Ihenacho�s Home Truths



I often chuckle with pity whenever I hear some westerners bemoan African poverty as if it were a sui generis phenomenon that has to do with their natural depravity and fate as sub-Saharan Africans lacking in industry and creativity.
Saturday, March 2, 2002

David Asonye Ihenacho
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AFRICA'S WOES:
GENUINE CONCERN AND HOLLOW SOLUTIONS


hether history records it as such or not, it seems clearly self-evident, at least in the eyes of many Africans both at home and in the Diaspora, that a major turn-around in what for many years appeared like a pathological amnesia of the west over Africa was recorded during the presidency of William Jefferson Clinton of the United States of America. For decades before him Africa was almost like a distant memory, in fact, an after-thought in the minds of the governments and peoples of western nations. She was viewed as a forgotten land, a hopeless dark continent permanently entrapped in the primitive cycle of tribal warfare. Right from the early days of colonial adventurism in the continent, Africa has had the misfortune of being viewed by many westerners as a continent that is lost to inexplicably pernicious diseases - what some early European explorers of the continent described as the white man's grave. For many of them ever since, Africa would hardly ever be able to remove its mournful garb of extreme hostility and untimely deaths. Even till today the much many westerners know or may wish to know about Africa is that it is a continent of intractable sickness, poverty, ignorance and inter-ethnic warfare, and, its people are as good as tangential backwaters of modern civilization.

After raping and pillaging Africa for several centuries through slavery, colonialism, invasions, wicked racism, unjustifiable socio- economic activities, etc., western countries appeared to have at a certain time in the late 19th and early 20th centuries arrived at a consensus to abandon the completely despoiled continent to die ever so slowly through subtle self-strangulations. Africa appeared every inch like a land being gently and systematically goaded by some invisible world powers to assume its rightful destiny as the museum of the world. Hence the continent became a piece of dislocated real estate to dig for lost civilizations, a jungle thicket to search for rare plant species, a virgin forest to research on insect varieties, and in fact, a throwback retreat good only for romanticizing on the past and primitive glories of humanity. Consequently Africa became not a place to think of the future but a junkyard to search for the lost. She became a place to long for what was rather than seek what could be, a land to dig wells in search of the wealth of the under rather than a place to build towers in search of the thrills of the yonder. In a simple language Africa was regarded by almost the whole western world as a place for mining rather a place for refining. Gradually she became synonymous with the abandoned, the wasted, the rusted, the busted, the undusted, the crusted, and the home of skulls and bones of the long dead ancestral ape-men.

Part of the great legacies of the two-term administration of Mr. William Clinton was its unabashed public concern for the unimaginable tragedy that was perpetually on display in the continent of Africa. Clinton was the one president of America among the forty-plus others before him who while in office appeared deeply moved by the monumental tragedies of Africa. Though many Africans, Europeans and Americans often criticized him for what they described as an African policy of showboating that was lacking in substance, any independent analysis of the situation could convince anyone that Clinton in his eight years did more than prove beyond any reasonable doubt that he was honestly and genuinely concerned with the horrendous tragedies of the continent of Africa. As he noted while opening the National Summit on Africa in Washington on February 16, 2000, "Africa does matter to the United States, not simply because 30 million Americans trace their heritage to Africa, though that is very important �.The 21st century world has been transformed, and our views and actions must be transformed accordingly� The central reality of our time is that all this globalization is making us more vulnerable to each other's problems� We can no longer choose not to know�.We can only choose not to act -- or to act." Clinton seemed at every inch genuinely concerned about the horrendous conditions of the embattled peoples of the continent. He saw the enormity of Africa's problems and to his credit he set about doing something about them. He not only talked about them quite a lot but he proffered what he thought were genuine initiatives on the solutions of those problems. He sought and entertained opinions on how to liberate Africa from her woes. He appointed credible envoys that enjoyed almost cabinet level status to oversee initiatives on solving the multiple African dilemmas. Reverend Jesse Jackson, a well-known civil rights activist and an indefatigable advocate for Africa's welfare, he designated as "Special Envoy for the President and the Secretary of State for the Promotion of Democracy in Africa."

