To Make Africa Great, First Get Rid of Its Crooked Culture

In this twenty-first-century world, it is about time that we all take an honest look in the mirror—that we see ourselves without cosmetic enhancements, that we present ourselves without pretense. The need for this reality check rings no truer for us as Africans than for our continent and the cities we live in. Because if we observe ourselves, peruse our outlook, and survey our beloved African cities, and then report back our earnest findings, we would observe that the average forest hamlet from one hundred years ago is still better organized and maintained than the average West African city.
I lie?

We abuse cell phones and employ the minds of computers for menial tasks. We adorn our wrists with luxury watches and drive around in luxury automobiles. This is the twenty-first century. We talk about cyber-this and tech-that. And yet we still parade our fine imported goods on more dirt roads than the village could boast of. Our cities have many more dirt roads for every mile of tarred road. In fact, with frequent potholes and puddles of water, our roads are more like jungle access paths.

How can we brag about being modern and brandish talk of modern economies when a tarred road in Accra feels like a beaten backcountry pavement? How can I stomach anyone who insists on his advancement and pretends to discuss the latest tech craze when, the second he gets into his vehicle, he traverses a bumpy, undulating, dusty path carved out of the bush to his brand-new encampment by a large, overgrown sewage gutter to boot?

Road construction is old-century technology, if not millennia-old technology. The Romans did it in togas and sandals, riding along coniferous forests on horseback! Yet the government in Accra, for example, adorned in all the glamour of the twenty-first century—a blouse called fugu, a Toyota Land Cruiser, a wristwatch, and a pair of shoes made with the entire skin of a crocodile—has still not mastered the management of proper roads. They are stuck on the cutlass construction of bush-access mud pavements. This is simply disturbing! No serious nation behaves in this manner. Tarring a road is second nature everywhere else, and it happens with such regularity and routine that it is as unnoticeable as trimming the grass, which is sadly another activity even more difficult than road construction for West African administrations to upkeep.

So what is the barrier to building and maintaining a civilized habitat like a city in West Africa?

I hear the objections already. But… you are just comparing Africa to the West. No, I am afraid the Japanese and the Singaporeans too are not trekking through dust and mud in their major cities. They do not have modern epidemics of trash, loiterers, and illegal structures on either side of their muddy pavements.

But… there is no money in Africa. You mean the nations with tons of resources, like gold, so much so that they can make half of their nation’s deposits disappear in just two months and throw away billions while playing around with manipulating their currency—billions that, mind you, would have tarred the entire metro area of cities many times over and still left billions over?

But… our leaders are corrupt; they steal all the money; they buy themselves multiple houses and vehicles; they whisk their families away to the West and gift millions to Western schools for their children’s education and living expenses; they steal all of the money that is meant for these very projects.

Alright. We may be getting closer to the truth, the whole exercise of looking oneself in the mirror. But can we look more closely? Is it just our leaders to blame? Why do the people fail to hold them accountable? Does the top not mirror what is below it? And does the ocean not mirror the sky above it? My theory is that so many people feel they might just be next in line to engage in kleptomania that they do not wish to disrupt the theft. Doing so would mean foreclosing their future opportunities for theft. If we turn and notice, we might appreciate that among us it is difficult to find upstanding people who might not engage in some form of crookedness.

The men who are skimping on road materials are crooks. The men under whose watch national deposits disappear and large sums of money go missing are thieves. Even the women who are cooking with MSG are murderous, telling the rest of us that their diluted palm oil is dzomi when it is rather poisonous. Part of the problem with modern African culture is the lack of reflection—the looking away from the mirror and refusing to call out the dishonesty and indiscipline that are eroding our future.

Unmotorable roads belittle us. Bad food makes us sick. Poisons kill us. Stolen money makes fools of us. In combination, these pressures weigh on the system—on us. A dishonest culture stresses everyone out. It makes everyone tired. It holds everyone back. It accomplishes nothing except elevating crooks. Crooked culture infects all of us. Under the burden of crooks, African cities face serious degradation, perhaps an irrecoverable amount.

We have come to collectively love Africa the same way we love our dysfunctional families. Family is family. But this is not enough. It cannot be. Why can’t we love Africa because Africa is great? Why can’t we make Africa great? And if there is some inspiration, Addis Ababa may be on its way to becoming a modern African city to admire, with scenic parks, huge sidewalks, wide tarred roads with separate bike lanes, public restrooms, and public parking lots—and absolutely no urban blight: no squatters hanging out in the medians or pitching settlements along the sidewalks.

Can West Africa copy? Can they just learn? In order for sprawling cities like Accra and Lagos to follow Addis Ababa in becoming civilized and habitable, the residents first need to declare that they do not want to forever be crooks. Good luck. That they want their cities to be better, to be great; that they do not want the squalor of trash, makeshift tents, and loiterers on the streets and sidewalks. Good luck again!

If we look in the mirror and are happy with the degradation that we see, then we deserve it. But if the reflection haunts our place in this modern world, then we should feel obligated and motivated to change what we see.