WHY AFRICAN COUNTRIES NEED TO WORK TOGETHER

When the US President stood to address the men and women of both members of the house of Parliament at Westminster hall,he laughed at  the high bar he claimed had been set by the three predecessors who had the honor of addressing the same gathering before him in the past.Only the Pope,Her Majesty the Queen and Nelson Mandela had been so honored by addressing both houses in the past.The full transcript of the speech can be read here

There were some key note points i picked from his speech and i am going to point them out here.He started of by reminding the gathered members of the long relationship the US and UK have in their shared histories and the value they place on the rights of individuals and the rule of law and not on ethnicity or color.He also emphasised that the prosperity of nations was intertwined,countries could no longer exist in isolation.He defined the US and the UK as being countries that were defined by ideals and one of the most important questions he posed to the audience was,what future are we passing on to our children?

Listening to him was enthralling because President Obama plays and uses words much in the same way Mozart used musical notes to create pieces that resonate 250 years later with audiences the world over.Obama's greatest gift to audiences who listen to him is that he is able to paint pictures with words,and it is a joy listening to the way he puts his thoughts together in words.

But this post here is not meant to extol the oratory skills of the  44th President of the United States of America,it is out to show the need for African countries to work together if they are to shed off the tag of the dark continent.Too many times the world has been treated to the spectacle of hungry and malnourished children standing at deaths door,or to the bloody and mutilated bodies of the victims of tribal violence on the continent.It is time we stopped being the recipients of all forms of aid from food to military to educational aid.

At the moment there is a huge crisis in eastern Africa especially among the countries that make up part of the horn of Africa.This is as a result of the drought and famine that has ravaged the people in these region and left them high and dry begging for food yet again.The area right now has seen an influx of international aid workers as well as the accompanying spectacle of international TV crews.All the food that is going to be donated to manage this crisis will come form the west,it is very rare for African countries to sort out one of their own.Why cant we have maize from Malawi and wheat from South Africa to assuage the pangs of hunger our brothers and sisters in Daadab are feeling?

Why is it countries in Africa apart from the peace keeping forces they so faithfully send out at times of crisis and the support they give whenever one of their own is being hounded by the "west" be extended to helping each other in times of crisis such as this?

The US and much of the countries in Europe operate under various alliances and have perfected the art of bailing each other out to a t".Why cant the same be replicated in Africa?Are we so busy seeking to outshine each other and compete for the never ending aid that we fail to notice that working together would be mutually beneficial to the citizens of these continent?

The re branded African Union needs to stop being a body that does less  talking  and more action ,it needs to have some more  relevance in a world that has changed drastically since it was formed.It needs to answer to Africa's needs today and create a future for the children of these great continent.Too much time is spent discussing conflicts,resolving conflicts and not much time is spent on real workable solutions that cause the conflicts in the first place.

Regionally we have already seen the reluctance that has met the launch of the East African Common Market with some country's like Tanzania being wary of their neighbour Kenya.We will not see any progress on the continent if we are suspicious of each other.We cannot also be fighting over territory like the Migingo and Ugingo islands in Lake Victoria which you can read about here and expect to go on with business as usual.

We need to recognize that we need to work together or we "die".Our countries need each other to survive economically and with the newest kid on the block South Sudan is looking up towards the countries that have been independent for much longer .Countries need to stop living in isolation,there is an African proverb that says .Two trees planted together cannot avoid brushing against  each other " and countries have begun to realize that we do not need the west to market what we produce locally .Our biggest and best clients are right here right across the border .We are now doing more business with our neighbours than we did in the last  5 years,it is time we went beyond being markets for each others goods and became allies and friends,neighbours who can help each other out in times of difficulty because as they say" it is a fool who rejoices when his neighbour is in trouble."

Africa is where the rest of the world is looking towards for ideas,resources,market and expansion yet our eyes are so focused on the countires across the oceans we have failed to see the need in our own backyards.

THE POLITICS OF FOOD ....

