From: sunny@me.cs.wm.edu (John S. Egbo)
Subject: Neo-Colonialism and Africans
Organization: College of William & Mary, founded 1693
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 1993 23:49:58 GMT

                   Neo-Colonialism and Africans


A quote from E. D. Morel's book "The Black Man's Burden" about the
slave days:

     "The trade had grown so large that mere kidnapping raids
     conducted by white men in the immediate neighbourhood of the
     coast-line were quite insufficient to meet its requirements...
     ... Tribe was bribed to fight tribe, community to raid
     community.  To every native chief, as to every one of his 
     subjects, was held out the prospect of gain at the expense of
     his neighbour.  Tribal feuds and individual hatred were alike
     intesified, and while wide stretches of countryside were 
     systematically ravaged by organised bands of raiders armed
     with muskets, 'hunting down victims for the English trader
     whose blasting influence, like some malignant providence
     extended over mighty regions where the face of the white man
     was never seen', the trade put within the reach of the
     individual the means of satisfying a personal grudge and of
     ministering to a private vengeance."

Today, this has a new twist in the name of Western Foreign Policy and
often comes in three flavors.

  1. Support dictactorships in Africa and elsewhere.  Provide military
     assistance as long as the dictator is doing the Western interest
     thing; when he decides to do what is in his country's interest,
     withdraw support, call him a dictator, and provide support to his
     enemy (of course western trained).  Use the press both foreign and
     local for propaganda.

  2. Supply arms and insurgence in any African country that shows
     any progress in being self-subsistent.  Supply arms to both sides
     for them to kill each other off or close to it.  Find ways to destroy 
     agriculture and their ability to feed themselves.  Use food as a
     weapon to get them in line.  If there is an overriding interest
     (e.g. minerals to be exploited) move in and "help".  Raise another
     western educated fool to kill off intellectuals that know what's
     going on; catch him in the act and hang him.  Take whatever you
     want out of the country.  Use option 1 above.  Show pictures to
     Africans in diaspora how better off they are.

  3. For multi-national corporations.  Give a million (dollars, pounds,
     lira etc) to an African fool.  He will in time buy friends in 
     high places (of course option 1 is ideal).  He will gain social and
     political status; he will even be made a chief by someone.  In turn
     he will make connections that will award your company lots of
     contracts worth billions of dollars.  You deliver nothing (except for
     your one million investment) and you walk away with billions and
     anything you want from the country.  Use options 1 and 2.

This is what is confusing many Africans my friends.  Many African
intellectuals have bought a lot of the craps we learned in social science
classes that they cannot tell their ass from their head.  I am getting
tired of typing.

-Sunny