We suffer the worst kind of poverty – of the mind It would not be entirely wrong to blame it on the state of the mind. A few months ago, this column ranted about it. Now it has happened again next door and every time it happens, it leaves a sour taste in the mouth. We are talking about aid inflow and the insult of it. Indeed, the Tanzanian former Minister who is quoted as having said one day, our great, great grand children may be forced to dig-up our remains in order to have our brains checked for insanity of the highest kind-stupidity!. Zambian economist, Dambisa Moyo wrote passionately against Dead Aid but I suppose African policy makers are immune to reading and research being as they are, more open to posing for pictures, like flower girls at weddings, while receiving Dead Aid supposedly for emaciated citizens, in air conditioned settings against the well known background of immeasurable wealth that Africa holds in its belly. Scene 1: The United States Embassy lines up Internal Ministry officials in Dar es Salaam for a photo opportunity and polite effusive words are said as forensic laboratory equipment are donated to the Tanzanian Government. The equipment was worthy all of Tsh40m (US$24,691). Scene 2: The United States Government this week donated US$0.7m worthy of bomb detection equipment to the Kenya Government, ostensibly to help in the war against terror. There is no irony in the fact that the Kenya Government of President Uhuru Kenyatta has no love lost with the United States and United Kingdom both long-term allies who have decided to back the International Criminal Court (ICC) in its desire to find justice for Kenyans butchered in the post-election violence of 2007/8. In total, the United States has, in the last 12 months, graciously donated $724,000 worth of security countries to the two countries most hit by terror for the last 15 years beginning with the 1998 bombing of the US embassies in both Kenya and Tanzania. This war on terror is not our war. It is not the war of East Africa on Al Caeda and its surrogates Al Shabab. It is a war on western interests played out on our turf period. And we continue to bear losses both human and other damage for no reason of our making. Western interests in our mines, fisheries, forests and human capital is insatiable. They harvest everything under the sun in our climes under all manner of dubious contracts. Those contracts are signed by our own brothers as Ministers and Permanent Secretaries who shortly after arriving in those positions show a huge change in their personal fortunes and retire as local investors in the hotel and tourism trade among others. The western companies ask for tax rebates or out rightly tax holidays if not do tax avoidance. They pay top dollar to experts who come for all manner of reason to advise us on how to dig a hole and plant cane. They are here to advise our poor governments on how to ensure our women in Gairo do not die from childbirth due to availability of nothing other than aid Panadol in our health centres. They purport to know the soil texture better than our Sokoine University of Agriculture trained experts. The amount of profit they repatriate is abominable but it is all legal, because as beggars, we can’t choose which contracts to sign and which ones to turn our backs on. If there is one thing Africa is full of, it is the poverty of the mind of our leaders and policy makers. The wellschooled, Harvard trained African policy maker plus his Minister are all guilty of poverty of thought. When indeed the time comes to account, the whip on our skeletons may help to exorcise the ghosts of our poverty of thought that gave away, for near-nothing, the bulk of the wealth of Africa with one hand, while receiving with another the pittance that our so-called benefactors hand us in the glare of smashing light bulbs. Come to think of it why is it that tax holidays, profit remittances and declarations are done away from the glare of such photo ops. Why is it that foreign experts earn up to 70% of project funds in consultancy fees? When shall East Africa, nay Africa rise up to the reality that stares us in the face? Sub-Saharan African leaders are the guiltiest. They live like kings while their citizens live like animals in the forest. Their children get treatment out in Germany, Uk and US while our Gairo mothers deliver on the pathways unless JICA or USAID has donated a few beds to the local health centre. And dare you say no because over 70% of the health budget in Tanzania is donor-dependent. But the four wheels drive Japanese automobiles or the custom made German machines shall continue to carry the splendor of our deserving leaders –at the expense of service delivery. The columnist, a Media consultant & researcher, is a regular commentator on East African issues with interests in media development in the region and can be reached on utafitinews@yahoo, twitter@motowntz. By K’oyoo Nick, Tanzania Daily News
Posted on: Sat, 19 Jul 2014 12:54:26 +0000