Are they brainwashed to embrace all these issues?
There is the arguable truth that any form of distortion in the natural growth of man or the evolution of a society may result in damage that lasts a lifetime for the individual or society. This is certainly true and evident in African political and economic development. While it is arguable that all African nations have since attained self-rule and retained the sovereignty of their respective countries, the minds of most Africans are still caged in the materialistic strategy of colonialism (exchanging salt, guns, etc. for human slaves). The same exchange policy of the colonialists is now being deployed by African leaders under a neo-colonial system.
It is simple: weaponise poverty so much that people’s minds become comfortable remaining in the cage of exchanging present crumbs for the future promise of economic empowerment. Divide the people with wealth and privileges so much that the ambition of the poor becomes to perpetually live at the mercy of the rich. Keep the system of political and economic power as the exclusive preserve of a few. A typical bourgeois and peasant French system before the bloody revolution.
What is more, enslave the minds of the people so much that seeking a better life is no longer a goal to desire. Rather, fighting amongst themselves over the leftovers of their political leaders becomes their life’s achievement. For instance, it is only in Africa that Africans are treated as aliens despite the presence of the African Union. The citizens of the 27 member states of the European Union and its affiliated countries are allies to one another. On the contrary, Africans are treated as immigrants on the African continent, just as they are in Europe, America, and even Asia.
While Americans and citizens of some European countries are free to ingress and egress as they wish in Africa, it is appalling to see black Africans chasing other black Africans away from an African country. The depressing irony is that those same black Africans have never thought of chasing away their former white colonists because the crumbs fall from their tables.
Nigeria is another sad story of the bourgeois few depressing and oppressing the majority poor, while the poor would rather die protecting their oppressors than support any form of political or economic emancipation. When the voice of one freedom fighter becomes unbearable to the few privileged political classes, they throw some of the crumbs to a few of the poor to raise even louder antagonistic voices.
The few hungry opportunists, privileged to mingle with politicians, suddenly take up activism as a trade. Make noise for the politicians and make money. Feeding on the pain of the majority poor becomes the popular profession of the jobless, who are clueless about the subject of the agitation. There is no direction to the noise made over insecurity and poverty, only a desire to become popular for political recognition and personal gain.
The use of charlatans without any ideology, opportunists employed to disrupt the lone voice of agitation for better governance, free and fair elections, and economic welfare benefits from the common wealth, has now become a viable tool of oppression. While some of the poor pretend to be fighting against the oppression of the poor and become rich themselves, the majority of the poor enjoy the crumbs from their oppressors so much that they even fight anyone who challenges those oppressors.
This is the reality in South Africa, Nigeria, and many other African nations. They would rather fight fellow black Africans than fight their former colonists, simply to continue having access to the crumbs provided for them. No doubt, the African mind is still enslaved by the colonial system of materialism and remains far from any form of true emancipation.
