When Negative news dominates African coverage!
Journalists around the world are hailed for the enormous role they played in championing and sustaining a good and mature democracy, nation building and the protection of human rights and human dignity worldwide through their interminable campaigns to point out the dangers posed by dictatorial rulers whose main pleasure is derived from depriving the masses of their legitimate rights to live a peaceful and well-enjoyed way of life.
This understandably reflects on the journalism profession, but to our utter dismay, today, journalism has taken a new and peculiar dimension and a horrendous definition in the Western world or in the so-called much advertised "free and civilized" world.
Regrettably enough, the once valued and highly regarded Western media have disgracefully slipped a bit from its renowned tradition of fair and balanced reporting, most especially when it comes to reporting issues pertaining to Africa and Africans. It is a living reality that nobody except a fool can underestimate the strength of the mass media, be it print, electronic and otherwise to peoples, communities, societies, races, countries and continents. But how are we going to separate facts from sentiments as regards our adopted culture of incessant listening to news in radios, viewing them on televisions and also reading it in the print media.
In reality, newspapers, magazines, TV, radio, pamphlets, etc. give information to the public; sometimes they give facts, and sometimes the facts are presented in a seemingly biased way. If not for bias or for a grand-propaganda campaign aimed at suppressing, black-listing and condemning a particular continent, its peoples and tribes the issue of President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe's stance on the much controversial land reform and the West's boisterous response couldn't have been reported in such a manner that it is reported today in the Western media. Every now and then the issue of Mugabe and the white settlers remains bread on toast, while the issue of the calculated racism in disguise in Europe has bogged down and one hardly reads a critique of the Europe-born fee-status imposed on international students mostly Africans by European universities, despite their knowledge of an African student's financial history. In my own view, Africans are better off in the war-ruined Africa than in the inhospitable West.
This single act of fixing a fee-status to be collected from an African student and the heavy taxes collected from African immigrants in the UK and the rest of Europe while in reality back here in Africa, Western manipulation and exploitation machines such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank have marshaled the evil schemes of devaluating the local currency and destabilizing the African economies renders the atmosphere unpropitious for him or her to pursue his or her academic endeavors.
Africans were reduced to doing menial and very degrading low-level jobs in Europe and the rest of the Western world. They are constantly harassed and embarrassed by the immigration officers and nothing is done. They were on several occasions stoned and maimed by their hosts and they always stand the probability of being hit or smashed by a spit from inhospitable Westerners. In Africa, white settlers are enjoying the highest degree of immunity and they live in peace and enjoying every bit of their lives without a threat of being harassed or embarrassed by the host black African communities.
This so-called civilized and professionalized Western media failed to point out or even criticize or publicize the illegitimate ownership of black African lands by the minority white population despite the fact that for over a century, since the slave-trade era Africans have been deprived of utilizing their lands for the betterment of their families and they are piteously punished in return by an unceasing tapping of their resources and the total subjugation to slavery and back-breaking labor in their hijacked lands. Isn't this racism in disguise? Why should the West panic when President Mugabe resorted to giving his best to his people, thus, making them comfortable with their own resources?
With this kind of a situation on ground, Mr. Mugabe's defiance is no doubt to the betterment of the deprived and oppressed black population. The whole Wild-Wild West have to think inwards, because it goes with the wise saying that says "Do not do to others what you do not want done to yourself." If the leaderships in the West think they are natty, Mr. Mugabe is not accidentally smart. And no amount of blame-shifting, psychological warfare or misinformation in the media can change his resolve.
Africa, a continent blessed with world's brightest brains and abundant natural endowments has been destroyed by both internally and externally influenced and imposed conflicts and hardships, hunger, abject penury, lack of security of both food and life and the list goes on and on. On their own sides our unskilled, visionless African looters and not leaders are well versed in diplomatic languages that have the grand capability of triggering war and confusion. Give a second thought to the war in Liberia and the attitude of the deposed President Charles Taylor, the war in the Democratic Republic of Congo and the attitudes of the presidents of neighboring Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi, the war in once peaceful and harmonious Cote d'Ivoire, the war between Ethiopia and Eritrea, the war between the SPLA and the government in Sudan, the war in Angola, the genocide in Rwanda and the war in Somalia.
The West bore heavy direct or indirect responsibility in exacerbating this hardship to an alarming state. From endemics, epidemics to pandemics, today it is malaria here, AIDS/HIV there, polio here, ebola there, cholera here, starvations, malnutrition and ethno-religious violence elsewhere. By so doing, the black race was reduced to an endless struggle for survival and nothing good in this respect is expected from the Western media but rather a mere self-centered and biased report? Africans were left with nothing to cheer them up in their countries of origin, so they resorted to total and forced vagrancy, constantly searching and dreaming for a greener pasture, which translated into human trafficking, child abuse and all forms of abuses visibly manifesting and militating against the development of this great and blessed continent, Africa.