Perhaps the one undisputable achievement of the Clinton administration was the constant light it beamed on the horrible situation of Africa. Former President Clinton used his bully pulpit to beam a presidential searchlight on Africa's perennial woes. It was something that had hardly ever happened since the beginning of the United States of America. His was one genuine occasion of "America for Africa". For once there was a president in the White House that did not feel embarrassed to address himself as "a friend of Africa", an American president that openly claimed to be genuinely "feeling the pains" of Africa. Apart from former president Jimmy Carter of the 70's no American president did come close to Clinton in according Africa the status of a legitimate continent of planet earth. Despite the numerous distractions of his presidency Clinton did achieve quite a lot for Africa. Beside his two momentous visits to Africa in March-April 1998 and August 2000 which served as some of the greatest moments of modern Africa spotlighting her terrible situation and putting her woes on the front burner of world problems, Clinton fought and oversaw the enactment of The African Growth and Opportunity Act of 2000 in the US Congress which was designed to promote US-Africa trade in at least 48 African countries. He also elevated the problem of AIDS in Africa to a place of highest concern in the US government, namely, as a matter of national security. The former president was at the forefront of great efforts to persuade the US and world business class to invest in the continent so as to alleviate its poverty. During his eight-year tenure, economic aids to the African nations quadrupled. Over and above his many achievements he fostered great personal relationships with many African leaders like Nelson Mandela, Thabo Mbeki, Jerry Rawlings, Olusegun Obasanjo, Hosni Mubarak, Yoweri Museveni, etc.

Back home in the United States, the Clinton administration blazed the trail in opening the doors for respectable cabinet positions to African sons and daughters of US origin. It is wonderful that the current president George W. Bush has continued that laudable tradition arguably made fashionable in the Clinton administration. Clinton's rainbow-like cabinet became a source of strength and confidence to Africans as a whole and a signal to many African leaders that they had a channel to present their views and wishes directly to the most powerful man on earth. So in every way conceivable Clinton deserved the title of "a friend of Africa" that many African leaders and intellectuals lavished on him during his tenure as America's president. His relationship with Africa and its problems reflected so positively on many African leaders and peoples that they considered him their own man. The great African-American literary guru Toni Morrison described Clinton as "our first black president". Her authorial sentiment seemed a perfect encapsulation of the positive attitudes of a great majority of Africans all over the world. There was that perception out there that the former president was genuinely for the welfare of Africa and her offspring. Ahmed Salim-Salim, the former secretary-general of the Organization of African Unity, captured the sentiments of most Africans when he described Clinton as having been intimately involved in African affairs since taking office in 1993. "It is our hope and prayer that future administrations in this country will sustain his efforts" (cf. CNN - allpolitics.com Feb. 17, 2000).

But despite the undeniable great efforts of President Clinton to address the problems of the continent, despite the bonanza of attention Africa had enjoyed during the Clinton years, and despite our peoples' buoyed confidence and appreciation for the attention given to them by his administration and its allies in Europe and Asia, the fate of the continent hardly improved any bit. The gloomy Africa has remained the same as if there had not been an American president like the empathizing Bill Clinton who had shown her genuine concern. All her malignant tragedies have persevered and are not showing any signs of surrender. The land is still simmering with aching poverty. The AIDS virus is still embarked on its deadly rampage all over Africa. Inter-ethnic violence continues to spiral out of control all over the continent. Investments are yet to arrive in Africa from the industrialized nations of the world. And jobs are yet to be offered to the restively jobless African youth. In fact it can simply be said that the genuine concern towards Africa of former president Clinton and his friendly administration is yet to bear fruits in Africa. In view of this kind of situation one cannot but ask, what actually is wrong? As our people say in their proverbs, what is the reason for such a bad haircut on Africa our beloved continent? Is it because a professional barber cannot effect a good haircut or is it that the razor is not sharp enough?

