Ukweli unakera kwanini waafrika hatuendelei kamwe....

tujebway · 2014-04-17T14:31:06+00:00

They call the Third World the lazy mans purview; the sluggishly slothful and languorous prefecture. In this realm people are sleepy, dreamy, torpid, lethargic, and therefore indigenttotally penniless, needy, destitute, poverty-stricken, disfavored, and impoverished. In this demesne, as they call it, there are hardly any discoveries, inventions, and innovations. Africa is the trailblazer. Some still call it the dark continent for the light that flickers under the tunnel is not that of hope, but an approaching train. And because countless keep waiting in the way of the train, millions die and many more remain decapitated by the day. Its amazing how you all sit there and watch yourselves die, the man next to me said. Get up and do something about it. Brawny, fully bald-headed, with intense, steely eyes, he was as cold as they come. When I first discovered I was going to spend my New Years Eve next to him on a non-stop JetBlue flight from Los Angeles to Boston I was angst-ridden. I associate marble-shaven Caucasians with iconoclastic skin-heads, most of who are racist. My name is Walter, he extended his hand as soon as I settled in my seat. I told him mine with a precautious smile. Where are you from? he asked. Zambia. Zambia! he exclaimed, Kaundas country. Yes, I said, Now Satas. But of course, he responded. You just elected King Cobra as your president. My face lit up at the mention of Satas moniker. Walter smiled, and in those cold eyes I saw an amenable fellow, one of those American highbrows who shuttle between Africa and the U.S. I spent three years in Zambia in the 1980s, he continued. I wined and dined with Luke Mwananshiku, Willa Mungomba, Dr. Siteke Mwale, and many other highly intelligent Zambians. He lowered his voice. I was part of the IMF group that came to rip you guys off. He smirked. Your government put me in a million dollar mansion overlooking a shanty called Kalingalinga. From my patio I saw it allthe rich and the poor, the ailing, the dead, and the healthy. Are you still with the IMF? I asked. I have since moved to yet another group with similar intentions. In the next few months my colleagues and I will be in Lusaka to hypnotize the cobra. I work for the broker that has acquired a chunk of your debt. Your government owes not the World Bank, but us millions of dollars. Well be in Lusaka to offer your president a couple of millions and fly back with a check twenty times greater. No, you wont, I said. King Cobra is incorruptible. He is He was laughing. Says who? Give me an African president, just one, who has not fallen for the carrot and stick. Quett Masires name popped up. Oh, him, well, we never got to him because he turned down the IMF and the World Bank. It was perhaps the smartest thing for him to do. At midnight we were airborne. The captain wished us a happy 2012 and urged us to watch the fireworks across Los Angeles. Isnt that beautiful, Walter said looking down. From my middle seat, I took a glance and nodded admirably. Thats white mans country, he said. We came here on Mayflower and turned Indian land into a paradise and now the most powerful nation on earth. We discovered the bulb, and built this aircraft to fly us to pleasure resorts like Lake Zambia. I grinned. There is no Lake Zambia. He curled his lips into a smug smile. Thats what we call your country. You guys are as stagnant as the water in the lake. We come in with our large boats and fish your minerals and your wildlife and leave morselscrumbs. Thats your staple food, crumbs. That corn-meal you eat, thats crumbs, the small Tilapia fish you call Kapenta is crumbs. We the Bwanas (whites) take the cat fish. I am the Bwana and you are the Muntu. I get what I want and you get what you deserve, crumbs. Thats what lazy people getZambians, Africans, the entire Third World. The smile vanished from my face. I see you are getting pissed off, Walter said and lowered his voice. You are thinking this Bwana is a racist. Thats how most Zambians respond when I tell them the truth. They go ballistic. Okay. Lets for a moment put our skin pigmentations, this black and white ----, aside. Tell me, my friend, what is the difference between you and me? Theres no difference. Absolutely none, he exclaimed. Scientists in the Human Genome Project have proved that. It took them thirteen years to determine the complete sequence of the three billion DNA subunits. After they were all done it was clear that 99.9% nucleotide bases were exactly the same in you and me. We are the same people. All white, Asian, Latino, and black people on this aircraft are the same. I gladly nodded. And yet I feel superior, he smiled fatalistically. Every white person on this plane feels superior to a black person. The white guy who picks up garbage, the homeless white trash on drugs, feels superior to you no matter his status or education. I can pick up a nincompoop from the New York streets, clean him up, and take him to Lusaka and you all be crowding around him chanting muzungu, muzungu and yet hes a riffraff. Tell me why my angry friend. For a moment I was wordless. Please dont blame it on slavery like the African Americans do, or colonialism, or some psychological impact or some kind of stigmatization. And dont give me the brainwash poppycock. Give me a better answer. I was thinking. He continued. Excuse what I am about to say. Please do not take offense. I felt a slap of blood rush to my head and prepared for the worst. You my friend flying with me and all your kind are lazy, he said. When you rest your head on the pillow you dont dream big. You and other so-called African intellectuals are damn lazy, each one of you. It is you, and not those poor starving people, who is the reason Africa is in such a deplorable state. Thats not a nice thing to say, I protested. He was implacable. Oh yes it is and I will say it again, you are lazy. Poor and uneducated Africans are the most hardworking people on earth. I saw them in the Lusaka markets and on the street selling merchandise. I saw them in villages toiling away. I saw women on Kafue Road crushing stones for sell and I wept. I said to myself where are the Zambian intellectuals? Are the Zambian engineers so imperceptive they cannot invent a simple stone crusher, or a simple water filter to purify well water for those poor villagers? Are you telling me that after thirty-seven years of independence your university school of engineering has not produced a scientist or an engineer who can make simple small machines for mass use? What is the school there for? I held my breath. Do you know where I found your intellectuals? They were in bars quaffing. They were at the Lusaka Golf Club, Lusaka Central Club, Lusaka Playhouse, and Lusaka Flying Club. I saw with my own eyes a bunch of alcoholic graduates. Zambian intellectuals work from eight to five and spend the evening drinking. We dont. We reserve the evening for brainstorming. He looked me in the eye. Opinion:You Lazy (Intellectual) African Scum! If you consider yourself smart, please read this | iHarare

Thread starter tujebway
Start date Apr 17, 2014

tujebway

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Ukweli unakera kwanini waafrika hatuendelei kamwe....

tujebway

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