I am in essential agreement with Ejike Okpa's  abbreviated framing of the solution, starting with his thesis that "the solution lies with us too" in

African Development Bank: Predator? but only so far. I would go further by saying that the solution rests squarely with us, and with nobody else. By us, I mean the African elite and people.

Between 1960 and 1975, it may have been the norm to situate our underdevelopment within the context of Afrisecalist [after Chinweizu, Molefi Asante and Abu Barry] and/or Rodnean [after Walter Rodney] responses to Colonialism and Neo-Colonialism, or to the Neo-Marxian responses of the Center-Periphery Analysis School espoused/exemplified by Samir Amin, Andre Gunder Frank, et al.

Within the kernel of these responses were the notions adumbrated of racial and civilizational conflicts, with the implicit situational and circumstantial conspiracies fashioned by the West to either keep the African savages in their place (in order to facilitate the plunder of their estates) or where direct domination was no longer expedient or prudent in a post-colonial era, to manipulate the emergent, unsophisticated leadership of the new Africa to do the bidding of the West, both in economic and geo-political terms through such institutions as the United Nations,the Commonwealth, the various Bretton Woods Institutions, and regional institutions such as the ADB/ADF. 

Unfortunately, whilst these responses had strong relevance, in today's age of globalization, any responses that imply an inexorable progression from Colonialism, through Neo-Colonialism to barely disguised Economic Terrorism by the West is simply out of touch, and probably a form of escapism.

These latter-day conspiracy theories are plain hogwash! The fact we, Africans of today, elite and followers alike, have abdicated our responsibilities to ourselves, especially in the political context, and still succumb to the seductive pull of the hold-them-down-so-we-can-prosper-at-their-expense theorists smacks of barely concealed ignorance, nay, moral impishness! To understand and properly context our predicament, it is important to understand that, ab initio, the UN system and the Bretton Woods institutions were not set up to our advantage or to develop us: to expect anything to the contrary is self-delusional.

I do not know whether Ejike Okpa is a banker, though his choice and framing of the problematic would support such a conclusion, but he appears to subscribe to the notion that capitalism, especially the international banking institutions that are at its core, are imbued with altruistic and beneficent remits, the cardinal one of  which is to develop us. 

Space and time will not permit me to frame a complete response to the many issues raised in Okpa's exposition, but a few points will suffice to enable a reformulation of the problematic, realistically. Firstly, our future is in our own hands; we can only make progress, collectively as  a people, if we desire it strongly enough, and are prepared to embark on a journey of self-understanding - a study of our history as Africans and why we are still poor and underdeveloped. Secondly, we must be prepared to make the necessary sacrifices, in blood, sweat and tears, to wrestle our political and economic destiny from a misguided and hare-brained elite that is clueless as to the basic requirements for survival in a competitive, globalized world.

Finally, whilst looking inwards to find our moorings - morally, philosophically or otherwise, we must also look outwards - the Tokugawa Shoguns of Japan and the Meiji Restoration a few centuries ago, and the modern-day example of China starting under Deng Xiao Ping - are ready exemplars of the oft-quoted, but oft-betrayed exhortation to us from Frantz Fanon that "every generation must, out of relative obscurity, define its mission, fulfill it, or betray it."

At a later date, I hope we may collectively inquire into some of the questions begged by the afore-going, and maybe contribute towards an understanding of how a Communist China has become the powerhouse of the Capitalist World, the financier of the West, rather than a borrower and a beggar. I suspect that the answer may lie in their history, their culture, and the conscious choices they have made as a people in articulating a developmental trajectory for themselves: they made a political bargain within to use the methods of the West to beat the West at its own game! This was possible because they have an effective, articulate and enlightened elite in charge of their affairs!

By Ezinwa Chinedu Ibekwe.