I think the reason why the great efforts of the Clinton years could not make a dent on Africa's woes was because of poor diagnosis of Africa's problems. The genuine concern of that administration appeared to have fallen drastically short of truly apprehending the root causes of Africa's woes. The administration of the former president concentrated all of its attention in tackling what could be described as mere symptoms of the real problems of the continent. To be able to effect some real changes in Africa it is absolutely necessary to know not just what one sees as the immediate problems of the continent but what lies under those problems. The visible problems of the continent are only symptoms of deeper causes that must be addressed for real changes to be effected in the continent. It is not enough to feel the pains of Africa's tragedies. It does not suffice in any way to describe oneself or be described as Africa's friend. It takes a whole lot more to bring about real changes in modern Africa. It does not do to just to talk about Africa's woes or even to proffer some symbolic solutions to them. True greatness in the efforts to overcome Africa's woes lies in being able to proffer solutions that work. Despite his blazing the trail to turn the minds and hearts of western nations to the tragedies of Africa, former president Clinton fell short in not being able to conduct a true diagnosis of the African maladies. But to be fair to him, President Clinton seemed like a man with great ideas on how Africa could be helped out of its woes. He seemed like somebody ever willing to look at new initiatives about Africa. He and his African-American allies believed that they could help transform the current tragic face of Africa. And African leaders and peoples had great confidence in their ability to provide new ideas in the collaborative work that is needed to lift Africa from its woes. So for one fleeting moment in Africa's checkered history most of the factors that could help Africa move forward were in place. But what was still lacking for a reasonable launch forward was a good diagnosis of the problem.

Notwithstanding the lack of specific accomplishments in Africa by the administration, as Clinton prepared to leave office in January of 2001, anxiety descended on the African nations. Many Africans surveyed the field of world leadership and found no successor in sight with Clinton's empathetic charisma, knowledge and peculiar romance with Africa. Anxiety degenerated into depression for many Africans and their friends. It seemed that the little spotlight Africa had briefly enjoyed with Clinton in the White House had come to an abrupt end. There had been a tacit recognition among African leaders and peoples that our continent was in a terrible ditch and could use some helping hands of some powerful world leaders to help it pull through. When Clinton came on the scene professing what was believed to be a genuine love for Africa expectations were raised. But with him gone, a victim of the term-limited America's presidency, Africa looked good as returning to its days of amnesia in the west.

But fortunately for Africa, Clinton's bosom friend, Prime Minister Tony Blair of Great Britain, immediately stepped on to the plate in apparent efforts to continue the legacy of African recovery that had strangely been made fashionable in the west by the Clinton presidency. Following in Clinton's footsteps Blair embarked on African missions apparently to reassure the despairing people of the continent that they would no longer be forgotten by the western world. Since becoming the heir apparent of the new African mission Blair has made numerous visits to many African nations. He has several times met with many African leaders in London to brainstorm on how to address the woes of the continent. In Blair Africans began to see another budding powerful friend formed in the image and likeness of former President Clinton. So it was no surprise that in a recent meeting tagged "Progressive Summit" of the eleven center-left government leaders held at Stockholm, Sweden and spearheaded by Prime Minister Blair to address the deteriorating situation of Africa former president Clinton was tapped to "lead a mission seeking solutions to African problems ranging from AIDS to debt." And the leaders of the summit seem to be professing a new vision and commitment to Africa's recovery and integration in the world. According to them, "We commit ourselves to work together to promote economic growth, education and health and fight the development challenges in Africa, including HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria" (cf. CNN.com/world, Feb. 23, 2002).

Unquestionably this is a wonderful commitment that has hardly ever emerged from the western world since the end of colonialism. That these leaders could make this commitment to Africa currently convalescing with its worst ailment in history seems to herald a new era for the continent and the world at large. It is also wonderful that they decided to have former President Clinton lead this new endeavor for the welfare of the lagging continent. One can easily see why. Clinton is a personal friend of Africa. He is a man African leaders can listen to and confide in. But more than that, the progressive summit was his baby, which he had nurtured when he was in power. Moreover Clinton seems to be the one with the greatest emotional commitment and personal knowledge to see this effort through. He seems the only one among the so-called progressive leaders less preoccupied with the ever-engrossing home politics to afford the enormous amount of time and clout needed to carry out this task with some thoroughness. In every way it may be viewed, President Clinton is the right man for the new African recovery initiatives embarked upon by the progressive leaders of the industrialized world.

