The Dishonourables 3]

By 

Sam Abbd Israel

The leadership practice in contemporary Africa, as in every country under the new global order of unregulated market economy and globalisation of free trade, is now defined in terms of monetary success. Money now delineates the sole criterion for determining the eligibility of persons for political leadership positions. The global economic ethics based on the slogan, ‘greed is good’ that started with Reaganomics and Thatcherites in the 1980s have supplanted every other ethics of human relationships. It is an acknowledged fact that under modern democratic practices the support a candidate enjoys is often directly proportional to the size of the purse or wealth under the control of the candidate. In every nation of the world the richest men are also becoming the best men for political office and leadership role. Jeremy Hardy a columnist for The Guardian Newspaper of Britain put this across clearly in his analysis of what he saw as a sign of lack of moral principle in the New Labour Party of Britain. Hardy says, "in New Labour’s scale of values, an achiever is a person successfully driven to attain wealth and power above all else; and such people are clearly suited to running everything."

The history of contemporary African leaders is a relatively new development. In fact we can time the beginning of this history to the 1960s when the agitators for political independence collected the illustrious prize of independence from imperial Europe. The class of 1960s and the military vandals that came shortly after them have since gorged themselves senseless with stolen money from their respective state treasuries. Perhaps, in their warped mentality, this is the price their fellow nationals ought to pay them for taken up the fight against colonialism. As a result of their banditry, Africa can now boast of wealthy millionaires but without any supporting evidence of the means or source of procurement of the wealth. These African millionaires cannot point to any production outfit through which their wealth was created. As it were one can only hazard some guesses: maybe these millionaires harvested their money from money trees planted in their back gardens or maybe Father Christmas deposited the loot through the chimney. However, without much ado about the obvious, every intelligent African knows where the mammoth wealth of these vagabonds came from.

The consequences of the unearned wealth in the possession of African so-called leaders have done irreparable damage to every value hitherto held sacrosanct in Africa. The value of hard work, the ethics that abhors stealing – in fact the pre-colonial Yorubas in West Africa prefer to serve as slaves to pay off debts than to steal - the principle of equality of persons, the decency in moderation and several other moral values were jettisoned by the new crop of political leaders imposed on Africa. Since the advent of the Arabs and Europeans in Africa, the group of Africans that emerged as leaders are indeed the undesirables of Africa. These special breeds of Africans have proved beyond any shadow of doubt that they are truly the dishonourable kind of Africans. There is no iota of nobility in the whole lot of them.

However, it is important to mention that a very few men like late Julius Nyerere of Tanzania could be counted as notable exemptions. He was one of the significant few that demonstrated a contrary proposition that it is possible for a society to have a leader and still failed to progress. The theme of the essay is that Africa lacked leaders and that is why Africa is in despair. But here was Julius Nyerere, a truthful and selfless leader who sacrificed all he had for his people and yet Tanzania is not really different from all the others. He led Tanzania by example of simplicity that chose to live a life of noble moderation and that bravely refused to worship at the altar of mammon, yet Tanzania has nothing to show for his exemplary life.

President Nyerere’s vision for Tanzania died on the drawing board because his lieutenants allowed themselves to be compromised by imperialist lies. In short they sold their lives to the devil while they pretended to be going along with Nyerere on his ujamaa ("familyhood") crusade. Tanzania is therefore a classic case of a country in Africa that had a leader but lacked followers. The digression on Tanzania is necessary to demonstrate the other side of the coin that leadership needs followership too before it can be effective as a catalyst for change and progress. It is no good putting the blame of Africa’s woes on lack of leadership without understanding that leadership without articulate and well-informed followers can never produce a fruitful result.

Travelling around Africa today during political party elections will testify to the assertion that money has debased every moral and ethical code in Africa. The role of moneymen and women as they swing the votes through money power that deliberately play monkey games on the ignorance and poverty of fellow nationals cannot but shame the enlightened. With money playing a dominant but pernicious role in the political affairs of the continent, ideas, ideals, principles, honours, beliefs, convictions, ethics, morals etc. are all sacrificed at the bazaar of mammon. Take away these virtues in the life of any people; any society; any nation; or any race what will remain is a shell of soulless beings. Aristotle once said, the difference found between beast and man is the result of the positive impact of education or philosophy. Therefore without education, without a formulated logic on the purpose and the meaning of life, man is not different from beast or even worse than beast. "For man when perfected is the best of all animals, but, when separated from law and justice, he is the worst of all."