Africa, a continent with about 56 countries is yet to secure a single seat in the United Nations Security Council since its inception about 30 years ago. By this, Africans were told that France, Britain, USA and the rest of the UNSC members are to decide on their breakfasts, lunch and dinner and hence they knew what we wore on our bodies, what we ate and what we are to eat and also our belongings and possessions. Whenever a down-to-earth leader emerges from an African country the whole West counter-attacked him and brand him a bandit, a looter and more sinister a threat to the free world. This is because what they always need for Africa is dream and nothing but dreams.
Monday, August 10, 2009
Global Warming: The Shadow Over Africa
In Africa poverty and want are prevalent, hunger and needless war becoming more and more incessant, and the rigor of bad and irresponsible leadership is eating away the souls of its inhabitants.
Prior to the emergence of globalization with its gospel of exposing developing nations to the logic of free trade, which as a result gave rise to an alarming rise in the influx of costless, used and, in many instances, substandard products like the so-called "Belgium cars" (a catch-phrase for used cars in Nigeria), e-waste in the form of used and hard-to-dispose-of computers and their accessories, etc., the continent of Africa has been a so-called "heaven on earth" and an irresistible tourist destination for many years. It boasts its prowess and grandeur by being the host to so many endangered species, calm waters, culture and centuries-old traditions, and most importantly its hospitable people.
As a young man working in a media consultancy firm in Kano State in 2005, I have been a part of a massive sensitization campaign carried out in conjunction with the Office of the Special Adviser to the Executive Governor of Kano State on Nongovernmental Organizations with sole aim of sensitizing commercial motorcyclists popularly known as Achaba on the dangers of reckless driving and how good and careful driving will contribute toward curbing the rise in the number of casualties recorded as a result of daily motorcycle accidents. Being a coordinator in the project, I had the opportunity to go through the results of research surveys that sought to achieve the objectives of the project and it is there that I came face to face with a striking but horrendous revelation -- a revelation that is casting a very big shadow on the future of this most populous state in Nigeria. A head count was carried out on the number of motorcycles available in the state, and the result showed 3,000,000 plus or about 30 percent of the state's overall population with about 87 percent daily on the streets. This means about 2.7 million motorbikes emitting CO2 daily on our streets! This number is reflective of what has been obtained in 2005, which means the numbers of motorbikes emitting CO2 today have quadrupled considering how politicians are importing these motorcycles in large numbers from China for distribution to their cronies and subjects.
Many will say global warming is the creation of the most developed nations as a result of their all-swallowing appetite for energy. People subscribing to this notion may likely be right in their assertion. But one cannot easily with the wave of a hand dismiss or rule out the complicity of African governments in the global rise in global warming. This is more evident in the fact that these governments care less to formulate and put into action good, effective and earth-saving import policies and regulations. As in the case of Nigeria, the politicians are happily or rather naively contributing toward global warming by squandering state resources in importing motorcycles unwittingly in large numbers for distribution to the young party faithful in order to buy their votes and loyalty.
In a partnership between Indian companies and some northern Nigerian state governments, about a million of tricycles are daily matching on our roads, thereby contributing their own quota to the rise in CO2 emitted from Africa and released into the already harmed atmosphere. If we add the carbon monoxide emitted by mostly ageing Europe-originating imported used cars, the result will come out to be horrendously overwhelming! Little wonder today that one finds people wearing masks that cover their noses on the streets of most northern Nigerian cities, especially metropolitan Kano; the mask selling business is also booming this days, but for how long will the mask be able to filter the air?
If our governments are serious about safeguarding the future of tomorrow's leaders, then large-scale importation of motorcycles and automobiles is not and will never be the right answer. Governments have experimented with Information Communication Technology for Development tools and the result has been very overwhelming. Youths with little or no formal education have been trained and empowered with ICT skills and they are doing well today, either by being gainfully employed or satisfyingly self-employed.
Empower the youths with education and never with overbearing CO2-emitting machines; this way governments can easily achieve the long-term goal of safeguarding the future of its youths and curbing global warming-instigated natural disasters that are claiming innocent souls, homes and shelters in Africa.