However we are afraid that unless the former president re-evaluates and refashions his understanding of Africa's woes he might end up where he had stopped when he was in office. In fact we dare to suggest to him that before he embarks on his new mission of overseeing the realization of these new African initiatives, he should do well to abandon as much as possible his former methods of treating symptoms of African woes instead of their causes. If he does not shed his former approach to the problems of Africa, he might find out at the end of the day that he had wasted both the resources of the progressive governments and his precious emotional and intellectual commitment without achieving much for the continent. Clinton's understanding of Africa's problems is heavily tainted by and tilted to his love for globalization and free market economy. Ideally speaking this makes for a great argument on behalf of developing countries. At the African Growth and Opportunity Act signing ceremony on the South Lawn of the White House on May 18, 2000, Clinton said, "Sub-Saharan Africa is home to more than 700 million people, one of our biggest potential trade partners. I say 'potential' because America exports now account for only six percent of the African market. This bill will surely change that as it expands Africa's access to our markets and improves the ability of African nations to ease poverty, increase growth and heal the problems of their people. It promotes the kinds of economic reform that will make sub-Saharan nations, on the long run, better allies, better trade partners and strong nations." On paper Clinton's globalization argument is a good one against some CEOs who may choose not to invest in some developing countries for reasons other than economics. The logic of globalization and free market argues quite strongly for the economic empowerment of the developing countries through investments and debt relief that will provide a healthy environment for businesses to flourish everywhere. But such arguments tend to have only academic values. Moreover in Africa such an argument tend to lead to the treatment of perceptible African problems rather their underlying causes.

In that signing ceremony Clinton talked about developing a "multifaceted agenda" for the developing nations that recognizes that "trade must work for all people, and that spirited competition should lift all nations." He strongly advised all interested and dedicated to tackling the woes of Africa; "we need to see the problems of Africa plainly and do our best to meet them." Earlier that year in a speech marking the opening of the National Summit on Africa in Washington on February 16, 2000, Clinton highlighted Africa's problems as "economic turmoil, disease, terrorism, poverty, inadequate education, and racial and ethnic conflicts." Former President Clinton's favorite diagnosis of Africa's problems can be catalogued thus: ethnic wars, social upheaval, democracy, debt burden, poverty, AIDS, social amenities, educational infrastructure, etc. His main vision of success in this task seems necessarily to imply finding a way to rally the industrialized nations to go after these catalogues one after the other.

However it is easy to see where the former president is coming from in this catalogue approach. In fact his approach seems scientific and honest enough. But it seems to lack a sense of Africa's history, which is interlocked with colonialism. Almost every one of these catalogues of social ills has its roots in the evils of colonialism. To treat them as if they stand individually alone as malignant evils of the African society will hardly lead to the continent's transformation. But nonetheless Clinton's concerns for Africa seem clearly genuine. While his approach seems to rise up to the test-bar he had set when he said on the occasion of the African Growth and Opportunity Act ceremony that "we need to see the problems of Africa plainly and do our best to meet them," it hardly addresses the real issues of the continent and will hardly lead to the transformation of the present Africa. African problems are deeper than what is visually accessible. Moreover Clinton's approach of going after these catalogues of problems tends to fall apart when one realizes that he has only one favorite way of dealing with them all. As well articulated by Bill Vann, Clinton seems to have only one solution to all these, "trade not aid." Clinton believes that "Africa will supposedly develop through the application of free market policies and an open door to US investments and exports" (cf. wsws.org, March 28, 1998). Clinton's approach to Africa's woes is terribly deficient on two key areas. First it is based on a wrong diagnosis of the real situation of Africa. Clinton sees only what is clearly manifested to him, namely, debt, war, AIDS, poverty, lack of democracy, etc, and his game plan is to attack them head on. But we contend that these problems though serious in themselves are not the main issues rather they are symptoms of terrible conditions that must be rectified for any meaningful progress to be made in Africa. Second, Clinton proffers a one-size-fit-all for all the problem symptoms that he sees in Africa. He prefers free trade and globalization. This may well be the solution to some of these problems but a lot has to happen for any genuine trade between say Africa and America to come on stream. There has to be a way to raise the income base of ordinary Africans. For free trade to thrive ordinary Africans have to have some incomes. If the west wants to trade with a people without any income at all, then they should be ready to revert to the primitive system of trade by barter. It may even happen that for the average Africans to participate fully in the free trade and globalization they may in fact have to barter themselves, their wives and children, in which case we would revert to where we were during the world's first attempt at free market, namely, slavery. The fact globalization and free trade will hardly work in Africa. Globalization works with people with incomes. Majority of Africans today have no basic incomes and that is the primary problem that must be addressed before talks about free trade and globalization.

