Hegemon Class Anguished Families As Foreign Currencies Fluctuate
Who can afford foreign currency no matter what the cost is at the black market? The hegemon leaders can go to the Bureau Du Change market and convert their surplus local currencies to dollars for laundering. When caught overseas, they abandon millions and run home. The recent fluctuations up and down against the dollar demonstrates that the leaders know how to enforce existing laws, tighten loopholes and regulations. But if you have surplus local currency stored in the graveyard, cabinets and storage bins, you can wait until law and regulations enforcers relax, then upload again at the Bureau du Change.
Until the Government mop up excess local currencies buried in volts, burial ground, file cabinets, fridges and other unproductive places like garages and warehouses, local money will be falling up and down like a yoyo with detrimental effect on the vast majority. Unfortunately, it is these poor majority of Africans without access to American dollars or Euros that suffer the consequences. The rich are indifferent and use local currencies for aggrandizement like a monopoly game at any time they want.
The village it takes to raise a child is disappearing fast. By the time the leaders of the privileged hegemon take their lion share from allocations, little is left for the most vulnerable women and children. African minorities combined in each country, are more than each single majority ethnic hegemon. But usually the ethnic hegemony leaders and their cronies have turned away from the African adage of “we are our brothers’ keeper” into every man for himself. This unprecedented selfishness could explain extreme riches of a very few Africans.
There is a trend where the majority in many countries dominate each minority. We have seen how cultures based on democratic principles change when they do not have the majority of voters in so called "civilized” countries. The consequences of a minority class ruling over the majority, even if not strictly on ethnic lines can lead to resentment as witnessed in Rwanda and Sudan. We are also aware of cases in African countries where the privileged class, like the Fulani minority of West Africa, dominate the Hausa.
When most Africans rallied against Colonial rule, they fought for Independence as fundamental Human Rights. Under the leadership of Herbert Macauiey in Nigeria and Kwame Nkrumah in Ghana, they were united to drive the British out. While there were reservations about how and when, Africans from East to South Africa were determined to liberate themselves from the claws of exploitative rule over their natural resources and talents. Ironically, Africans are helpless against their own enemies within.
Each region in Nigeria contributed and were able to trade, rule and feed themselves. The Oil discovery and the income in foreign currencies changed that. Oil sales were nationalized and its foreign income became a commonwealth. The rationale for being a patriotic Nigerian changed to what individuals can loot from Nigeria. It was no longer what they can do for Nigeria but what the Government can do for them. Personal demands from the Government increased exponentially to the point that politicians and their appointed cronies can loot recklessly from the treasury in broad daylight.
Indeed, most Nigerians believe that but for the sudden foreign income from Oil, there would not have been a Civil War! Each side that went to war wanted the Oil under its domain and full control. It was unfortunate for the Minority Group in whose land most of the oil existed. Both Nigeria and Biafra in the War refused to grant them Independence. Those in the Oil rich areas suffer not only from the destruction of their livelihoods but from the consequences of environmental degradation by multinational corporations oil spills
Throughout the existence of the people before and after Independence of Africa, minorities from the North and the South bear the grunt of violence and economic Injustice. The irony in the North is the domineering power of minority Fulani through religion over majority Hausa in Nigeria replaced that of the British. Fulani influential power pervades other minorities in the North disguised as One North and Hausa/Fulani slogans. The power of the Fulani also pervades the South, though not as overwhelming. The political machine was bestowed on the Fulani by the British out of common interests of both Fulani and the British.
The British wilful choice is the difference between other African countries and Nigeria where the Fulani minority is only 9%. Compared with the Guinea/Conakry of about 38 percentage of Fulani in their population, 30% in Mauritania, 22% in Senegal, 17% in Guinea-Bissau, 16% in Mali and Gambia, 12% in Cameroon, 6.3% in Burkina Faso, 5% in Sierra Leone.
The mischievous advantageous relationships of the British in Nigeria of choosing rulers among ethnic groups was also demonstrated in Ilorin, a Yoruba enclave. Ilorin had been divided within the Yoruba ruling houses and captured by Fulani. Eventually, the Yoruba regained the Obaship ruling house and drove out the Fulani Emir by burning his palace and driving Fulani descendants out of town.
However, after the British domination, they spitefully invited the Fulani on their retreat, back as the ruling house to entrench their influence. The same way the British and French did throughout Africa. The Yoruba rejected British compromise, the Fulani accepted and was brought back into the ruling house as Emir to reward them.
It explains why there is no loyalty to a conquered territory. The desperate greed and voracious tendencies to loot legally by jumbo salaries and to commandeer any allocation by reducing projects into mere shadows of acceptable minimal standards, became the norm for all leaders, no matter their ethnic group. It has turned the countries into animal farms. The amount of money withdrawn from the Central Bank with impunity by those in charge of check and balance, spell the doom day. Even some looters wonder how their country withstood all the assaults on the Treasury.
Farouk Martins Aresa @omoaresa1