Chasing black unicorns by Marek Zmysłowski

Author:Marek Zmysłowski [Marek Zmysłowski]
Language: pol
Format: epub
Publisher: Agora
Published: 2019-10-22T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 11

JAGUARS AND LEOPARDS

I recently watched a certain French feature report on TV about Nigeria. It was sad and moving. And it ended with the thesis that we Europeans, a real civilization, must do even more to help these poor unfortunate, malnourished people, who no-one invests in and are generally ‘dirt poor’, to take care of their future.

What a crock of shit. People driven by ideology completely fail to notice how they contradict themselves. On the one hand, “Africa is wonderful and doesn’t need the white man” and a second later they say “Hey, let’s collect money for Africa, they need our help”. Africa has become more a subject of academic than practical solutions. Everyone wants to talk about it, but most don’t have much to say.

One of the most popular media myths is that a supposed ban on receiving international aid written into the constitution of Botswana is the reason why one of the poorest countries of sub-Saharan Africa has become one of the richest.

I’ve read this many times and corrected it as many times. But I have to bring it up once again, as it’s a real scandal that people learn history and geography from memes (in fact, I’ve read the constitution of Botswana from cover to cover; and there isn’t a single word about any ban on taking money from anyone. If anyone doesn’t believe me, go ahead and read it. Botwana’s constitution is available on the net).

In actual fact, in its history Botswana has received the most international aid per capita of all African countries, perhaps the most of any country in history. The initial years of its independence were financed by Britain. Later, big money came in from the USA, Germany and Scandinavian countries.

Why then did Botswana, over the space of 60 years, go from being one of the poorest countries in the world to one of the richest in this part of the world? In my opinion, mainly because it had the good fortune to have honest presidents. In contrast to the many subsequent ‘presidents’ of Nigeria. Even though honesty is less often a result of happiness and more often one of culture.

There are two similarities between Botswana and Nigeria. Firstly, both were ravaged by the British. Secondly, in the middle of the last century, both were found to have enormous natural resources – oil in Nigeria, diamonds in Botswana. Insofar as Seretse Khama, the president of Botswana, who served for 14 years, used this wealth to reform the country, subsequent presidents of Nigeria, of whom there were five in the same period, mainly concentrated on reforming the contents of their own pockets and those of their supporters. And those who came after them were no better. While Botswana battled with corruption, racism and social problems until these were brought down almost to zero, Nigeria simply did the opposite.

The result of all this is that Gaborone, the capital of Botswana, is a fairly modern city, built in a near-Western style, where people live well

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