The world as we know it today is full of many contradictions  and none more so than in the distribution and availability of food.While people in the developed countries watch news items of starving children from Eastern Africa struggling to suckle at the breasts of their malnourished mothers,they are also some of the biggest wasters of food.It was reported in a UN study that you can read about here that an astonishing 1.3 billion tons of food is wasted every year,much of it in North America and Europe.If i may quote the study it stated that  the "estimated  per capita food waste by consumers in Europe and North-America is 95-115 kg/year, while this figure in Sub-Saharan Africa and South/Southeast Asia is only 6-11 kg/year. "


It should be noted that most of these countries run relatively democratic governments while Africa and much of Asia is still struggling with this "D" word.This has led me to the  conclusion  that being a democratic,developed country is hinged very much on the country's ability to feed itself.Right now much of the horn of  Africa is facing a food crisis,the worst in years. Africa is awash with foreign aid agencies who have come to our rescue because we have been unable to feed our people.If you look at the countries that are recipients of much of this food aid,their political and governance histories are always very colorful.A hungry man has no time to think about politics ,he would rather worry about where his next meal will come from because much of the population in these countries lives from hand to mouth.It is also why voters in most of the constituencies in these countries are easily swayed by the sight of a few dollars  that they can buy food with and that will assuage the pangs  of hunger they have suffered for days.

People in the West marvel at the kind of leaders we elect sometimes,yet they forget that they so readily give us food aid with conditions attached or as reward for good behaviour(meaning we kowtowed to what they demanded of us).As long as countries are still receiving food aid they will not know democracy and good governance.So long as people are electing leaders based on their oratory skills and popularity  and not leadership and integrity then we will be seeing the pictures of starving children in Northern Kenya till kingdom come.It is also true that as long as food aid is given not out of a sense of altruism but as a reward for "good behaviour" or as a way for donor countries to have their way in the recipient countries then Africa will not know what it is like to be free to feed and rule itself.

If i had a magic wand i would pass it over the countries that have for years been the recipients of food aid in  the arid and semi arid areas of the Eastern part of Africa.I would make the deserts of Northern Kenya, lush and green with food crops,flowing with life giving water from streams and rivers so that the women and men of this part of the world  do not have to trek for miles in search of food or water .Their cows would be plump with health,their coats glowing with nourishment and their udders full of milk so that we do not have to see the picture of another starving child.Then they would know the joy of electing a man  or woman who will not give them fish for a day but will show them how to fish too so that they never know what hunger pangs  or food aid is...ever again.


However magic only happens in fairy tales and not in real life and so i am hoping that common sense prevails and that in the coming elections people vote with their heads and not their stomachs or emotions.We need to elect leaders who are able to think outside of the confines of the "box".People who would love to see Kenyans free of the shackles of foreign aid which have made us puppets in the hands of donors.Food aid never allowed anyone to think beyond their stomachs........

SOUTH SUDAN....A NEW BEGINNING

South Sudan becomes an independent country today after successfully making their view on secceding from the Northern Sudan in a referendrum that was held in January of this year.Watching the proceedings of the celebrations going on at the Garang Mausoleum that are being aired live on most TV stations in Kenya i was both happy and sad.Happy that after decades of war and thousands of lives lost the people of South Sudan now had a place they could call home and whose destiny they could be a part of but sad that this was not Kenya being born again.

The Southerners have got so much hope for this new nation that the excitement was infectious ,seeing all the celebrations that have been going on all week.These people have their whole lives ahead of them if they do things right and do not get infected with the diseases of tribalism,corruption and impunity that have destroyed Kenya.With their oil reserves and if they are able to mange them well,South Sudan could surpass Kenya in growth by 2030 as it is blessed with vast oil reserves which remain untapped.


The President of the new nation Salva Kiir has his work cut out for him, in driving the growth of Africa's and indeed the worlds newest nation.It is my hope that he is going to keep the momentum already being shown and even surpass it so that the thousands or indeed millions who have immigrated to other countries have reason to come back home and be a part of stirring  the growth of this country.

