My Imaginary Africa: The Motherland For All

The poverty of Tanzanians and Africans in general is not the poverty of Money and or materials; it is the poverty of heart, knowledge, information, psychology of successful life and deficit of leadership in general. Africans cannot be proud if the houses, cars, furnishing and all bunch of materialistic things we have seen in the so called African leaders and their crony investors and pep-crooks who aim one thing and one thing only to keep Africa as it is in order to leave the corrupting gateway that benefit African leaders and the multi-national corporations. We have seen these mansions, luxurious cars and materialistic things from these people; it could be better for Africans and African pride, if and big if they were built, manufactured and promoted by materials from Tanzania and or Africa. But I guarantee you that less than 1% of the materials and man power (physical and mental) used to make these flying fancy materialistic things came from Tanzania and or Africa combined. The rest came from Asia (Arab world and China).

In my opinion as I see, if I were Chinese, I would be happy than ever because I captured the colonies of Africa that I can continue to mentally enslave and rip the raw-materials that I need in my home country. A lot of Africans’ acts and ways of life indicates diagnosis of been mentally slaved, a dose of therapy and delicate care is needed to eradicate such infectious epidemic that is tearing apart the motherland. Tanzanians likewise Africans, do not see themselves and their own as good, but when a white man or an Arab does something they jump and see them as worth-while and more superior. How can anybody treat us, African, equal while we don’t even treat ourselves, even half equal? If a white man jumps, Africans ask, how high? If African jump, fellow comrades says that he used witch-crafts. They have mentality that whatever is made out of Africa, from the developed world so to speak, is of much better value. It is not always true, so many things in the locality of Africa are valuable than can Africans imagine, yet are still walking and breathing blind folded. I don’t mean to be rude but let the truth be told. Truth, sometimes can cut you through like a surgical knife, it worth the pain. It is better to be the person who is boarding in a wrong plane which is heading to the right path rather than boarding the right plane that is heading to the wrong path. This is metaphor that Africans and their leader need to ask themselves without sugar coding the dialog.  We say, "keep it real".

Situation in Africa is happening because it starts from Africans themselves. Africans have tendency of not valuing their own, so they don’t think of their own as well. The question is how can Africa be developed by none-Africans? Of course, how can outsiders come to create jobs for Africans while Africans who are supposed to create jobs for Africans are creating jobs for Arabs, Chinese, Europeans and or Asians?  I remember this polarizing say in Tanzania, a Swahili say that river and canal water runs to the sea/ocean”. Canal and river water means the poor and working class people, and ocean/sea are millionaires or rich people; or canals and rivers are Africans and ocean/sea are Western/Asian people or developed world. Now if Africans don’t stop such self degrading mental polarization and start to elevate themselves are the high standards and toil to attain such standards, Africa will never come out of the dark cloud at that lingering Africa and all its problems.

Leadership is the key here, compare to American’s founding fathers and Presidents like Abe Lincoln, FDR, JFK and Ronald Regan all we see is the aspiring leadership from the positive leaders at the gruesome time that human being can doubt to see a brighter future like light at the end of unknown tunnel. Instead these leaders inspire and insight “the people” and they made sure that they see the light at the end of the tunnel. These leader made problems the solutions and and transformed society where everyone benefited from such solutions i.e. internet, infrastructure, good governance, empowerment to people e.t.c. Unlike African Leaders who makes problems more problematic and feed off them for personal gains i.e. power problems and project contracts aimed to tackle community problems that are often not solutions rather addition problems to Africans. It is all about “the people” and a good leader who knows how to articulate the powers of the people by the people to reach the desired goals as one people and one nation. Who can resist such truth and inspiring examples? It is sad when you see what is wrong and see people who knows better and should do something about it; instead they go about their business harvest for themselves and leaver millions to fen-for themselves.

Africans have all the richness of the world, Africans world is not explored at all, Africans can do wonders. African food is natural and healthy, but Africans don't get it right because of what? Greedy. When African leaders get in power all they think is how they can personally benefit. Something that makes easy for Multinational Corporations to lure these leaders with such mentality for cheep materialistic things. Mwalimu J.K. Nyerere said that poverty of material can be easily cured, but poverty of mind can take the fabric of society into shambles. He furthered that there were Africans who went to elite universities locally and internationally but to his surprise, they were not educated at all. The aim of educating people to the developed world is to bring back to their native countries the development experience and transform their natives lives. Instead these leaders established connections with crooks and come home to exploit the already depressed poor. 