The saints and the redeemed souls of Africa cannot help but shed tears of shame for Africa. They can see Africans as they swim in their vomits like pigs in dirty puddle, yet the majority of Africans are unable to see the state of their pathetic wretchedness. It is like one of the songs that Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, a popular Afro musician, once sang about Nigerians in Suffering and Smiling. He noted that even though Nigerians are suffering untold hardships in the hands of their prodigal leaders yet they kept on smiling. Some enemies of Africa called this trait African resilience but it is nothing of that kind; it is simply African foolishness and depravity. Despite the unacceptable state of Africa, the African dishonourable leaders still glorify in ignorance and seem unperturbed by the low level of life around them. They have no time to fathom out what on earth is wrong with Africa? Greed and gluttony seem to have blindfolded these misleaders of Africa and have stifled their mental capacity for both rational thinking and logical reasoning.

Nigeria is a classic case study of a country where ignorance and gluttony have been crowned as diarchy or dual kings. This country have natural riches and wealth in abundance but due to mental laziness, the nationals have allowed swindlers and con artists of all shades and characters to deprive them of the benefit of this good fortune. Yet, some of the nationals who participated in the rape and pillage of this country as spineless, brainless middlemen haven’t got any clue and therefore have no shame about what happened and what is still happening. They can still be seen presenting and introducing themselves as leaders of the ‘Federal Republic of Nigeria’ in international forum.

It is understandable why most enlightened Africans who have closely followed the story of this nation often feel ashamed as Africans when the case of Nigeria is presented for discussion. They would ask themselves in umpteenth times, how could these prodigal sons and daughters of Africa from Nigeria be lacking in shame? How could they have the gut in any international forum to be seeking leadership role or opportunities? What example have they got to show and to convince the world that they are capable managers of resources when their national resources and wealth were recklessly wasted? It beats the imagination of all and sundry how any Nigerian so-called leader can still stand tall and proud when all the human calamities of that nation are put together. A host of nations with serious leaders of vision have lamented their ill luck and could not resist wondering what would have happened to their country, if only they were able to lay their hands on one-tenth of the resources of Nigeria.

However, Nigeria is not different to other nations in Africa, her case is only significant because of the volume of resources and wealth at the disposal of that country. Every other nation in Africa has exhibited similar profligate tendencies even with the meagre resources at the disposal of these countries. What amazed observers of Africa is the careless callous manner the so-called leaders of Africa have treated and abandoned the affairs of their people. The impression of palpable lack of feeling and love shown by the elite of Africa for their own kind is a serious indictment. It is a testimony of an endemic paucity of spiritual enlightenment and development. This is the most incontrovertible evidence that demonstrated the fall of Africans from a position of spiritual grace to a level below the animal forms. The result of the spiritual fall is the overwhelming physical calamity visible all over the land of Africa in the 21^st century.

Can you remember what Beull said about the African clerks and traditional rulers who were employed by the colonial government to do their dirty jobs? I will repeat it again. Beull says, "In many of these cases, the educated natives showed that they had lost all sympathy for the group out of which they came and that they had no compunction in abusing their power for personal ends." Can you remember how the authentic indigenous leaders were dethroned and sidelined since the coming of the Arabs and Europeans? Can you remember the kind of people and the type of characters the Arabs and Europeans attracted to their religious cults and ‘civilized societies’? Can you remember the weaklings of Africa that the imperialists favoured and elevated over and above better Africans and who they later imposed on Africans as leaders. Can you remember the personality types – the uneducated or half-educated – that the departing imperial powers preferred and schemed into office to take over the rein of government after independence? Can you remember the types drafted into the Colonial Territorial Armed Forces and later parachuted into officer cadres to man the military institutions of the new independent countries – the Idi Amins of Uganda, the Bokkasas of Central African Republic, the Mobutus of Congo etc.? Can you remember how these thugs with the prodding and connivance of the agents of imperial powers later succeeded in taken control of the independent countries from the equally ignorant politicians that failed to perform to the ‘standard’ expected of them by their puppeteers?

