Foreign Policy - Africa

This article explains that African governments is an impediment to wealth creation in Africa.  It also explains that the sources of wealth for any country are:

1. Hard Work
2. Innovation
3. Natural Resources

Africa is rich with natural resources.  Therefore, we believe that the governments in certain African countries should be replaced by UN formed governments to remove the corruption and incompetence in order to help their people.

This is, of course, easier said than done.  Replacing a government can be a bloody event as seen in Iraq.  Some have argued that Africans should be governed by Africans and would not like their government to be composed of non-Africans.  We agree that this is not an ideal situation, however, many Africans already do not like their governments. Their governments are oppressing them and keeping them in poverty.

As explained here, Chad, Equitorial New Guinea and Sudan are rich with oil, but the corrupt governments keep their people in poverty.  Some governments are killing them and causing genocide, such as the Sudanese government.  Should the Sudanese government be replaced for humanitarian reasons?  We do not advocate any violent policies, but we do believe that the Sudanese government should be replaced.

[Added Aug 2011:]

Greece is suffering from a severe debt crisis, as it has borrowed too much and earned too little.  Its economy is shrinking and the country is becoming poorer.  One of the options that Europe is looking at to solve this problem, is for Greece to sell some of its assets.

According to this article:

"German public figures called Greeks cheaters, and German magazines ran headlines like why don't you sell your islands, you bankrupt greeks? , ordinary Greeks took it as an outrageous insult.  In June of this year the Greek government started selling islands or at any rate created a fire-sale list of a thousand properties—golf courses, beaches, airports, farmlands, roads—that they hoped to sell, to help repay their debts."

Excluding the Sahara desert, Africa has approximately twice as much real estate as the U.S.  Many African countries have not only have ample real estate, they also have more natural resources than other countries around the world.  Just one small African country such as Somalia or Ethiopia has more land and natural resources than Japan.  South Korea and Taiwan have even less land and natural resources than Japan.

The rest of the world has poured aid into Africa for multiple decades, only for Africa to continue needing aid.  If replacing governments in Africa is not an option, another option is for African countries to sell their assets in return for aid.  North Americans pay thousands of dollars each winter to sit on a warm beach in Mexico or a Caribbean island.  It's likely that North Americans would be more than willing to give money to Africa in return for ownership in some of their stunning tropical beaches or real estate.

Foreign Policy - Africa

The West has poured billions of dollars of aid over the past several decades into Africa, to no avail.

For most countries, there are only 3 sources of wealth:

1. Hard Work
2. Innovation
3. Natural Resources

Japan has no Natural Resources, but is wealthy because of #1 and #2. Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and United Arab Emirates are wealthy because of #3, even though they have almost no innovation or hard work (#1 or #2).

Africa is rich with Natural Resources, far more than Europe, Japan, America, Australia or even Canada.

Oil companies pay billions to Nigeria for its abundant oil, yet they still have rampant poverty.
Ethiopia has more geography, natural resources and arable land and has less population than Japan, and yet it was one of the poorest countries in the world. After the removal of Apartheid and the white government in South Africa, the economy has deteriorated and crime has skyrocketed to 350 violent assaults per day in Johannesburg alone.

Equatorial Guinea is wealthy with oil. Oil companies have paid hundreds of millions to its government. However, the government is corrupt and has not passed that wealth to the people. Instead, the President’s son lives in France with $500 million, drives a Lamborghini, buys thousand dollar suits and enjoys the life of a playboy.

According to CBC News, Chad is another African country that is rich in oil. CBC said:

The World Bank lent Chad money in 2003 to export oil. Since then, they have sold $1 Billion in oil. Despite this, they still have severe poverty. Chad is one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Most of the money is kept by the ruling clan in the government.

In the past 50 years, the West has poured aid into Africa, and yet the number of needy and poor have exploded, not decreased. We believe that continuing with this current strategy will create even more needy and poor in the future. Not only has this solution not worked, it's immoral and unethical to keep making the corrupt African governments richer and to create more poor and needy. It is also wrong to continue to waste Western taxpayers' money.

It's one thing to be wasting your own money and time. It's another thing to be wasting other people's money with a strategy that doesn't work. This is what multiple people, including Bono, do when they urge countries to provide aid to Africa. We believe that it is almost criminal to be wasting other peoples' hard-earned money.

There is a strong correlation between how successful a country is and how competent and corrupt the government is. The more incompetent and corrupt the government, the poorer the country will be. There's already ample incompetence and corruption with Western country governments. It is highly unlikely that African governments are any less incompetent or corrupt than Western governments. In fact, they are reported on the news to be extremely more corrupt and incompetent. This is corroborated by this video on ted.com.

Human Beings are easily capable of murder, torture and genocide. This seems to happen incessantly. Corruption, stealing and fraud is child's play.

In summary, pouring more money into Africa will simply go down the drain.

We believe that most of the aid never gets to the people due to corrupt, incompetent governments and warring factions. If anything, the money goes into the pockets of the leaders, who then move to the West, such as the French Riviera, to live the high-life with our millions of dollars.

Read our proposed solution.