I could not agree with you more. We do have a habit of creating a mess out of even benign instruments of change. You are right, our airwaves have been hijacked by bandits who hide behind the freedom of speech banner. Rwanda’s unfortunate example of how radio could be use to incite hate serves as a cautionary tale. While I agree our radio stations need to be tamed, I am more distrustful of politicians who propose curbs on radio broadcasting to pursue their own nefarious agendas. We need an independent, apolitical body of people who can be trusted with policing the airwaves. Until that happens, the status quo may unfortunately be a lesser of two evils.

I agree, internal factors have been the bane of African countries. Where this hypothesis is found slightly wanting is when you compare African growth figures with the global mean over the time period in the essay. African growth figures were unremarkable but relatively competitive to the rest of the world post-independence until the 70s where it plundered. If the “internal” hypothesis is entirely true (without some intervening factors), we would need evidence to prove that the internal factors were significantly worse in the late 70s, 80s and perhaps a greater part of the 90s than at other times- hence the steep decline in economic growth relative to the world. In my mind internal factors (corruption, bad leadership, etc) were as bad in the 70s and 80s as they were in the 50s and 60s and some would even argue that the bandits have become even more sophisticated and are stealing greater sums of money as recently revealed by the SEC in its investigations of Cobalt Energy and three Angola government officials (one of whom is presumed to be president in waiting). Yet Africa has picked up where it left off in the late seventies (as it did in 50 and 60s) inspite of the internal factors. Something else must explain the “anomaly” – this is where the FDI argument comes in. It is a bit of a circular argument – good internal conditions are needed to attract FDI. However, we need to identify the root cause and rally the internal factors needed to attract foreign money. I’m afraid obsessive focus on the “wrong” internal factors could take our attention of the prize while the rest of the money world passes us by. Cash, once again, is king!

Hope all is well with you,

Glad you enjoyed it. We have some serious momentum (growth as you described it) going on right now. Unfortunately, there have been many false dawns before. Hopefully that powers that be would capitalize on this opportunity, get out of the way and focus on building infrastructure, infrastructure and more infrastructure to create the enabling environment that will unleash the creative impulses of the people. There are healthy signs but don’t rule out the possibility of the ruling elite snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. But lets be hopeful.