If all these factors are put into consideration, why should Africans expect the seeds of these wretched evil vines to produce anything but sour fruits? This writer will like to challenge all protagonists of contemporary leadership practice in Africa to present one honourable or noble person among the lots occupying or jostling for leadership positions in Africa. It is the contention of this writer that no honourable person can be found participating in politics or practising in business under the prevailing evil climate in Africa today. The seeds of ignorance, hatred, and callousness and of divide and rule planted by the imperialists have germinated and their roots have now deepened to a dangerous level. The sporadic, catastrophic and volcanic rumbling from the seeds of hate sown amongst Africans are almost at the edge of eruption to tear a host of countries apart. It was bad enough that different nations were unnaturally forced and bounded together under one flag but to play one ethnic group against another for the sole purpose of ensuring a perpetual imperial domination of other people without given a thought or concern for the happiness and well being of the people was cruel, immoral and a complete mockery of life and civilization. That the nationals of these divided countries cannot, up till now, fathom out this ingenuous evil machinations in order to understand the genesis of the problem tearing their poor countries apart beggars believe among the enlightened souls.

Democracy is a political ideal and practice invented by Ancient Greeks to regulate the leadership practices of their city-nations. It was designed, among many other things, to limit the role of wealth in the decision-making processes of the City-states. In its original form, it was not a particularly perfect practice since it denied right of citizenship to slaves and women. However, the lofty universal principles it engendered have received lots of tinkering here and there ever since across the globe. Each country and each seeker of truth that takes interest in democracy has attempted to improve on the basic principle of equality of persons in a society; on the full right of a citizen to participate in the affairs of the state to which he/she belongs; on the need to device a justifiable strategy for decision-making in society; and on the best approach for delegating political power and safeguarding the abuse of power by people delegated to handle the social, economic and political affairs of the people when the geographical spread of the state is too large to support direct participation of every citizen.

Despite the fact that all democracies are geared towards the practice of the afore-mentioned principles, there are as many variants of democracy as there are nations in the world. It is a known fact among students of politics that monarchical parliamentary democracy is not the same as federated republican democracy. And neither is socialist democracy the same as communist democracy. Yet, each of these systems of democracy maintains it is the ideal and the best form of democratic practice. At this moment in the history of the world, every enlightened African needs to critically review the thrust of the sanctimonious powers of the world as they push, shuffle and blackmail Africa into embracing one particular form of democratic principles, reforms and practices.

The questions that all enlightened Africans should be asking are, which of the democratic practices is suitable for Africa? Doesn’t the type of democracy in practice in a nation a reflection of the nature, history and culture of the people concerned? Isn’t it true that there is a history behind the monarchical parliamentary democracy of Britain? Isn’t it also true that both the federated republican democracy of the United States of America and the pluralistic republican democracy of the Swiss have pertinent history behind them? If so, then why should Africa not allow its nature, its culture and its history to determine the types of democracy to be adopted in each household, in each community, in each region, in each state and in each nation?

Looking at several stable democracies, it is apparent that the ideal a nation wishes to achieve will definitely determine the kind of democratic practice a people will adopt. For example, if equality of persons is an ideal a nation decides to pursue and safeguard, the parliamentary democracy of Britain will definitely not be a suitable choice for this aspiration. British democratic practice does not hide its abhorrence for the principle of equality of persons. British culture is a rigid, hierarchical and non-mixing class system where the sovereignty of the state resides solely in the reigning King or Queen. The British Monarch owns all and sundry – both the land and the people on it belong to the crown and the noblemen. The state is run like a sophisticated secret Mafiosi, where every crucial decision of government is made in secret and the nationals are carefully kept in the dark at all times. Neither does the British parliament hide its disgust for the principle that ordinary subjects of the crown have sufficient commonsense to participate in the political affairs of Britain apart from casting the vote when those who know best about such cerebral matters call for election.

