can do to break this age-long jinx that has hung around her neck?
1. Good education: If we give our citizenry good and qualitative education, in no distant time they will catch up with the developed and the developing countries. Qualitative education is the bedrock for economic growth.
2. Honest leadership: our leaders should be ready to provide honest leadership to their people. Once the people learn to trust their leaders they will be willing to co-operate with and help implement whatever good policies they formulate.
3. Economic blueprint: African leaders should have an economic blueprint that should be pursued over a specific period of time to bring in the desired economic growth of the continent.
4. Exchange of ideas: We should be willing to exchange ideas with countries which have made it economically. We can bring in scientists from developed countries and pay them well to help teach ours the rudiments to scientific advancement. Multinational companies can even be lured with our oil moneys to come and help us set up factories and industries where we can produce quality products.
5. Tourism: Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa and Egypt seem to be leading in this area that others have neglected. If countries like Malta and Switzerland that don’t have much natural resources can survive on tourism then we can as well.
6. Encouragement: Our scientists should be encouraged to invent. African leaders should be ready to help people get patent right for whatever they invent and also be willing to help them mass-produce those things. They can even give scholarship to such people to further their education and trainings overseas so that they can improve their skills, and when they are fully trained we should be willing to set policies that would make their products to be patronized by our people.
7. Make stealing unattractive: Our parliamentarians should enact laws that carry stiff penalties that would discourage stealing of public funds; and these laws should be well implemented. When this is done any one going into political office would go for the purpose of serving the people and not for stealing.
8. Discourage borrowing: No country would develop with a heavy debt burden hanging on her neck. I really wonder why a country like Nigeria with oil and lots of solid mineral deposits should be taking foreign loans. If borrowing is discouraged African countries would look inwards and develop their economies from what they have.
9. Infrastructural development: If we develop our basic infrastructures such as roads, school, markets, electricity, pie-borne water, etc it would go a long way to encourage our small and medium scale businesses to grow and also reduce brain drain.
10. Good condition of service: one way we can discourage brain drain is for us to pay our employees well and when this is done they will find it encouraging to stay and work in this part of the world. This would invariably help our economies to develop further.