For President Clinton to be successful in his new role as the leader of the Progressive African Economic Initiative there are two key areas he must focus attention. These areas, we strongly aver, are the mothers of the current woes of the continent of Africa. If he could make some inroads in these areas we believe he would have set Africa on its way to recovery.

1. "Departitioning"

From the 1400's onwards, the Europeans engaged in a mad rush to grab and partition African peoples and territories. The factor determining the placement of the different ethnic groups of Africa in their present-day modern countries were European might, greed and foreign nations' aspirations and interests. There was zero consideration to the indigenous peoples' interest or how the different ethnic groups of Africa could coalesce and live together effectively as individual nations. The determining factor was what was convenient and of socio-economic values to the colonial masters. Hence people of different historical experiences and cultures were lumped together as single nations. This mad rush and greed to appropriate the African peoples and territories were consummated in the Berlin Conference of 1885. Modern Africa of about 53 countries owes its partitioning to European arbitrary decision. For a long time through the twentieth century these arbitrary divisions appeared to have worked. The artificial bonding of the different ethnic groups seemed to work when the real issue was colonization and how to attain national independence. When colonialism was the common enemy African ethnics bonded effectively and fought the colonial masters under the banner of one African people. But immediately the battle of independence was won, the different artificial nations fostered by colonial greed started to reveal their absolute imperfections and subsequently began to unravel. Peoples and cultures that were never meant to be together by their creators woke up in the morning after their first independence celebrations to find out that they had been duped and forced by colonialism into an impossible marriage. Hence the struggles for divorce began. President Clinton and his group must realize that what they perceive in modern Africa as inter-ethnic warfare is for many people a mortal battle to procure a divorce certificate from the altar of colonial matrimony. There is a titanic war raging in almost all the countries of Africa today. The issue is; some ethnic groups have made up their minds that they can never live together with their so-called compatriots of other ethnicities. Such groups have determined that it is impossible to live together with their rival ethnic groups and no amount of fighting and conquest will deter them. This is the reality of the Africa's troubled situation. Many of the African inter-ethnic wars of today have no end in sight. They will only end with a permanent separation of the ethnic groups involved. Colonial partitioning of the African territories planted time bombs all over Africa that have now begun to explode. There is no end in sight. It smacks of a total misapprehension of the real situation of Africa to describe the raging wars of Africa as resulting from acute poverty. They are not wars of poverty per se, but wars for a second independence from domineering indigenous ethnic groups. Western nations that are labeling them as poverty wars are revealing a terrible misapprehension of the peculiar situation of the continent. These wars are considered almost as metaphysical in nature and therefore interminable. The end will come only with the dissolution of some of the impossible nation states created by colonial greed. For instance Rwanda and Burundi have revealed that they are among the impossible nation states brought about by colonialism.

