Nigeria and indeed Africa are richly endowed. The geographical expression called Nigeria is robustly blessed with natural resources. Anything that can make a nation great abound in Nigeria. Why we remain where we are over these years is because we have refused to tell ourselves the bitter truth. And also because we have refused to do what is right.
The bitter truth is that you and I are the problem why Nigeria is still crawling instead of walking.
Last Sunday was a particularly sober day for me. My pastor was unsparing in his message as he gave it out hard. I have just recovered from that sober mood. His message was on Giving and our Attitude to Giving. He gave an example with Ananias and Saphirra in the bible who suffered grave consequences because they wanted to cheat God. He gave other biblical examples to show that corruption is not just a sin against God but something that can bring eternal damnation to those who think they are smart.
By way of necessary digression, he veared from the message and began to talk about Nigeria and indeed Africa. He recommended an imaginary experiment. The experiment goes like this: “All Nigerians should be evacuated from this territory and deposited in the United States of America or Japan, and be made to live there for the next 20 years. Conversely, all Americans or Japanese should be evacuated and bought to live in the Nigerian territory for the next 20 years. Then he asked the question, which held the congregation spellbound: How do you think Nigeria in the hands of Americans or Japanese will look like after 20 years? And what do you think Nigerians will have turned America into after 20 years? This question set thoughts racing through my mind.
The answers are not far- fetched. After 20 years, Americans or Japanese would have moved Nigeria into an advanced country-technologically developed and a major economic world player. But the same thing cannot be said of Nigeria with America in their hands, for 20 years. They would have bought the country down from its present status of a world power to a crawling status of poverty, poor health care delivery system decayed social infrastructure and heavily bastardized public institutions. Go and see the public schools built by Oshiomole and you will shed tears: Hoodlums have turned them to public toilets.
The Japanese have no natural resources, so to speak. Instead they daily contend with natural disasters like earthquake and furious weather conditions. But the country is the greatest in electronics and the 3rd most technologically advanced country in the world after United States and China. What do you think will become of the Nigerian territory if you bring such people here given our generous weather conditions, arable land, climate and complete absence of natural disasters, and above all availability of crude oil. These are resources that they lack in their land and yet have been able to turn their country and put it on a very enviable position on the world economic map.
If all Africans are evacuated to live in Europe for 20 years and all Europeans are brought into Africa to manage the continent for the same period, what do you think would become of the two continents.
Exporting the Robert Mugabes, Blaise Campaores Musevenis Paul Biyas, Sudanese President, the Eyadernas, etc to Europe to superintend for a 20 year period will really be interesting!
This imaginary experiment explains the depth of our pains over the situation in Africa, A continent impoverished not as a result of absence of natural resources but on account of leadership deficit and the wickedness of the elites.
In the early 60s to late 70s, it was fashionable for scholars to blame Europe or the West for Africa woes. This was when most “nationalistic” Marxists opted to defend the Dependency Theorists, in their traditional arguments placing the blame of the underdevelopment of Africa on colonialism and neo- colonialism.
They place the blame of Africa underdevelopment on capitalist Europe and the “West” which gave rise to “imperialism, colonialism, exploitation and unequal exchange all of which ultimately favour the West.
A scholar like Prof Ake, in a book looks at what he calls Western misadventure of imperialism, colonialism and trade in Africa.
He argues that the colonial misadventures of Western imperialism are just largely to prevent the effects of over accumulation of capital resulting from internal contradictions within the system from implosion. He argued “the colonial economy was characterized by market imperfections and monopolies. This characteristic of colonial capitalism is an important element in the link between colonization and underdevelopment” the trades were done only to protect the interest of the Europeans and imperialists but not for Africans. While we agree with Ake to a large extent, if he were to be alive today he would have realized how theoretical he had been in his analyses. The fact that his ideas were expressed few years before the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the collapse of Soviet Union in 1991 shows how “ weak” and delusional the Marxists are. Cuba is the last of what was left of the stranglehold of Marxist. I doubt if Castro still holds strongly his Marxism-Leninist views given his country’s recent “friendship” with its capitalist and “bitter” neighbor, United States of America. The Marxian method of analysis is only better appreciated by incorrigible Karl Marx disciples while the non-Marxist may see it as another piece of communists ‘propaganda!
Since the Cold War era was not just about espionage, territorial or covert welfare; ideas and ideologies play critical role as well.
No one doubts the good intentions of Nigeria scholars in their writing, but to be clouded by Marxian ideological-orientations (perhaps indoctrinations) is too discomforting to a fault. They provide little or no inspiration for the future.
The truth of the matter is that the problems of Nigeria and indeed Africa have nothing to do with ideological labels and systems of government. If we are able to tame the selfish and greedy tendencies of the image we see when we look at the mirror, Africa will be on the right path to economic prosperity.