Prior to the emergence of globalization with its gospel of exposing developing nations to the logic of free trade, which as a result gave rise to an alarming rise in the influx of costless, used and, in many instances, substandard products like the so-called "Belgium cars" (a catch-phrase for used cars in Nigeria), e-waste in the form of used and hard-to-dispose-of computers and their accessories, etc., the continent of Africa has been a so-called "heaven on earth" and an irresistible tourist destination for many years. It boasts its prowess and grandeur by being the host to so many endangered species, calm waters, culture and centuries-old traditions, and most importantly its hospitable people.
As a young man working in a media consultancy firm in Kano State in 2005, I have been a part of a massive sensitization campaign carried out in conjunction with the Office of the Special Adviser to the Executive Governor of Kano State on Nongovernmental Organizations with sole aim of sensitizing commercial motorcyclists popularly known as Achaba on the dangers of reckless driving and how good and careful driving will contribute toward curbing the rise in the number of casualties recorded as a result of daily motorcycle accidents. Being a coordinator in the project, I had the opportunity to go through the results of research surveys that sought to achieve the objectives of the project and it is there that I came face to face with a striking but horrendous revelation -- a revelation that is casting a very big shadow on the future of this most populous state in Nigeria. A head count was carried out on the number of motorcycles available in the state, and the result showed 3,000,000 plus or about 30 percent of the state's overall population with about 87 percent daily on the streets. This means about 2.7 million motorbikes emitting CO2 daily on our streets! This number is reflective of what has been obtained in 2005, which means the numbers of motorbikes emitting CO2 today have quadrupled considering how politicians are importing these motorcycles in large numbers from China for distribution to their cronies and subjects.
Many will say global warming is the creation of the most developed nations as a result of their all-swallowing appetite for energy. People subscribing to this notion may likely be right in their assertion. But one cannot easily with the wave of a hand dismiss or rule out the complicity of African governments in the global rise in global warming. This is more evident in the fact that these governments care less to formulate and put into action good, effective and earth-saving import policies and regulations. As in the case of Nigeria, the politicians are happily or rather naively contributing toward global warming by squandering state resources in importing motorcycles unwittingly in large numbers for distribution to the young party faithful in order to buy their votes and loyalty.
In a partnership between Indian companies and some northern Nigerian state governments, about a million of tricycles are daily matching on our roads, thereby contributing their own quota to the rise in CO2 emitted from Africa and released into the already harmed atmosphere. If we add the carbon monoxide emitted by mostly ageing Europe-originating imported used cars, the result will come out to be horrendously overwhelming! Little wonder today that one finds people wearing masks that cover their noses on the streets of most northern Nigerian cities, especially metropolitan Kano; the mask selling business is also booming this days, but for how long will the mask be able to filter the air?
If our governments are serious about safeguarding the future of tomorrow's leaders, then large-scale importation of motorcycles and automobiles is not and will never be the right answer. Governments have experimented with Information Communication Technology for Development tools and the result has been very overwhelming. Youths with little or no formal education have been trained and empowered with ICT skills and they are doing well today, either by being gainfully employed or satisfyingly self-employed.
Empower the youths with education and never with overbearing CO2-emitting machines; this way governments can easily achieve the long-term goal of safeguarding the future of its youths and curbing global warming-instigated natural disasters that are claiming innocent souls, homes and shelters in Africa.
Africa: An Embarassment of Riches!
Africa is blessed in its people and its land.
From the rivers of the Rift Valley to the wild animals of the Kalahari Game Reserve there is more for tourists to see in Africa than anywhere else on Earth.
If you doubt this poor writer, kindly spare some hours out of your life to Google "tourism in Africa" and not "terrorism in Africa" and see the wonders for yourself.
Africa is blessed in its ability to nurse, nurture and preserve many of the world's most treasured and admired cultures and traditions. The Masai people and their robust culture prove my point.
Africans and people of African origin have done much to benefit the world. Think of Boutros Boutros Ghali and Kofi Annan of the United Nations.
They have also shown military prowess and skill in foreign policy. Think of the number of black military officers that fought in the two Iraq wars, or the likes of Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell.
People of African origin have changed the fate of nations. Remember the boldness and charismatic energy of American civil rights activists Martin Luther King Jnr. and Malcolm X.
Other famous Africans include Nelson Mandela of South Africa, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Dr. Julius Nyerere of Tanzania, Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, Emperor Gabriel Hail Salasee and Sir Ahmadu Bello K.B.E. of Nigeria to name but a few.
In the field of the display of exceptional wit and intelligence, the exceptionally creative writer Professor Chinua Achebe, Nobel Laureate Professor Wole Soyinka, Professor Emeritus Ali Mazrui and Nobel Laureate Wawuru of Kenya are just some of the many great African intellectuals and thinkers.
To cut a long story short, Africa is stunningly and stupendously blessed with both human and natural resources.