It is this dire situation of Africa that makes another favorite theme of Mr. Clinton, democracy, almost anachronistic. President Clinton like most western leaders likes to bandy democracy about as bait and the cure-all mechanism for all the socio-political problems of Africa. The fact is true democracy is not yet where most Africans are at the moment. They are at a point far more basic than that. They are yet to understand and define what the present nation state means to them. When people like the progressive leaders of the west prescribe democracy as an elixir for Africa they reveal their ignorance of the issues at play in her. The most urgent issue for modern Africa is the failure of nation states as bequeathed by colonialism. The issue of nationhood in Africa must be resolved before genuine democracy can take root in the continent. Evidence now abounds that the colonial partitioning of Africa is the real cause of the crisis of the continent. It is absolutely difficult to find in any so-called nation state in modern Africa where the ethnic constituents are happy to live together. The colonial national contraptions for Africa are not working. They have woefully failed. The challenge for Clinton and his group is to convince modern African leaders who are the only beneficiaries of the current chaotic situation of Africa to convoke an African Conference patterned after the Berlin Conference of 1885 to 'departition' Africa. There must be a forum for Africans to define what they mean by nation states. Colonial definition of nation state in Africa has collapsed given rise to interminable social upheavals and wars. So there is need for a 'departitioning' of Africa by indigenous Africans. This is not as radical as it appears. What Africa needs in every country is a no-holds-bared national conference where it will be possible for people who want to opt out from the unworkable colonial nation states can freely do so while those who prefer to stay can produce their own national constitutions determining the parameters of coexistence with their ethnic neighbors. Africa is made up of about 1500 nationalities. The Clinton group should strive to create the environment where as many as the different ethnic groups of Africa that determine that they can live together as one nation can do so though workable constitutions, but those who find it impossible to live with other ethnic groups could have their way of freely forming their own nations no matter their sizes and notwithstanding whether such nations will be viable or not. When this takes place, the talk about democratization of the nations of Africa will be meaningful. To talk about real democracy in the present situation of Africa of colonial nation states will almost certainly be very hard to understand by many African ethnics. Democracy in the present context amounts to surrendering the instruments of governance as well as the common wealth to the ethnic groups with the largest number in every country or the ones that have perfected the arts of rigging elections to their favor. Democracy in Africa is in essence winner-take-all. The smaller ethnics are not easily persuaded to take this risk of abandoning their fate to "pure" democracy, which is purported to be a game of pure numbers that they can never have. They would rather plan in a long term to secure the best of the artificial nation for their ethnic homelands through cutting corners or take their chances by using the military to capture power so as to hold it ad infinitum with all sorts of excuses. Most African ethnics are very suspicious of democracy in the way it is being marketed to them by the west. Hence the ethnic group that has captured the instrument of governance must find a way to circumvent democracy in order to maintain power. To lose national political power is to lose every thing in Africa. If your ethnic group is not in power in Africa chances are very real that your ethnic group will get little or nothing of the common wealth. That is why democratic elections are a matter of life and death for many countries in Africa. No amount of preachment on democracy by the west and their leaders will be able to resolve this in the foreseeable future. Pure European democracy cannot function correctly in the present Africa. Modern Africa is structurally disabled.

2. Jobs! Jobs! Jobs!

I often chuckle with pity whenever I hear some westerners bemoan African poverty as if it were a sui generis phenomenon that has to do with their natural depravity and fate as sub-Saharan Africans lacking in industry and creativity. Also I find it very hard to understand why many westerners are not able to make the connection between the poor economic situation of Africa and the terrible social realities of the continent. Rather many people like to treat Africa as if it were the land of a different kind of human beings with certain types of inherited genetic disorders that make it impossible for them to keep pace with the civilized world. These are some of the myths Africa and Africans are facing today because the continent has fallen into a terrible disuse. But all such talks about depraved genes and a terrible fate could never have made sense, in fact could never have been thinkable less than three millennia ago when most of the civilized world was in Africa. But as a local African proverb says, when a lion suffers a fractured leg the lamb comes to him to claim an overdue debt.

