http://accra-mail.com/index.php?view=article&catid=80%3Amainnews&id=39278%3Awe-and-our-leaders-i-am-referring-to-africa-african-leaders-&tmpl=component&print=1&layout=default&page=&option=com_content&Itemid=209

We and our “Leaders” I am referring to Africa: African leaders.

Alhaji Abdul-Rahman Harruna Attah

Let me pose this question: If Ghana’s first president, Dr. Kwame
Nkrumah had not declared Ghana a one-party state and vested ALL
political power in his person and his political party, would he have
been overthrown?

I am aware of all the CIA connections, the bomb throwers, and all the
development projects…

I was just wondering aloud, knowing it is not quite kosher to think
such thoughts about the greatest African who ever lived. It is the
plight of Libya that has forced me into such heresy.

My heart goes to the Libyan people who I believe, like all of us,
deserve not to be bombed by their own government or outside powers,
but here we are, they are being pummeled from all sides and parts of
this once prosperous nation are now being described as a “humanitarian
disaster”.

The leader, Colonel Muammar Al Qathafi (there are other spellings)
whose people love him – he said so on a BBC television interview – has
been in charge for over four decades and was in fact readying to pass
on the dynasty to his son (sorry King Idris) when his loving people,
or at least some of them rose up to say enough is enough and the
leader lost his cool.

Why they cannot keep their cool is something I find so hard to
comprehend. Here in Ghana in 1995 or thereabouts, street
demonstrations (Kume Preko) led to the deaths of four individuals
because the leader at the time and his handlers could not keep their
cool.

Since then demonstrations in Ghana have become commonplace to the
extent that in one of them, a sitting president was even called an
armed robber. Remember “Kufuor nie, Ata Ayi nie”? Thank God he kept
his cool…

Let’s contemplate some of these other leaders: Abacha, Iddi Amin,
Bokassa, Nguema, Mobutu, Doe, and others like them who have since
found repose, hopefully, in their final resting places, but what of
the current leading ones?

How much leadership are they giving us? What could trigger them
sniping at us and eventually lead to outsiders to bomb us in
retaliation?

No matter what justification Laurent Gbagbo may have had in trying to
hold on to power, did it not occur to him, when the blood started
flowing, that his tenacity may after all not be that beneficial to his
people – the people he loved so much?

And poor Charles Taylor, now holed up in a prison cell somewhere at
The Hague. He has protested his capture and says he is innocent.

And what could have happened for Kabila the elder to be dispatched the
way they did to him? Well, at least he got his dynasty well under way
and Kabila the younger is now lord of the manor in the DRC…

…And let’s not forget that just next door to the east the Eyadema
dynasty is flourishing – to achieve that, tiny Togo had to go through
a period of mayhem and insecurity.

And our northern neighbor Blaise, since he saw off Thomas Sankara in
such a bloody fashion, Mr. Compaore is also holding on tight.

Lately, it has not been that rosy for him. Was it not during his
tenure that Harry Zongo, the journalist was done in?

Venerable old Maitre Abdulai Wade. I ‘m sure they were trying to give
him a bad name when rumour went round that he was also preparing the
ground for his son to take over the Senegalese throne…But as the
saying goes, “There’s no smoke without fire”.

Just a few more examples: General Ibrahim Babangida. He supervised an
election costing the Nigerian taxpayer hundreds of millions of
dollars.

After the results were declared and the late Chief Abiola was in the
lead, the General simply annulled the entire election and departed
into quiet and enjoyable retirement leaving Africa’s most populated
country to handle whatever the mess his action had created...He
remains a kingmaker in Nigerian politics…

In Gambia, we have another – Yayah Jammeh. The product of a coup
d’etat, he is now acting so strangely that some people think he is not
quite well.

He claims to have the cure for HIV/AIDS and journalists have become
such an endangered species under him. They are yet to find the
murderers of my good friend Deyda Heydara.

And ah! Let us not forget what Mr. Moi Kibaki did to Kenya. When it
was clear that he was losing an election to Raila Odinga, he
fast-forwarded things and before anyone could blink an eyelid, he had
“won” the elections.

That action left around 1000 people or more dead and became the
subject of an international inquiry led by former UN Secretary General
Kofi Annan.

Kenya has not been the same since. I am not by that absolving his
predecessor, Arap Moi, who is another matter altogether…

In Somalia, look at what the leadership of Siad Baare, Mohammed Farah
Aideed and others has wrought – a completely failed state.

Uganda has “strong man” Museveni stomping all over brooking no
“nonsense” from anyone, least of all from the “opposition”.

Recalling the happenings in North Africa and other Arab countries, he
said famously on a BBC programme that in Uganda “we will lock up”
anyone who tries to demonstrate against his government.

Before he died, Lansana Conte had declared himself President for Life
in Guinea and took his country to the brink as a result.

The likes of Hissen Habra are still swaying between freedom and a
human rights court; Omar Bashir has actually been indicted already.

In Cameroon they have an octogenarian, I believe, still holding tight.
What of the father-of-all African leaders, His Excellency President
Mugabe of Zimbabwe.

After halting the rise and rise of that once very thriving country, he
is still poking his middle finger at anyone daring to tell him it’s
time to go. He’s well past the Holy Bible’s three score and ten years…

And finally, how did Thabo Mbeki – remember the man who first spoke of
the African renaissance – yes, how did his leadership get so messy
that he was shunted aside in mid-stream by his own political party?
Just a curious thought…

That then, is a rough portrait of the continent’s face of leadership.
Any wonder then that they’ve been unable to call their brother Muammar
to order even asd as he was clearly and inexorably pulling his people
down with him into the Gotterdamerung?



-- 
-Laye
==============================
"With fair speech thou might have thy will,
With it thou might thy self spoil."
--The R.M

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