In comparison but totally different in conception and practice is the democratic constitution in a republic. Essentially, the republican constitution and democracy takes for granted the principle of equality of citizens in every respect and facet of the word. Even though this is the conceptual frame of the republican constitution, the contradiction arose with its design of a representative democracy that tends to accord almost a monarchical status to political leaders. Under republican constitution, leadership ought to be an anathema because it is totally at variance with the concept of equality of persons. Every citizen ought to have the right and the opportunity to offer himself or herself for election in order to serve. Service and not leadership ought to be the cardinal goal of every elected representative. However, when representatives are elected under the platform of leadership or ruler-ship in an election, then it becomes imperative that the business of people's representatives will not be to serve but wholly to rule.

This innocuous value that seems to accept the essential role of elected representatives in the American democratic constitution as leaders inadvertently destroys equality. As a result and in practice full accountability of tenure could not be expected of these leaders since only servants can be mandated to give account of stewardships. Leadership connotes supremacy or superiority and it will be degrading under the present principle of political leadership in United States for elected representative of the people to give full account of their stewardship to their subjects. They may, if they wish and this could only be at the pleasure of the leaders to give a perfunctory account of their stewardship but the electorate cannot compel them to do so. This is a fundamental flaw in the doctrine of anti-classical democracy that tends to support the inescapable role of political leadership in democracy.

The root of this leadership attitude in the American democracy has been traced to the historical link with Britain when there was the need to protect the inherited status quo of the traditional monarchical colonial parliamentary government. Under the monarchy, the Kings, the governor-generals and the prime ministers occupied positions of personal leadership and responsibility that almost in the past tended to assume a divine authority. This traditional position wittingly throws out all ethical considerations of equality of persons, which is a primary requirement of republicanism. In spite of the desire of the founding fathers of United States of America to do away with monarchy in their lives yet the vestiges of monarchy still run deep and wide through all the sophisticated democratic practices of United States of America.

On the other hand there is the Swiss democracy as a different example of a republican constitution. Since 1830 Switzerland has been essentially pluralistic – a system that allows different ethnic, tribes, groups etc. to preserve their own customs and to hold equal power within the same society/nation. This is particularly evident in its strict abhorrence and "hostility to all purely personal power". According to Wolf Linder, "the Swiss were not unaware of the aristocratic and oligarchic democratic regimes around them but they wisely cling to their own popular ideals of pluralism". Today the Swiss democratic principle of pluralism is manifested openly from the cantonal legislatures to the Council of State where for example, "chairmen of councils do not as a rule hold office for more than one year at a time and are not immediately re-eligible as chairmen." As a result, the type of larger than life aura bestowed on the American Presidents is practically non-existence in Switzerland.

African countries have played dice with several borrowed versions of democratic practice and they have had their fingers burnt. There is nothing wrong with any version of the practice except that to lose sight of the history behind the practice and the evolutionary process that informed its design is to curry avoidable disaster for the borrower. Therefore, is it not high time African intelligentsia accepted democratic principle as not a principle written in stone but as an ideal that is open to reviews and corrections as circumstances dictate? Hence for Africans to expect that one variant of democratic practice can be borrowed wholesale and transferred from one culture to another is a practical demonstration of the ape-like mentality. This writer will like to invite all thinkers in Africa to begin afresh on a course of seminal reflections and actions that can unravel the history of the lost cultures of Africa in order to ascertain the type of democratic practice that shall be relevant to Africa. The culture of a people holds the key to their beliefs and their understanding of the meaning of life. And unless a democratic practice flows from these beliefs and understanding, it can never fulfil the physical and spiritual needs of the people concerned.

The history of Africa since the period of colonisation shows that the culture of Africans has been bastardised; and the meaning of life as Africans knew them has been perverted and ridiculed by the foreign conquerors. As it were and after a long association with these conquering forces, Africans are neither here nor there. The belief systems in practice are artificial and they hold no meaning to the psyche of Africans. The Africans that embraced these foreign faiths did so as a means to an end. It was a way to social elevation and social acceptance into the ‘civilized societies’ of their conquerors. It is high time every living African woke up to this reality of a spiritual vacuum in Africa before we are buried alive for good.