The whole world will be watching how this new country takes its baby steps and with time we hope the southern Sudan people will be able to erase the years of conflict they have had to live through and face the promising future ahead with courage and bravery.They need to put their best  feet forward in ensuring that the dreams the leader of the  SPLM had, Dr John Garang are realized and that the Sudanese people are able to enjoy being free to determine the direction their country takes.

So today am going to choose to be happy and pop a bottle of champagne for this new country taking g its baby steps in the  world of democracy.

WHY AFRICA'S VOTE FOR HEAD OF IMF DOES NOT MATTER

Christine Lagarde and Agustin Carstens have been on a tour of some countries which by the sheer strength of their economies may just be the deal breakers in the search for the next Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund.The position was left vacant after the previous holder Dominique Strauss Khan was charged with sexual assault and other charges  committed against a hotel maid in an upmarket New York Hotel.

When i hear  talk about the IMF all i seem to remember are the Structural Adjustment Programs(SAP'S) they gave as conditions for Aid to the Kenyan government back  in the 90's which went on to cause a lot of grief among Kenyans.Now the tide has changed and Kenya and most other African countries  are no longer at the mercy of the  IMF.They   have a very willing partner in China who lends without too many questions or conditions.

Looking at the wooing that is going on for votes by the two candidate it is a no brainer to conclude that African countries do not carry that much weight in the vote.That is why they do not feature in the itinerary that has been mapped out by the two contestants.The countries that contribute a bulk of the money.This is mainly because funding for the body by member countries is based on quotas that are determined by that countrys' strength on the world economy.The system used for funding the IMF can be read here.African countries do not have much economic clout on the global stage and that could be the reason that the two candidates have not paid much attention to them.Another factor that could be influencing the choice of countries the two are visiting to pitch their suitabilities for the job are that countries in much of Europe like Greece,Ireland,Portugal are in need of bail out from the IMF.


In voting for the next managing director for the IMF job,a candidate needs to garner votes from the members with the highest percentage of contributions because these are the ones who have the greatest say in decision making.African countries are largely borrowers in these financial arrangement and more often than not have been saddled with loans with so many conditions ,that African countries end up being forever mired in debt for generations to come.

According to an article by rainbow warrior on how voting is done it is literally a matter of how much your influence is worth in gold that will determine who gets the top job.Africa with its meager resources can in noway have a say in who heads the organization,the decision is in the hands of the US and much of the G8 and G20 countries.Africa and the rest of the developing countries who make up the IMF membership can only ever hope to have one of their own heading the financial body if they can garner financial clout that can stand up to the US and Europe and that is going to take years.

Meanwhile as we wait to hear who gets the job though i think it is a no brainer that it will be Lagarde with Carstens as deputy in order to appease the BRICS countries,it is time the next MD changed tact on the way the IMF views Africa.Much of the time it has received a lot of flak from African intellectuals for forcing conditions down the throats of begging countries and imposing plans that have done nothing but harm the recipients of the countries they have been channeled to.This is because some of the money is targeted at projects that hardly ever benefit citizens and the  conditions imposed for the loans end up wrecking the lives of the very same people they are meant to help.

Focus by the new head should now be on well thought out and researched policies that can benefit the people  in the developing countries while also making sure the funds are used for their intended purposes.With China now joining the list of options available for loans and grants IMF needs to drop the list of conditions it imposes for their loan,what should be focused on is monitoring of these funds to make sure they are being put to their intended purposes.

African countries also need to play a a part in ensuring that they reform their policies to include more transparency in the way they utilize their funds,elect leaders with integrity and knowledge to push their economies to compete in a world where bail outs have become the norm rather than the exception.Countries are facing tougher times on the world economic stage and previously countries we never thought would need bail outs are now in urgent need of financial help,it is now up to African countries which have so many resources are able to manage their resources in such a manner that they reap economic benefits for themselves and their citizens.