A Changing World for Africa, in Africa. Globally

By Takura Zhangazha*

Global politics is seriously changing.  And this is not a rumour.  There are many shifting allegiances and also changing cultural perceptions of what is considered universally correct. 

 This is not only due to internationalized conflicts such as the Russia- Ukraine conflict or Israel’s genocide in Palestine nor the civil war in Sudan. Or the other one in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

It is also because of a mistaken general assumption that “everything will be alright.” 
But if you have a general idea of international relations and its history you can easily tell that no, everything is not alright. 

Since the Cold War sort of ended, remember that one between the global east and west where we used to watch Rambo movies as a cultural reflection of the same? And with the Russians or Middle East comrades always either being the bad guys or the vanquished in the end? 

It is not necessarily as binary as it was before but we are getting there at what is now being re-framed as a new multipolar world.  So it not so much the East versus the West as of old but a mixture of a global reconfiguring of state-based- nationalist and economic strategic interests.  

All underpinned by fluid themes such as controlling immigration, climate change, ease of doing business, entrepreneurship and technology as it relates to what we have now been told is a ‘youthful demographic dividend’. 

At least from our African Global South perspective.  We almost have to look at young Africans in a commodified format for what are regarded as ‘markets’.  Except that these so called markets are largely consumerist, global north oriented neoliberalist perception of what should be preferred capitalist reality. 

Our African leaders have taken to this global perspective like ducks to water.  Very few, if any, contemporary African governments have what would be considered progressive Pan African economic, let alone political policies.  They tend to go with the global wind.  And hide  behind the Deng Xiaoping dictum of “No matter the cat is black or white, so long it catches mice”. 

And they also use the Singaporean and also Chinese model of what we now know to be state capitalism as a justification for many undemocratic political practices.  In this, they build mafia and oligarchic like political frameworks in which they have revolving doors between business, political and military leaders.  With the sometimes overt or tacit approval of capitalists in the global north. 

The key catch however is that Africa is almost still unfully explored for its mineral wealth.  Particularly in the contemporary as it relates to either renewable and non-renewable energy.   It is seen in the global north stock markets as almost a laissez frère for investment in mining, banking (money laundering), tourism and transport outsourcing (build operate transfer ‘BOT’).   

Essentially we, as Africans, are cannon fodder for emerging global markets.  And our governments are not willing to argue back.  Not least because our leaders are either pre-ordained by the same same controllers of global capitalism but also in relation to their own personal material interests. 

They also do not have any qualms about their policy approaches because they also know that ideologically we have entered a new phase of a lack of Pan African consciousness. Particularly with those that would vote for them, young or old.  In their pragmatism or at least their understanding of who those that they lead are, they probably know that it’s materialism (money), individualism and lifestyle opportunities that matter.  Hence African cultural celebrities or previously progressive NGO’s are always coopted into cultural and development programmes that limit a critical Pan African consciousness. 

On social media, some cdes were joking about the recent South-Korea Africa summit. Specifically they were laughing about how one country can summon a whole continent to its shores for a meeting about its own interest.  This is not a new thing.  In fact it’s a trend that fits the narrative of Africa being desperate enough to be an open sesame for what are considered ‘new markets. 

Almost as of colonial old where adverts were flouted in print media exhorting, for example, the British to come to the then Rhodesia.  Except that we are now doing it ourselves.

But as Amilcar Cabral writes, ‘No matter how hot your water, it will not boil your rice’, we, as Africans, are required to be pragmatic.  A ‘pragmatics’ that understands global dynamics, our struggle and organic history as it relates to the present and how we must move forward to a progressive future. 

In this we have to recall our most progressive African heroes and the ideological lessons they taught us.  Without the internet. Without social media. And I will end with just one, Julius Nyerere of Tanzania, Africa, when he said, almost as an affront to assumptions of equitable universalism, “Democracy is not like Coca Cola.  It cannot be exported everywhere.” 

The reality is that as Africans we need to be conscious of our own inferiority complexes and our penchant for mimicry of the global north culture/lifestyles, economics and politics.  I am off to re-read Steve Biko and Robert Sobukwe. 
*Takura Zhangazha writes here in his personal capacity (takura-zhangazha.blogspot.com)