However it must be said upfront that the present state of Africa has nothing to with depraved genes or fate. It has everything to do with jobs and terrible economic situations. African mass poverty is as a result of lack of jobs. There are no jobs in Africa hence a great majority of Africans have practically no incomes. We are not interested in what is generally described as per capita income for such does not make any meaning for most Africans. A great majority of Africans have no per capita incomes short and simple. It is pointless weighing their none- incomes against what obtains elsewhere. In reality they have no incomes. And that is the genesis of most social problems of Africa. Africans are largely not employed, not to talk of being gainfully employed. And that is the real issue in Africa. There are no establishments in Africa to offer people basic employment. The governments are not well organized enough to offer common people such jobs as picking up the garbage, cleaning the public places, guarding public infrastructures or running some minor errands, etc. Because there are no jobs for most Africans there are no incomes for the great majority of the people. And when there is no income there is absolutely no plan for the future, and when there is no plan for the future one can assume that there is no future for such people. When a large number of people are living their daily lives without any future in view, they are bound to become despondent and aggressive. And what follow immediately after are social upheaval, unrest and wars. In a situation of joblessness every social malady easily assumes a disproportionate prominence. In such a situation, many young people will learn all sorts of tricks to get by from day to day, some will become robbers; others, touts, con men and women, etc. A situation of joblessness breeds all sorts of problems in Africa. Also Joblessness and economic downturn in general do not support political stability. People who are economically deprived easily move almost violently in search of an alternative government. This has been proven time and again in democratic elections like those in the United States. People everywhere tend to throw out by any means possible governments that cannot weather terrible economic situations. Such is not peculiar to Africa. So the instability of political organizations in Africa is not as a result of the bad genes of Africans. It is largely due to bad economic conditions. Africans are not politically different from the rest of the world that reacts sharply against their governments in terrible economic situations.

Also the shallow world looking at African children without considering their tragic social constraints tends to think that they were born congenitally bad and dishonest. Many in the west tend to think that the terrible things happening in the African continent are as a result of the depraved nature of Africans and their morally permissive cultures. Hence, people often ask: isn't the rapid spread of AIDS in Africa caused by the peoples' congenital sexual permissiveness coupled with their immoral and oppressive cultures? But a real analysis of the situation could show that the harsh economic situation of Africa contributes immensely to what many westerners allege to be natural perversion. Terrible economic situations usually drive people into acquiring all sorts of dangerous habits some of which may reasonably be thought natural or cultural. For instance, because of acute unemployment and joblessness, many African youth tend to be idle day in day out. To occupy their vacant period many of them do indulge in sexual escapades. What results is promiscuity, which provides ferment for the transmission of sexual diseases like AIDS. This seems what is happening in many parts of Africa today. AIDS seems to be prevalent where people have no jobs or as the case may be, where people are lazy to hold on to jobs. Rather than malign their nature and culture efforts should be made to provide them jobs, teach them the usefulness and dignity of human labor.

It has been proved in many cities and nations that jobs are a great distraction and a wonderful control against preoccupation with sexual matters. For instance in the USA, when there are prolonged blizzard conditions that confine people to their homes for substantial periods of time, the population commission as well as the department of health services do estimate and expect that the birth rate in the coming nine months will be higher. And it usually turns out the way they predict it. This is because when people have no jobs and are confined to their homes without much to occupy them, they usually become sexually active, keeping busy with sexual matters and breeding children uncontrollably. It is as simple as that. The statistics for this exist in all major cities in North America and perhaps in Europe. Idleness breeds dangerous sexual behaviors. The implication of this with regard to the African situation serves as a warning to the Clinton group and those interested in solving the critical problems of Africa. Apart from the problem of "departitioning" the African ethnic groups all efforts should be focused on finding jobs for the African youth.

