Where is world outrage? Africa, weary, sick and tired of creating wealth in rich countries while Africa’s children are impoverished! This is not about preaching ancient history. It is happening right now. Every continent laughs to the bank with trillions of dollars generated from Africa while returning fraction as “generous” foreign aids. Out of that foreign aid comes payment for stipulated export: food, water, military gears to contractors, farmers, banks and corporations.
African countries do not want charity in form of foreign aids; Africa needs fair trade and justice against capital flight of over $13.4 trillions plus $4.2 trillions in odious interest paid to banks in London and New York since 1980. These are aided and abetted by government manipulation and turning blind eye to $700bn mis-invoicing. How can super powers with conscience define chicanery as aid aware that for every $1 received developing countries lost $24 in net outflows?
Yet, these same donors of so called aids satisfy their bleeding hearts while blaming Africans as lazy, corrupt and unproductive? Even Africans agree on corruption and blame vultures within carrying pails for their masters, at Africans’ expense. After all, Africans cannot go on blaming others when they have traitors among them that have been compromised by their indulgence, taste and flavor in foreign toys, goods and services. From remnants Africans fight over and loot.
No African country is wealthy enough to cater for its own people, not to mention refugees from other African countries. Xenophobia has gained ground in many countries against their fellow Africans. If they do not have enough to make a difference to poverty at home, they cannot accommodate their fellow neighboring brothers. Ghana had kicked Nigerians out as Nigeria retaliated. Even S. Africans that had enjoyed immunity in African countries has turned red eye!
The power behind one trillion dollars they sent back as foreign aids out of more than 3 trillion dollars they suck out of Africa in 2012 alone, force African countries into perpetual submission. Any African country that refused to play along, would find itself in the same place as Nyerere’s Ujama in Tanzania, Sekou Toure’s Guinea after the French left, Mugabe’s Zimbabwe as postal or Lumumba’s Congo. Powers showcase them as leaders that refused to play along to get along!
If Africa fails to deliver to their banks, corporations and foreign portfolio investors they have the big sticks of their government to whip any into compliance. The story of Enron Corporation in Africa where both liberal and conservative Governments acted as advocate facilitating loans at home and abroad is still fresh in our minds. Even when Enron was going under at home, they had support from their Government to conduct business overseas especially in Africa and Asia.
Blame victims while bleeding in trillion dollars! Vestiges of slavery, even abolished slave trade still remains. Free labor or starving wages to make corporate bodies rich is a strong economic principle that is still alive and well but disguised hospitality today. The days of importing slaves are gone; we now sell everything Africa has at home including our best to pay for expensive visa and plane tickets to the “promised” land after undergoing through thorough vetting process.
We are all trying to escape poverty at home created by “massah” that delivered Africa’s trillions outside to their “promised” lands. They are not only wicked as the old slave massah in the plantations, these modern massah are highly educated in the economic principles of outside continent they know has never worked in Africa. The more classic economic theory is applied as learned from Wharton, Harvard, Oxford or London School of Economics, the poorer Africa gets.
African countries are depleted of foreign cash received from selling natural resources cheap by devaluation (or Structural Adjustment). By design they hardly have enough to satisfy their needs and wants from rich countries. The only way to get foreign “cashistics” is to compete for foreign reserves by hook or crook, so that looters’ families can live abroad lavishly.
Unfortunately, individual African countries are running out of middleclass and their very rich are well protected from the angry poor, some of whom turn to criminal behavior to make ends meet. As they run out of people to rob with dangerous weapons, criminals turn on fellow poor folks around them. Neighborhoods become unsafe for lower middleclass and those abroad are fearful of returning home unless they can live in high class areas where protection is adequate.
If African countries relatively wealthy in gold, diamond, uranium, cobalt, oil etc. cannot provide infrastructure, jobs and school for their buoyant youths; impoverished African countries can barely survive; sending their young generation across the ocean and desert at the risk of their lives. They will rather starve to death outside than die shamefully at home.
Misinvoicing of African natural resources has been going on for ages. The US-based Global Financial Integrity (GFI) estimated that developing countries have lost more than $13.4tn through unrecorded capital flight since 1980. They used to pay royalties to themselves after profit made by their corporate “explorers”. After Political Independence, no African country knows how much cobalt, gold, diamond or oil is going out or how much is sold in the markets.
The disparities in economic realities are inherently designed to benefit western countries at the expense of the poor countries and their people leaving desolation and poverty in their land. If these poor people try to cross to greener pastures in the land of those that benefit from their misfortunes, they are labeled as economic refugees less deserving of accommodation. The reason they fled is the trillion dollars drain from their countries!
Reasonable minds may agree to disagree. However it beats the minds of fair minded people why this excessive daylight robbery in trillions of dollars are not the main point of contention among world leaders instead of the consequences that create war/economic refugees in poor developing countries of Africa and Asia. There is no permanent solution when the real cause of fire around the world is not addressed. As long as the beneficiaries are left off the hook and not confronted with the consequences of their trillion dollars avarice, there would be no solution.
Having indicated all this, lip service by our leaders without action is not enough. Indeed, many of them are overwhelmed – play along or remain poor like the rest of your people. Sadly, even if the trillions dollars are given back to these leaders they will loot all dry! More income in their hands does not necessarily lead to better living condition for their people. Just look at oil become a curse to producing countries and how they rob their treasuries.
Where and what can be done if some of the money is returned? Asking foreign powers to monitor and police certain projects in individual deserving countries may sound patronizing. However, after all the promises of starting new and separate projects with Hail Selassie, Abacha and Mobutu’s stolen money in foreign banks have not produced the desired effect. We cannot trust foreign intention either. They must form world transparent agency to watch one another.
Written by Farouk Martins Aresa.
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