AU: Tale of unfulfilled promises.
By Udo W. Froese.
AFTER a long walk to freedom and many wars against imperial-colonial exploitative occupation, Africans found that they have no money, no access to their own land and their own economies, to actually enjoy their newfound “freedom”.
It seems that in the mind of a black person, whites never created black poverty.
Caucasians believe black Africans would still be poor had they not brought “civilisation and Christianity” to the African continent.
In fact, South Africa’s former and first black South African president Nelson Mandela and his Zimbabwean counterpart, President Robert Mugabe, are the same — they are both African.
International Western “neo-liberalism, or neo-conservatism, or neo-fascist-racism” are all the same indeed and are deeply rooted in the Caucasian mindset, though publicly denied.
At the founding conference of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in May 1963, Ghana’s President Kwame Nkrumah announced: “The people of Africa are waiting in anxious expectation for a concrete and constructive programme which will assist them to realise their hopes and aspirations.
“They know their suffering; they know how heavy is their burden and we must know too that if we fail them — woe betide us!”
In his book, “Handbook of Revolutionary Warfare”, Nkrumah documented, “as far as the imperialists are concerned the real solution to the problem of continued exploitation through concessions and reform lies in the concept of ‘sham-independence’.
“A state can be said to be a neo-colonialist or client state if it is independent de jure and dependent de facto. It is a state where political power lies in the conservative forces of the former colony and where economic power remains under the control of international finance capital.”
He writes on to explain aforementioned: “In other words, the country continues to be economically exploited by interests which are alien to the majority of the ex-colonised population, but are intrinsic to the world capitalist sector.
“Such a state is in the grip of neo-colonialism. It has become a client state.”
In his keynote address at the launch of the OAU in Addis Ababa in May, 1963, Nkrumah noted:
“It is proper that we should have made and adopted these resolutions (number of resolutions and declarations adopted by the summit conferences and the council of various commissions of the OAU) in the interests of African unity, but unless an effective political machinery is devised, to implement these resolutions, they remain no more than words on paper.
“In spite of these resolutions and declarations, in spite of all good intentions, in spite of our plans, the naked fact, alas, is that Africa is still an impoverished continent, immobilised by the lack of political cohesion, harassed by imperialism, and ransacked by neo-colonialism.
“That is so because our unity is still incomplete and ineffective in the face of grave threats to our very existence. What use is it to us then that our continent is so rich in material and human resources? Brothers and colleagues, the fault is in ourselves, not in our stars,” observed the former Ghanaian president Kwame Nkrumah.
In the eyes of most Africans south of the Sahara, nothing much has changed since.
Today in 2010 it seems that the black African mindset, particularly in Southern Africa, has been well conquered to the effect that Africans do believe in the Second Coming of Jesus Christ . . . this time from Europe only.
Kwame Nkrumah would have said: “By the very nature of its essential objective, which is exploitation, neo-colonialism can only flourish in a client state.”
All African countries have achieved their “freedom” from their former colonial masters, but they have been re-united under the Commonwealth with Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II being the head.
Southern Africa has its own unity, the Southern African Development Community (Sadc), based on the Southern African Customs Union (Sacu). The “new” South Africa expects to be accepted as the “powerhouse” of the region.
The media based in South Africa hails the country, more so its economy, as the big driving force behind “peace and security” and “economic development” of not only Southern Africa, but in its hyperbolic hallucinations, of all of sub-Saharan Africa.
The Fifa World Cup will kick off in Johannesburg, South Africa, on June 11 2010.
This is hailed as a major breakthrough for Africa. But, is the average South African actually benefiting economically? Or, who is really benefiting?
One of the leading pan-Africanists, the Tanzanian Dr Hassy Kitine, a retired government minister, parliamentarian and university lecturer, explained the absence of pan-African unity in an interview with the editor of the London-based news magazine, New African, Baffour Ankomah.
“We have no choice at this stage to continue to practise international Western democracy, because all our values are now based on a definition of a development enunciated by the Western world.
“It is the truth and we cannot run away from it.”
Dr Kitine continued: “We will never be left alone to form a viable union. We will be fought against, and I think you know what I mean.”
The official languages of communication of the African Union (AU) are English, French, Portuguese and Arabic.
The only African language among the five official ones is Swahili.
The AU’s flag resembles Libya’s national flag. The Ethiopian-American, Yadesa Bojia, designed that flag, representing all member states on a green background, symbolising the hope of Africa.
To date the African Union has been unsuccessful, although its sponsors, foreign consultants and their employees will differ, highlighting their continuous congresses and the outcomes thereof.
It’s all documented on paper, hence the description of being an egotistical group of people busying themselves with a massive “paper-leopard” (in stead of the un-African “tiger”).
Africa, the continent, its people, its wealth, its economy and land remain as divided as before. Neo-colonialism remains in charge.
Source: The Sunday Mail
Published here: 23 May 2010
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