This writer is beckoning and requesting all Africans to wake up today to face the reality of our losses. We are a castaway people - castaway from our natural habitats - left adrift on the sea of life. We must be prepared to navigate together the chaotic and turbulent sea of life in order to find our own native shore. The shores of life are infinite; Africans no longer need to relegate themselves to an alien shore. We do not need to remain a lodger anymore on foreign shores. Let us stand up in faith to seek and to search until we rediscover and regain our natural shores of life where we can build new and truthful edifices that will befit our understanding of the meaning of life. We must reject and we must shatter the alien ‘law-tables’ currently in use. The principle of might is right is an alien philosophy of snobs.

Let the creative thinkers or visionaries or sages or the wise men and women of Africa begin today the gruelling task of articulation, of formulation, of compilation of basic ideas, of offering earth shattering propositions, and of propounding unimaginable theories and unthinkable ideologies on which the design of African political institutions shall be erected. Every enlightened African ought to have realised by now that every value currently in use – in philosophies, in religions, in education, in economics, in politics, and in societies – is a perversion of the truth of life and reality. The type of values defined by enemies of humanity as achievement, success and happiness are nothing but pure illusions. These decadent values pushed out and sustained by the army of elite psychopaths of our world are not supposed to bring satisfaction or happiness to mankind. But the values are created to set mankind on permanent edge that is perpetually positioned in a state of insatiable desires and forever wanting more of the fix of the fiction of life like a drug junkie.

History is used in this discourse mainly as a guide to signpost the point of the fall of Africans from spiritual grace and as a tool for intellectual exploration and analysis on the reasons for the fall. This writer is not an historian and I will advise history experts to put their professional swords back in the sheaths. Please forgive my errors, in case, if in the course of the analyses I broke all the rules in the rulebook of history. I will like to confess I am an ordinary user of history and will never knowingly abuse history. History should attract the attention of any seeker eager to understand the origin and nature of mankind. The very beginning of mankind may still remain in obscurity but there are ample materials since records began to give a seeker enough information from which to draw relevant conclusions for his/her own use as each of us navigate the many pitfalls in the journey of life.

This writer has been guided by what Sam Keen said about history in the book, Fire in the Belly when he writes, "History offers us the chance to take responsibility and change what we previously considered our fate." My primary concern is about how best to draw out the essential lessons that history is supposed to teach so as to help readers and seekers of truth to come to a better understanding of the nature of the problems facing Africa. I am also concerned about the quickest method by which to remove the blindfold that the sin of ignorance and forgetfulness had placed over the eyes of Africans all these years. But more importantly, the effort of this work is to bring to the remembrance of all Africans the gory essentials of Africa’s past and to help each other to draw out and pick up the pertinent lesson we needed to learn from this shameful history. As Santayana once said and quoted above, unless we can remember the past, we run the risk of repeating the same mistake again and of missing the opportunity to make any progress.

However, if the hypothesis of this essay holds true then we can conclude that the class of humanity across the globe that are holding and occupying leadership status of our world are indeed the depraved of the human race - the scoundrels, the low lifers and the bloodthirsty miserable species. Now we are being told "an achiever is a person successfully driven to attain wealth and power above all else; and such people are clearly suited to running everything." But could that be true? How can the possession of a special aptitude for material accumulation of money and property be the sole yardstick for the measurement of success and achievement? Does the human ability to create great wealth synonymous with human excellence or great virtues? It is necessary now to answer some of the questions we raised in the opening paragraphs. What is leadership and who is a leader?

Leadership in the ‘civilized’ or make-believe world is about power; how power is or can be captured; and how it is or can be used or abused by an individual within a commune or society. It is about the legitimacy of power: the question of who has the right to exercise power in a community. This is the bedrock of all conflicts in every society and the terrain of political scientists and politicians. Leadership is squarely at the centre of political life and it has been with mankind since the burst of consciousness occurred. The desire to own and to exercise raw power is one of the instinctive natural tendencies of the unenlightened mankind living in darkness. Niccollo Machiavelli and other protagonists of power are keen to argue that the possession of power by an individual - prince or king-to-be - will ultimately enhance safety of life and provide innumerable life choices and life chances to the power holder. They even argue that it is in the interest of peace and progress for a society to have a strong person or a tyrant to hold the rein of political power as the absolute ruler, notwithstanding the manner by which the power was acquired.

