AFRICA.
Cradle of all continents,
Now cradled by other continents,
Mother of all humanity,
Now mothered by all humanity.
Conquered by Europeans,
Enslaved by Europeans and Arabs.
Neglected by America,
And being recolonized by the Chinese.
Described as dark.
Based on color of inhabitants?
Or paucity of technology and development?
Or lack of institutions?
Trails in all known developmental and technological indices,
Yet endowed with resilient, athletic people.
Blessed with abundant natural resources,
Misappropriated by misanthropic leaders.
Humanity, your mother is suffering.
Aren’t children supposed to care for their mums?
If Africa cannot take care of Africa,
The world must help Africa take care of Africa.
When will western humanity create an acceptable “one humanity” that will mean, one world brotherhood, to enable them to, equally recognize AFRICANS as such, as equally, simply human, and then, probably care for the suffering Africans? Even Karl Marx, the famed man whose works most influenced world humanity, saw Africans as inferior and lower than humans. He attacked one Jewish author of a darker hue who criticized him, by asserting that his mother or grandmother had occasion with one of the blacks that escaped from Egypt with Moses and the outgoing Jewish enslaved population, released by the Egyptians. So called great minds of the West:Thomas Hobbes, Benedict Spinoza, Rene Descartes, John Locke, Rousseau, Montesquieu; Pascal, Bishop Berkeley, Emmanuel Kant, Frederick Hegel, Charles Darwin, Sigmund Freud, Voltaire, Montaigne, Hume, Plato, Socrates, and worse still, Aristotle who brazenly asserted with impunity that: from birth some are made for command, others for subjection. Most, if not all of the above thinkers, maintained opinions verging on affirmation of the inferiority of blacks. From my view of things and the present world, the west, from which africastallestman appeal for help, have not yet recognized the humanity of Africans, to be in position to help them ,not to sink into the worst dehumanized abyss.
Hannah Arendt, the German Jewish Political Philosopher, at one pointed, pointed out that: when the whites shot and killed Africans, they did not recognize or see them as human beings…but as animals. Even Lord Luggard and the fellow nine European countries who shared out African communities,(the Scramble for and Partition of Africa, 1884-1885 in Berlin),did so without consultation, because, they did not regard them as fellow human beings. Once Emperor Mansa Musa, made his infamous journey to Egypt with so much gold, that the price of gold fall for ten years, the whites determined to find the source of such gold…El Dorado. They came from the sea to seek their exploiting sights beginning from West Africa. They dealt with gold, then Ivory, Human beings, cotton, coffee and and kola nuts. The took everything from Africa, and gave Africa a few items like Education, idea of the rule of law, constitutions, idea of freedom and liberty and that was it. Do we now expect them to come back and spoon-feed us again? No way. As you said earlier “The West Lack morals”. I agree, at least to help them help Africa at this daunting times in Africa’s checkered history. Africa does not need the help of the heartless colonizers, to wit. African intellectuals need to come up soon with ideas and concepts of what they want their societies to be like, what they want their governments to function like, and what the individuals and peoples are supposed to be like and live like. The story could go on forever. However, your plea may find space still, in the mind of most Africans, because, they never think for themselves in terms of CHANGE. In your words they pray to God instead of thinking and doing something for themselves. Thank you sir.
At least, the West should stop being a repository of African wealth, stolen by current African leaders. If Africa is be the repository of stolen Western wealth, the West would surely invade Africa to divest it of the loot.
Your comment is totally true, because, the west will not care or give a hoot when it comes to their wealth. They will carry a big bag of Christianity and massacre and murder their way to extract their wealth… the same attitude when purposely robbing people of their own natural wealth and other resources, anywhere in the world, which they shamelessly see as their own property, ordained by the supreme being..,.GOD. You can easily see the face of Thomas Aquinas when he was writing his famed Contra gentiles, and John Locke, when asserting that any uncultivated land of the native Americans could be usurped by colonials, mainly from Europe, and you will notice their attitude …I own the world and have right to use it any how, (although, Shakespeare said: “you cannot read the mind’s construction from the face”) This is their philosophy of life and being in this world, which is more or less their second nature.