This leaves many in the cumbersome life struggles like we have witnessed in Africa as a whole. One of my very close people in my life, also an African Diaspora has told me that Africans, all nations each are in “need of constitution to guide us how our country should be run.” Another thing I was going to add on this is yes the constitution is fine but we should make sure every Bongo person abides by and respects the constitution because whoever doesn’t then the law will take over. My question is do our characters reflect that we can do it? Probably not but if we’re determined we can do it. Look at the industrialized nations. It took so long to be where they’re. Rome was not built in a day” This is true and its entirety, we need leaders who are bold and wise to put together fair and equal living document (Constitution) that explicitly describe powers sharing, equal rights to all, and provisions that are to be used to enforce this living document where no one is above the law; just like the American founding fathers and European wise-gentlemen did; whereby regardless who is in power in their countries won’t get drunk powers, and if one fool gets drunk powers wont brutally destroy lives their national fabric like African leaders/Mugabe did, rather gets voted out or impeached by the same provisions of the living document. There is an old say that you can trust human when he/she is mixed together with powers and or money, this is always true. Do some soul searching and find out by yourself.

Negro please, emancipate yourselves from the mental slavery. You can’t build a sky-scraper in the air it must touch the ground and with a strong foundation too. Africa is jumping on the moving train and tries to compete with the world that has strong foundations. Africans need to have a strong living document that will guide them as the nations through good and bad times. What good does it do to have a mansion and your neighbor is living in the teepee house? I will feel unsecured, that is both real and a metaphor. How many people in Tanzania and Africa are living under $1 per day? Almost 75% cannot afford one meal a day, based on the world development agencies. How many Tanzanians or Africans get fairness and equal justice for all, "NADA". So all that is like sky-scrapers hanging on the air awaiting to touch down like tornadoes/twisters. A man doesn’t get measured by who he is or what he is or what he got or who do he knows, rather by his own characters, deeds and how he treat himself, his own and others. Remember, charity starts at home.

What is so funny and sad is what African measure as development or being rich; things like big expensive houses, expensive cars, read-made western like food (the West calls them junk food) and they forget to claim and establish the fabric that can bring about all that with equality without suppressing one another. With all that they work on so hard individually they end up having big houses without drainage, electricity, paved roads to get home all seasons or cut off unnecessary accidents, drainage system that can stop flooding that end-up killing them when it is rainy season, good social policies that benefit many and build-up the middle class as viable fabric of their nations, good agriculture system that can sustain farming and irrigation that can feed Africa and the world instead of the peasantry-system that they have, good quality education system that way even leaders family members can find it worthwhile to take their kids instead of taking them overseas and paying for by the corrupt money and so many good ideas that can make Africans prosper and self reliable.

A lot of Africans they find it rather having a teepee in the developed world where all peoples can play with the same set of rules, and can get quality of life as human being regardless of my status, education, position and to whom I’m known by iconic figures or corrupt leaders. Living in the teepee or not, in the developed world you are assured all basic human need without reservation; if one gets sick can walk in the Emergency Room and get quality care, if one need emergency care can get flown to where specialty is available, one can call 911 in case of emergency and help arrives in seconds if not less than a minute, one can petition the government whenever feels mistreated, can assemble and form association, no one-including leaders are above the law, can get all utilities (electricity, water, gas, telephone and paved roads no bribery) without discrimination and rationing because you have a teepee house or not, one can sue anyone including millionaires when their acts or behaviors or properties infringes the constitutional rights and have equal representation according to the law,  can own anything and do business under uniform commerce laws (no special treatment), one can question and or support your representative on the issues feel misrepresented and if there is misconduct can support to vote him/her out of the office on the election or form a referendum to recall such leader as allowed by recall-laws, and one can have oppositional voice under the law as “freedom of speech” permit. These are some of the provisions of the “Bill of Rights” that are God given, anything less than are not good for equal justice and certainly not good for development. Freedom is just a part of “bills of Rights” and freedom is not complete because it is an evolving thing; but freedom right is not attained until all other provisions of bill of rights are in place and simultaneously applied in peoples’ regular lives as community of society.