Many westerners like to ignorantly talk about the spread of AIDS/HIV in Africa as if it were a cultural issue. They gloat in the broad-brushing of African cultures as aiding and abetting the spread of the AIDS virus. Granted that some cultures all over the world have varied sexual codes, some loose some strict. It is absolutely irresponsible if not outright racism to label African cultures as generally sexually permissive and African peoples as sexually perverted. On the issue of sexual ethics and behavior African cultures are no different from cultures across the world. We strongly contend that the rapid spread of AIDS in Africa has a lot to do with the massive joblessness of the continent. African youths have no jobs. To distract them from engaging in casual sexual activities that may serve as enabling vehicles for the spread of AIDS they have to be given jobs. The answer to many social problems of Africa is jobs. While former President Clinton will be wisely looking for cures for those already afflicted by the HIV/AIDS virus, he should emphasize the control of the spread of the deadly disease through the provision of jobs to the African youth. Provision of jobs will control the spread of AIDS more than any moralizing or legislation. When the mind is engaged passions tend to go on vacation. This is the simple fact of life.

So as Clinton and his team embark on their mission in Africa they must find a way to convince both the home governments of the different nations of Africa to create jobs in their countries. There are so many areas to create jobs in Africa. The cleaning sector, the maintenance sector, the areas of middle-level technical manpower, the areas of security of the different facilities and installations, the areas of school management, the police force, the military, the epileptic postal sector, the telecom sectors, the local government agencies, etc., are all running at the rates of minus one million percentage points. If a government is organized or wants to organize itself, there are wonderful employment opportunities available in areas of public institutions. Organized governments in African nations coupled with good taxation systems will almost cater for the lower-level employment needs of most countries of Africa.

Also President Clinton and his team must refocus their attention in trying to get people across the world to open up small-scale industries in Africa in order to offer jobs to the African youth. President Clinton's passion of linking investments with the logic of a free market economy and globalization is terribly unconvincing. Moreover such an argument introduces with it the hiccups of determining what a global living standard can be. I do not think Africa needs such an argument that has the tendencies of denying her job opportunities. Africans just need jobs. We are not sure anybody cares whether he/she is paid an internationally acceptable living wage or not. All that the people want now is jobs! Jobs! Jobs! Give them jobs and we will talk about wages later. This seems the mantra of most Africans today. Many Africans will not care if they are paid only seventy cents a day. Anything called a wage is far better than idleness, which is causing all sorts of social problems in the present-day Africa. Moreover this serves as a very powerful argument for the Clinton team to use in the persuasion of western entrepreneurs. Africa of today is in such a state of disrepair that we are ready to take anything as wages. What we want is jobs so that families can start dreaming again and start thinking of some form of a future for themselves again. The logic of "come and invest in our land for the sake of globalization and free market economy is not going to convince anybody." Multi-national corporations do not invest in foreign countries as a matter of logic. They just do what they want to do. Rather than such a hollow argument, we would even suggest that the Clinton team argue for investments in Africa on a purely humanitarian basis. That may carry more weight than misusing the argument of globalization and free market that appear to be empty words as far as the current situation of Africa is concerned.

But first and foremost the Clinton team should convince the African communities across the world, especially the African American communities in the US to take interest in Africa and invest in her to create jobs for the youth. Days are gone when African Americans could excuse themselves because of the lack of economic muscles and capitals. A forum of African Americans recently stated that if African Americans in the US belonged to their own country, they would constitute the tenth richest nation in the world. African Americans now have considerable economic muscles even in the US. They should be encouraged to flex it in their ancestral homeland. That is what the Irish and the Jewish Americans have done. Africans across the world have considerable flexibility in the areas of investment and job creation. They should be helped to realize that it is their serious moral obligation to help pull the continent of Africa out of its present woes by giving jobs to her young ones. The Clinton group should launch a strong campaign among groups of black peoples in the west and publish regularly updated lists of who has invested what in different countries of Africa. Unless Africans in Diaspora are made to take the leadership position in saving Africa it will be foolish to expect people of other races to do so.

Finally the Clinton team should embark on aggressive efforts in the west to enable people realize how the availability of jobs in Africa could magically transform the whole social situation of the continent and improve the lifestyles of the majority of Africans. We believe that if the progressive team makes an inroad in the areas of facilitating the reconfiguration of the nation states of Africa as well as helping in job creation, they will have set Africa on the path of irreversible recovery and greatness.