Africa: The Solution!

Published on 4th September 2012

In personal performance training, the coach tells the participants that personal goals are only met when the goal is clearly defined, and then all resources mobilized to meet the goal. The coach then tells the participant a very important lesson: “…the goal must be bigger than the participant, big enough to lift me up my butts when I drag; big enough to pull me up when I fall; big enough to prop me when I am worn out.”

Africa’s solution must be a big goal, not small goals like middle income country; or semi-industrialised country. Africa must target first world status. Africans must believe that free and compulsory education is a heritage and inheritance of mankind. Africans must believe that healthcare is possible. Africans must have big goals. The solution of Africa is to have goals, big goals, goals which will make all of us wake up a little early, work a little harder; and go to sleep a little late. Therein lies our solution.

In warfare, the efficiency of the missile is dependant on locking the target. Indeed, a pilot worth the investment in his training must not release the bomb until the target is locked. The target, when locked, will guarantee that the destruction is guaranteed. However, the pilot knows it is as useless to lock an undesirable target, as it is not to lock before releasing the missile. If the African leader wants his people to live like human beings, then he must identify the desirable target, and lock it. This identification should be based on desired destruction needed, and in our case, on the desired level of development desired by Africa. We do not need budgets that are 24% funded by foreigners, like Uganda’s. We do not need drugs that are 70% manufactured by foreigners, like Malawi’s. We do not need militaries that buy 70% of equipment from foreign countries, like Kenya’s. We need a target of self independent and autonomous institutions, engaging in partnerships, not donor-donee relations. The African leader must state that the target is water for all; education for all; security for all; health care for all; and yes, dignity for all. Then we can lock the target, and go for the kill. Therein lies our solution.

In writing and publications, the author knows that he writes for both money and mind. He writes to sell and make money; and he writes to express and feel accomplished. However, the money becomes relevant only when acquired within a specific time line; and does the feeling of accomplishment. Everything in life is time relevant, and time is of essence. This is why projects are started with a finish line of time. This is why we train for a given period of time. This is why we go to war with timelines. This is why we date with a timeline for marriage.

Everything has a timeline, and so does Africa’s solution. We must start with a clear timeline, a clear time by which we will be there; a time by which we will have medicare, education, security, social justice, and dignity. The African leader must state when he is going to make African roads be human roads. When he will make African hospitals friendly to the pregnant woman. When he will make our classrooms friendly to intellectual development and creativity harnessing. When he will make the security forces proactive, and not reactive. Then he will rally all of us to support his dream, and we will, because there will be something in it for us. Therein lies our solution.

In strategic planning, we are told the strategy is the what, where, how, when and to whom. The new leader of Africa wants to clearly, like Garvey, state what he wants to do for Africans, how he will do it, where he will do it, when he will do it, and who will benefit from the act. But he must not only state what he wants to do, rather, he must state it, and make it Big. Donald Trump reminds any one who sets on the thinking activity to do it big, or not to. The what must be big. We do not need 30 universities since independence; we need 100 universities, way above our student’s requirements, so we can invite others to study with us. We do not need one referral hospital per province; we need referral hospitals per population. We do not need 1000 more doctors, or 1000 more policemen, or 1000 more teachers; we  need more teachers than we need, so that we can ‘export’ the excess abroad, and earn twice from our investment in training them; skills, and foreign exchange. We do not need roads to high productive areas; we need roads to all areas, after all, Ghadafi was right when he was abused for the highway in the desert to Benghazi, ‘development follows infrastructure.’ We do not service delivery to be tied to availability of funds, and threatened by increasing populations; we need a clear relationship between population growth rates, the future required services, and the specific actions that must be done today to address the future problems.We need to plan, and we need to plan strategically. This will win the cooperation of the African, and give the leader room to be confident that the plans will be realised. We will be proud to be black, without inferiority complexes. Therein lies our solution.

We learn from psychology that our actions are informed by our emotional states, where voluntary, or involuntary.  We are emotional, and we act emotionally, then justify rationally. The African leader must make us emotionally ready to act. But acting emotionally is not enough; we have enough weak emotions to dampen the warmest of rooms. We must have passion. Hot passion. We must believe we deserve what we seek, as Africans, simply because we are human beings. We deserve food security. We deserve to own the market leading companies, in our stock exchanges. We deserve to go to better schools. We deserve to give birth without fearing to die from preventable ‘cheap’ deaths, like lack of personnel or drugs. We deserve to have many universities, many institutes, and many schools, with recommended teacher to learner ratios, for participation in the process. When the African leader identifies this and gives the ‘how,’ ‘where,’ ‘when’, and to ‘whom,’ we will become a continent of human beings, and not sub-human beings. Therein lies our solution.

By Ojijo Pascal
The author [email protected] is a writer, public speaker, and consultant.


This article has been read 1,603 times
COMMENTS