The new generation needs to survive and the only assurance we can give them today is to be brave enough by denying ourselves petty luxury and offer them a solid living document that can govern all under the rule of law, "CONSTITUTION". Something that “Farther” or “Mother” can give to his/her baby if is to save his life, likewise, there is a danger with the trend that is unfolding ahead of us. ‘Fatherhood Life” is to do selfless and brave things assure the offspring get by and have better quality life than ours. The question is that, are we better fathers or mothers than our parents or ancestors? How will we be measured by the coming generation? That is the daunting question that I’m afraid many Africans can’t answer with perseverance. But for sure, Africans can certainly be productive for national building and make Africa the best place to live only if they sit down and o some soul searching to why and how to solve the problem Africa is facing. Without knowing why and how there is not proper solution to any problem. This needs to be done by forging good quality leaders who genuinely are to serve the interests of Africans from their individual nations to the continent level. Blaming others/west, status quo, wont take Africa anywhere and certainly can’t begging to address problems Africans are facing, it is a cheap politics that diverge Africans away from the reality for so long now. Africa is responsible for Africans and no one person other than Africans; they way they act, do business, lead, interact with others, articulate present from the past and project the future is what will be Africa of today, tomorrow and years to come. Africa is where it is because of the how African leaders shaped Africa to be and certainly it is now work therefore the Ben Frankly say that “to do the same thing over and over and somehow to expect different results it is insanity”. It is like living the dream that make Africans hallucinate living an imaginary life whereby actual life is detrimental. Fatherhood life style can become handy since that in Africa, father is the sole head of the house and raising children who are equipped to face-up the challenges ahead them can make a difference and project a brighter future for Africa ahead. This generation is already at its prime and there is little they can do to reverse the drastic changes but they can help by putting a grand-rule for all, the living document that will hold all accountable with a mechanism for enforcing accountability.

No shortcuts to solid and sound success in life, it will all knock the wall like rat-race. It is like a newborn baby, he/she has to sit, crow, stand, take a step, walk, run, jump and then do the somersault or tricks. Now, Tanzanians and most Africans are just new, independent 1961, and are trying to do the tricks with nations that were independent since 1400's and or 1700's and literary can preprogram anything within African system and successes, it is not a joke. The question is when Africans can be able to take charge and control of their lives and actions? It has to start from what they can control and that is mind, self, home, compounds, communities, then to govern their nations/themselves. Africans have to start like and take charge on what they can produce, then use their own produce and then attain sense of self reliance, otherwise Africa will continue to be poor and soon junk-yard of the developed waste, and that will become literary junky place than it is right now.

There are some good examples in Africa, such as South Africa after apartheid ruling that ruled South Africa propagating hatred among blacks and whites South African. In this regard, like the many leaders during the great generation, Nelson Mandiba Mandela and ANC wise men like Govan Mbeki, Walter Sisulu and Oliver Tambo drafter the south African Freedom Charter with its governing main theme state that "The People Shall Govern!"; mimicking the “Declaration of Independence drafted by American Founding Fathers and the true living document of all the time. (http://scnc.ukzn.ac.za/doc/HIST/freedomchart/freedomch.html) He is a truly legend who sought no revenge for all atrocities, humiliation and decades he save in jail while the people who looked him as their leader were killed and above all denied the very right of the country they so loved, citizenship with all rights. Mandela was like many Africans in the category of the Great generation, Mwalimu Julius K. Nyerere of Tanzania/Tanganyika, Jomo Kenyata of Kenya, Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia, Samora machelle of Mozambique, Patrick Lumumba of Zaire/DRC and Kwame Nkurumah of Ghana. Although they were brushed to have elements of communism during the cold-war era they did what they had to do and what was best for Africa at a time; to attain independency and self reliance. What their successors (baby boomers) brought to Africa is disgrace, greedy, civil wars and corruption that attribute what west calls “stupid death’ to the African people.

I’m sorry to tell you that over all Africans are lacking leaders who do understand the nature of the real world, not materialistic leaders who are bought cheep by the international businesses, while a dog/pet in the developed world gets 100 times quality care than 75% Tanzanian or Africans who can barely eat one meal a day. That is what they want, I guess, since they are all settled for that less, clapping hands on such leaders that are so corrupt and selfish. There is no African leader who doesn’t have immediate family members living or studying in the developed world; and they too, have been there numerous times. Why can’t they learn or copy the leadership style, development principles, governing quality of the successful/western leaders at their home countries that are so promising for them to initiate or send their loved ones to live or study? I think that they are selfish and not leaders from the first place rather special interest’s representatives without genuine challenge and mechanism that balance their powers. One can’t get precise answer to this because it is obvious that Africans can’t get in their brain or inner-cycle and reveal the answer to the general public. But their motives can be question based on their governing and leadership style and put the puzzle together, corruptions. Their family members abroad act like puppets who go overseas to establish businesses as a system of clean-up corrupted money in their banks and investments in the developed world. This is how African minds are corrupted; a leader of a poor African country is an investor in the developed world, taking jobs from poor Africans to well-off westerners. Nothing bad, if they were not leaders who obtain their wealth by corruption leaving millions to fend for themselves and die from hunger/starvation, poverty, disease and wars.  I wander if the developed world leaders could survive even a minute for been corrupt like African leaders; Treason, chapter of their constitutions will send them to the electric chair (capital punishment) so fast. I’m getting emotional, why can’t Africans use the God given assets, brain? No one can take away your knowledge and or drain your skills and experiences from another’s brain. Knowledge is power, use it, and don’t let it be corrupted or totally misused. Pass it on.

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