However, the history of the world does not support this fictitious assertion. We know that when the ambitious people captured power after using any of the callous and despicable strategies recommended by Niccollo Machiavelli and others, to keep the power under their belt often entails another more serious dastardly protective measures and vigilance. This is to be expected, since an adage says he who kills by the sword does not allow anyone to carry a sword behind him. There are always similar ambitious people like the current holder of power who would not resist the temptation to seize power at the slightest opportunity. The unnecessary turbulence that accompanies a power holder before and after capturing power is not a situation that any sensible human being should consciously desires. But it is obvious as day and night that only the senseless and the psychopath will hunger and thirst after power. It is like the case of a chicken that jumps on a thin line-rope, the continuous pendulum-like swinging of the thin rope can never give peace of mind to the chicken as it ceaselessly tries to keep and maintain its balance. This is the life of all power holders of our world.

Now modern political and economic practices demand ruthless competition as a necessary condition for attaining leadership positions or for selecting, electing and appointing political and economic leaders. Through this conventionally acknowledged and supposedly justifiable competitive processes, legitimacy is handed to all those who emerged as victors and they therefore have absolute rights to occupy the elevated political or economic thrones of their societies. The society in which they emerged as winners automatically adjudged them as the super-qualified persons to enjoy kingly privileges over and above all their contemporaries. The society would also find them worthy to exercise the constitutional rights as private or public office holders to wield absolute power over law and order; and to exercise absolute control on public policies, public finance and policy implementations.

As occupiers of the economic and political thrones of their countries and coupled with their innate self-centred traits, these so-called leaders would pragmatically institute lacklustre checks and balances to deter abuse of power held by themselves or held on their behalf; they would commandeer important political and economic offices for themselves and their own flesh and blood; and they would offer to themselves juicy incentives and over the top salaries. For example, these hoodlums turned kings and queens would gladly encourage debate on a minimum wage but will keep a treacherous and deadly silence on the moral or ethical need to set a ceiling on a maximum wage in the polity.

The group of people that emerged as the winners in the competitive processes are called the elites or leaders of the society. A leader by the elitist theory is supposed to be the best and under this neo-Liberal belief, only the best are judged to have the right to rule. However, it is the definition of what/who is best or the criterion for identification of what/who is best that often leads to problem. How do you measure what is best in another human being? Is it the physical endowment – beauty, brain or brawn? Is it the moral endowment – virtues, excellence, a civilised taste, the love of justice, or an impeccable character? Is it the possession of a blueblood – born into nobility, royalty or wealth? Is it personal material achievement that is based on the most crooked skill of accumulation of fortune, property, money, etc.? From these leading questions it is becoming obvious that the ‘best’ will have as many interpretations as the number of people defining the concept of what is best.

Judging by the state of Africa today, it is glaring that the eminent personalities grazing the political and economic landscape of Africa are definitely not the best materials of Africa. The relevant evidences of gross incompetence, senselessness, stupidity and utter ignorance amongst the so-called leaders of Africa are shockingly disheartening. A cross-sectional survey of the social and political institutions in Africa left nothing much to be desired when critical attention is focused on the group of scallywags who are claiming the leadership positions in these institutions. Although, the military thugs or prodigal sons and the politicians or political gangsters have convincingly demonstrated that no other class of elites in Africa have the right to contest the supreme leadership crown of the Dishonourables of Africa, yet, they are less worried about the irreparable consequences of their disastrous partnership. Even when the unorthodox diarchy of power relations between these two groups has successfully ruined the social values, mores and culture of Africans and has forestalled any hope of economic prosperity in Africa in the foreseeable future, yet they are not bothered.

