O. Jason OSAI urges African leaders not to allow themselves to be led into new slavery by treaties and agreements they don’t understand
The 1980 Box Office comic movie “The Gods Must Be Crazy” garnered over $200m. Meanwhile, Nixau Toma, the lead actor, was paid $300 for his role; he died a wretched poor man in 2003 at 59 years. How so? Nixau was hugely exploited at the negotiation table; he was merely told what was negotiated by his managers and he accepted gleefully. Why? He lacked the necessary knowledge, information and skills to understand what he was going into; he did not realize that he was exploited.
The experience of Nixau Toma is symbolic of the African experience in world trade and international relations over the centuries. Granted that in antiquity, King Jaja of Opobo, King Koko of Brass, Oba of Benin and monarchs of other African nation states signed treaties without understanding the language and content of the treaties, but that was in the distant past. The tragedy is that the scenario has not only persisted but has intensified in occurrence and degree to the point the East has joined the West in condemning Africa as the global source of mineral resources with no regard whatsoever as to how it affects Africans. This policy and attitudinal posture is captured in Gerald Ford’s infamous averment that “We want Africa without the Africans”.
France depends on Niger for 30% of uranium to power its people and economy 24/7 while 70% of Nigeriens live without electricity. The US has joined the fray given her strained relationship with Russia, and has doggedly protected its drone base in Niger in a facility the Nigeriens are barred from entering. Today, battle ready French soldiers routinely stop and search Ivorian motorists on the streets of Côte d’Ivoire. In Ghana, Terminal 1 at Kotoka International Airport has been farmed out to the US military. Ghanaian Customs is not stationed there; so, Ghanaian government does not know what comes in and goes out of Ghana through that terminal; even the Ghanaian president does not have access to it. Based on subsisting treaty, US soldiers enter in and out of Ghana without passport and Ghanaians are not allowed to seek legal redress if a US soldier or equipment kills them or destroys their property.
In South Africa, China has bought over vast land and established Chinese enclaves where South Africans can’t go. Unlike what obtains in the various China Towns in the West where the hosts’ law enforcement agencies are in control, the Chinese establish their own law enforcement systems and operatives in Chinese enclaves in Africa.
China has 20 police stations in South Africa to protect the Chinese and their businesses. China has four Generals in Zambian Army to protect the Chinese. The Mayor of Lusaka was once sanctioned by the Zambian President for speaking against a Chinese who refused a Zambian from entering a Chinese eatery to eat. A directive from the Zambian presidency instructed the Mayor to apologize to the Chinese.
Unlike Europe and America, China is not in Africa to colonize, install puppets as heads of state and puppeteer from a distance. No; China is in Africa to stay. Out of the desperation as a result of population explosion, China is in Africa for space
to accommodate its overflowing population. The Chinese are feverishly purchasing land and establishing farms and firms to prosper its people in a multiplicity of China Towns in Africa. They are here to occupy and take charge in a new form of colonization that borders on slavery. From all indications, China perceives Africa as a future slave colony.
Like Nixau Toma who nodded to an agreement he couldn’t read and so didn’t understand, African leaders are signing treaties written in Mandarin, a language that is alien to Africa. The Sino-Nigeria agreements and treaties reached and executed during the Buhari Administration were written in Mandarin. This emphasizes the Nixau Toma syndrome.
The questions are therefore asked: Where lies the sovereignty of Niger, Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Zambia, South Africa and other African countries that have been hoodwinked into signing agreements and treaties that farm out portions of their territory without understanding the letters, languages and spirit of the bilateral documents? Almost one-half a century after “The Gods must be crazy”, is the Nixau Toma syndrome not afoot in Africa? Are Africans whose ancestors were led in chains into slavery by the West not allowing themselves to be led into new slavery by treaties and agreements they don’t understand?
African leaders must demonstrate the capacity to lead futuristically; they must be generational thinkers who must be conscious of the fact that Africa is not a bequeathal from our ancestors but an estate they are holding in trust for future generations. Is Africa not under a curse that ensures leadership by idiots?
In “Redemption Song”, Bob Marley urged thus: “Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery; none but ourselves can free our minds”. Africans and their leaders must heed Marley’s call, which emphasizes the fact that the process of emancipation is the responsibility of the ones under the stranglehold of slavery, either physical or mental. Let me reiterate an earlier averment thus: “You can break the chains from the wrists and ankles of a slave but it is only the slave that can break the chains of his mental slavery”.
Globalization has shrunk planet earth into a global village and the information highway of the Internet has made it possible and easy for the slightest ripples on the banks of Cape Coast, Ghana at the eastern shores of the Atlantic Ocean to be felt instantaneously at the beaches of Rio Janeiro, Brazil at the western banks of the Atlantic. Today, a yodel in San Francisco is instantaneously heard loud and clear Downtown London.
African leaders must brace up and lead responsibly in a world that has degenerated to the Hobbesian state of nature.
Prof Osai writes from Rivers State University of Science and Technology, Port Harcourt