Africa is also rich in minerals. Diamonds and gold are buried beneath the fertile soils of South Africa and Ghana. Crude oil weeps profusely in Sao Tome and Principe, the Gulf of Guinea, Nigeria and the Sudan. Zambia and its neighbors are famous for their zinc deposits. Aquamarine, amethyst and other precious stones are scattered across the soil of Africa. The list goes on and on.
The so-called civilized people in the West used to brand Africa as the "Darkest Part of the World." Though painfully insulting, I find it very logical to agree with their assertion and their colossal condemnation of this blessed continent.
I agree simply because the larger part of Africa has been enclosed and enveloped by needless man-made wars and conflicts that tend to violently dwarf the socio-economic development of the continent.War has affected Darfur, the Congo, the Ivory Coast, Sierra Leon, Somalia, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Uganda, Angola, Chad, Gambia and the oil rich Niger Delta region of Nigeria.
Greed, lust for absolute power and bad leadership bedevil Africa, and unless the situation is reversed the continent will forever remain the so-called "Darkest Part of the World."
However there is good news coming out of this ancient continent.
Nigeria's role as mediator relieved war-torn Liberia of its trouble and facilitated the installation through democratic means of the first African woman president in the person of Allen Johnson Sirlef.
African organizations like the Economic Community of West African States and the Community of Sahel-Saharan States have done a great deal of good by intervening in warzones as peace keepers.
Africa is important for everyone regardless of their color, race or religious inclination. Africa has the potential to be a business haven equal to Dubai. Let us hope that the great continent will rise out of its present chaos and assume its rightful place as one of the most marvelous places on Earth.
From the rivers of the Rift Valley to the wild animals of the Kalahari Game Reserve there is more for tourists to see in Africa than anywhere else on Earth.
If you doubt this poor writer, kindly spare some hours out of your life to Google "tourism in Africa" and not "terrorism in Africa" and see the wonders for yourself.
Africa is blessed in its ability to nurse, nurture and preserve many of the world's most treasured and admired cultures and traditions. The Masai people and their robust culture prove my point.
Africans and people of African origin have done much to benefit the world. Think of Boutros Boutros Ghali and Kofi Annan of the United Nations.
They have also shown military prowess and skill in foreign policy. Think of the number of black military officers that fought in the two Iraq wars, or the likes of Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell.
People of African origin have changed the fate of nations. Remember the boldness and charismatic energy of American civil rights activists Martin Luther King Jnr. and Malcolm X.
Other famous Africans include Nelson Mandela of South Africa, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Dr. Julius Nyerere of Tanzania, Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, Emperor Gabriel Hail Salasee and Sir Ahmadu Bello K.B.E. of Nigeria to name but a few.
In the field of the display of exceptional wit and intelligence, the exceptionally creative writer Professor Chinua Achebe, Nobel Laureate Professor Wole Soyinka, Professor Emeritus Ali Mazrui and Nobel Laureate Wawuru of Kenya are just some of the many great African intellectuals and thinkers.
To cut a long story short, Africa is stunningly and stupendously blessed with both human and natural resources.
Africa is also rich in minerals. Diamonds and gold are buried beneath the fertile soils of South Africa and Ghana. Crude oil weeps profusely in Sao Tome and Principe, the Gulf of Guinea, Nigeria and the Sudan. Zambia and its neighbors are famous for their zinc deposits. Aquamarine, amethyst and other precious stones are scattered across the soil of Africa. The list goes on and on.
The so-called civilized people in the West used to brand Africa as the "Darkest Part of the World." Though painfully insulting, I find it very logical to agree with their assertion and their colossal condemnation of this blessed continent.
I agree simply because the larger part of Africa has been enclosed and enveloped by needless man-made wars and conflicts that tend to violently dwarf the socio-economic development of the continent.War has affected Darfur, the Congo, the Ivory Coast, Sierra Leon, Somalia, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Uganda, Angola, Chad, Gambia and the oil rich Niger Delta region of Nigeria.
Greed, lust for absolute power and bad leadership bedevil Africa, and unless the situation is reversed the continent will forever remain the so-called "Darkest Part of the World."
However there is good news coming out of this ancient continent.
Nigeria's role as mediator relieved war-torn Liberia of its trouble and facilitated the installation through democratic means of the first African woman president in the person of Allen Johnson Sirlef.
African organizations like the Economic Community of West African States and the Community of Sahel-Saharan States have done a great deal of good by intervening in warzones as peace keepers.
Africa is important for everyone regardless of their color, race or religious inclination. Africa has the potential to be a business haven equal to Dubai. Let us hope that the great continent will rise out of its present chaos and assume its rightful place as one of the most marvelous places on Earth.
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