However, since the military thugs and the political gangsters are bereft of commonsense, they are yet to see either the human carnage they have perpetrated or the economic damage they have caused to Africa. So it is very difficult at this stage to expect repentance and restitution from these lots for all the losses they have caused Africa. These two sets of clowns are still very cocksure of their inalienable rights till eternity comes to continue with their pauperisation programme of Africa. But this is where they are wrong because they lacked knowledge of the divine timetable of programmes set up from the foundations of the world for the spiritual intervention on behalf of Africa. This writer will advise all the enlightened souls to leave the buffoons of Africa alone. Let them be since the spirit of truth shall soon put them to shame at the time appointed.

We must not lose sight of the roles of other African leaders in the other sectors of the economy. How have these other African leaders performed in Education, in the Press, in other various professional bodies – law, accountancy, banking, insurance, finance, business, commerce, industry, manufacturing, architecture, construction, engineering, medicine, civil service, etc.? What type of contributions can be associated with these other categories of African elites that have helped in the development or underdevelopment of Africa? Perhaps, these illustrious elites of Africa will pretend that they were unaware of the evil practices going on all around them, under their noses and with their signatures. These elites might also claim that these shameful political events and calculated economic sabotage that have wrecked and ruined Africa were totally outside their official and intellectual jurisdiction. Therefore, the recorded foolishness was totally beyond their erudite interventions. However, the truth of the matter is, our professionals and scholars were terribly short-changed in the course of their training and education.

It has been amply demonstrated that the Colonial Administration deliberately exposed these erudite men and women of Africa to a seriously watered down form of education. Consequently, they have been exhibiting the classic case of those who passed through school but whom school never passed through. This is why they have all the phoney pretensions of the men and women of letters or of scholarship but in all honesty, they are shams. These African educated elites have not been recreated by knowledge. They are the unbaked, the uncooked, the half-baked, or the half-cooked and popularly called the half-educated. Every enlightened soul can easily see the shallowness of the pretences of the African educated illiterates. Their superfluous claims to education are hollow for it is a lie and they know it too. And this is the singular reason why these Africans have failed to yield the bountiful fruits of knowledge, excellence, virtues and creativity that were expected of them. It is a simple law of nature that whatever you sow is what you will harvest and bountifully too. It is a fact that the colonial lords sowed seeds of ignorance all over Africa and the continent has since got a bountiful harvest of dunces and ignoramuses.

Am I being rude? Not really but I am sincerely full of moral outrage at this particular revealed insight into the woes of Africa. I am very unhappy that our elders and my contemporaries have failed to discover this moral truth about the situation of Africa all along. May be they did but were too frightened of losing their privileged positions in the society if they raised the issue as an agenda item. There is nothing to say at this stage than to advise all Africans to strive, through the cultivation of proper knowledge, to put this ignominious history behind them. We must, after a true rebirth in knowledge, carefully begin the task of uprooting the seeds, the creepers, and the shrubs of lies and the cutting down of the trees of ignorance disguised as education that were planted in Africa.

Furthermore, this writer will like to invite all the sons and daughters of Africa who have seen the light of enlightenment to begin today the articulation of fresh ideas on how best to prepare the people for the great sowing and planting of the seed of truth and knowledge in Africa. This writer will like to assure any doubting Thomas that our successes in planting the true seed of knowledge, in painstakingly watering it and in carefully watching over it as it grows on the soil of Africa shall definitely yield the bountiful fruits of true knowledge.

It is the fruit of true knowledge that has the power to sharpen the senses, to awaken the mind, and to quicken the rebirth of the soul. The predictable signs that will manifest in the life of every African when the seeds of true knowledge have taken root in Africa are, an unprecedented outburst of creativity in all spheres of human endeavour; the unquenchable desire for political, economic and social freedom; the sacred respect for all creations based on a divine understanding of the principle of equality; and a desire for political harmony that is rooted on the principle of ‘loving one’s neighbours as oneself’.

As an excited farmer would feel when he has just taken delivery of a proven high-yielding seeds and could not wait to see the seeds planted in his carefully prepared farmland, this writer is also feeling the same way. Every enlightened African should be eager to plant the seed of true knowledge in every field of Africa because we are confident it is a highly recommended proven seed with a natural capacity to produce bountiful harvests in tens, hundreds, thousands and millions. This is our mission and our farms are the newly rebuilt, spiritually modified, divinely cleansed and exceptionally fertile hearts of African men and women.