On Obama's message to Africans that they "stop blaming colonialism" for their "problems":
Because he has African blood, we were afraid to tell him that it takes more than a couple of brief visits to Africa to understand the continent. We agreed with him that, “Yes, a colonial map that made little sense helped to breed conflict.” But we failed to explain to him that many of the Africans who bring up colonialism do not do so to blame the West. That we have never denied that in Africa corruption exists in endemic proportions; that we mention colonialism for the sake of practicality; that we want the West to understand that a continent brutalized and looted for centuries cannot turn around in 50 years.
We want the United States to look at where it was 50 years after its independence. Were the African slaves free? Could women vote? Had the civil war even happened? Wasn’t corruption rampant in the new, free nation?
But rather than ask this son of Africa to look at history, we let him spit the same Western rhetoric that implies that any African who utters the word “colonialism” wants Africa to wait 200 years for a strong “democratic commitment.” Because Obama is of our blood, we let him continue to push the same flawed, condescending idea that every African is in dire need of water, food and medicine. “And that's why," he said, "my administration has committed $63 billion to meet these challenges.”
We cheered when we heard Obama say that America “will put more resources in the hands of those who need it,” even though we know that most of that aid will end up in the hands of our not-so-democratically-committed African-born sons. We applauded when Obama said, “Wealthy nations must open our doors to goods and services from Africa in a meaningful way,” although it’s no secret that even if the entire world opened its market to Africa, most of us would have nothing to sell.
Ironically, Obama's African blood has made us too blind to see that the heart that pumps it through his veins is American.
For the full article, click here
And a report on Obama's visit to Ghana here.
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1 comment:
thanks for the news, charm! good juxtaposition between the articles too ;-)
my mom, though admitting to not following any political news in the US (= illiterate of obama's policies), shakes her head along with me, "obama - just a pretty face". she adds, "i thought because of his background he'd sympathize with colored people, with poor people"... more head shakes. I asked her what he did or said that was revealing to her. she said she read only one or two speeches, and doesnt remember them exactly; she only remembers being disappointed, being bored by the same (american) rhetoric. it's true, the american heart is more transparent through one's words than through one's blood.
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