Obama To Visit Kenya In July

[RV Pundit]

Yes it borderline. Moonki and Windy city have espoused the same sickening attitude with regard to Africa just because Raila their candidate has failed severally to win election. At one time in 08..Windy City wanted the last man to turn off the lights in Africa or Kenya.Moonki is still smarting from the democratic decision of kenyans to elect ICC indicted folks. That is the basis of their argument.  Your elect a "bad" corrupt leader and the everyone in that country doesn't deserve any compassion.

Is it not enough to hold regular, fair and free elections like most Africans are doing...and have their chance to elect a George Bush once in a while...not it has to be some form of democracy where we elect "excellent" leaders.

In any case I think bad leadership and corrruption is just one of THE MANY variables that determine the fate of a country. It not like once you fix corruption and bad leadership..the country will quickly transform..our TZ neigbour is good example. There are far more intricate problems like the "level of education" you've identified and many others (including culture) that are hard to solve.

seems borderline sociopathic to me, which is why I got involved in the thread.

[Kim Jong-Un's Pajama Pants]

Bella,

I get the feeling of being happily misunderstood.  I know the difference between stupidity and unenlightenment.
 
To clarify, some of that characterization applies to the leaders we love so much.  The ones that stay at gazillion dollar hotels with the begging bowl.

For the rest.  If someone is unenlightened to the point of others having to constantly shoulder the burden of his decisions, he probably should not be deciding in the first place. 

I believe even Khoisan are not that unenlightened.  Some of those decisions just mean they prefer that way of life.

vooke more or less echoes my view if you ignore the evolution reference.

We can disagree without resorting ad hominem I believe.  None of the arguments I have seen here can be characterized as sociopathic.

[Bella]

Terminator, why are you so convinced that we "love those leaders" so much? Can you not grant that there are other reasons the very uneducated, poor, and unexposed-to-others-ways African may make poor decisions besides this strange idea that the African loves to suffer and hates to be happy?

It took 30 years to convince Kenyans to work for a new constitution. That is hard work, educating an uneducated populace on such a venture but we did it eventually. That takes patience and continually singing to the African, what the civil society do. Until everyone has heard something of a bad law, why that law is bad, why it needs to change etc etc. According to the "let him suffer for his foolishness and not get help" view, the efforts that went into that before it materialized, before the African finally got on board, would be a waste because the slow African kept making poor decisions. I'm sure you don't think so. So why is this different? The same African will need the same patient educating and helping with other areas, it will take time.

For example, corruption. Sure, our culture is corrupt. But do you genuinely believe that Kenyans like it? I have never met a Kenyan who does. What you have is people convinced that they can only trust a man from "home" to take care of their interests "out there" with the government, which politicians craftily use, as politicians everywhere are wont to do. So for someone who wants to help Kenya, what do you do? Cease helping? Not at all. You dont get angry at the slow learning masses who are yet to disconnect their thinking from the old communal-based, us-and-outsiders approach. You keep educating, highlighting, singing. One day enough of them will get it in a way that will make a difference. But deciding that they do not want better for themselves is not helpful and cannot be true. They just are not savvy enough YET to see through the our people way of thinking so easily exploited by politicians, ESPECIALLY outside Nairobi.

Also, to explain, I had read you as accusing me of "insinuating" that the African is stupid, that is why I sought to distinguish unenlightened from stupid. And the reason I described those arguments as borderline sociopathic to me is not because I think you or moonki are personally sociopathic, of course I don't think so, having read many posts to the contrary the past two years. Rather it was to point out the principle in that thought that I disagree with, which is essentially that somehow a lack of empathy (hence "sociopathy") is a way of "helping" people who fail like Africans have done, or that Africans are undeserving of empathy for failing without looking critically at this "failing" in all its context. To put it differently, I think you and Moonki are guilty of impatience with the slow pace of "evolution" and ending up condemning rather than sympathizing with the African's slow progress.

[MOON Ki]

.Moonki is still smarting from the democratic decision of kenyans to elect ICC indicted folks. That is the basis of their argument. 

Huh?   He, he, he .... Now it is clear that you have desperately run out of steam!     How on earth did we get from Obama, his visit to Kenya, ..., whether the West is/can/should-be doing more to help Africa?

Please take some time off, relax, get a little better informed, learn to exercise the neurons, and then return to the subject at hand.  Continually veering off on wild emotional tangents is unhelpful to any discussion.

[MOON Ki]

MoonKi, no one has said that the bazungu needs to solve all of the continent's problems. Some will be solved only by father TIME and nothing more, some will be solved by a population growing up and learning, some by divine intervention (or a stroke of good luck for the atheists) in the form of that rare self-sacrificing leadership that comes around ever so rarely in human history, at the "right time". Question for me was whethere despite all this, they should do what they can. You have since said that you believe they should/do have the responsibility, which is why I'm no longer debating you. Of course Bazungu will not/can not/should not change Africa all by themselves, no arguments from me there. Like I said, humans with better fortunes do need to do what is reasonably within their power to do to help those who are much less fortunate. Advocating the opposite approach/principle seems borderline sociopathic to me, which is why I got involved in the thread. Usually, I say away from money/economic/developmental matters and its details; not my forte, though I do learn a lot from reading others.

I'd try to avoid words like "sociopathic"; they simply inject unnecessary emotion into the discussion.   

I understand your basic position.   And mine is that (a) Africans can do much more to help themselves and (b) that they ought to quickly get on with it because no outside help is going to make the necessary changes.

I am quite happy to engage in a discussion of

"Question for me was whether despite all this, they should do what they can."

But I would regard that as a purely intellectual exercise, as the outcome will not have any practical effect.    In fact, let us make the discussion quite short: Let us suppose that I agree that they have not done all they can and can and should do more.   Now what?

[MOON Ki]

It took 30 years to convince Kenyans to work for a new constitution. That is hard work, educating an uneducated populace on such a venture but we did it eventually. That takes patience and continually singing to the African, what the civil society do. Until everyone has heard something of a bad law, why that law is bad, why it needs to change etc etc. According to the "let him suffer for his foolishness and not get help" view, the efforts that went into that before it materialized, before the African finally got on board, would be a waste because the slow African kept making poor decisions. I'm sure you don't think so. So why is this different? The same African will need the same patient educating and helping with other areas, it will take time.
...
To put it differently, I think you and Moonki are guilty of impatience with the slow pace of "evolution" and ending up condemning rather than sympathizing with the African's slow progress.

Correct me if I am wrong, but the argument here seems to be that Africans and simply "evolving" at their own pace and we will just have to accept that time must be allowed for full "evolution".    That line of argument raises interesting questions of whether or not Africans are fundamentally as capable as any other human beings on the planet.    But we can save that one for later.   For now, I have a different question:

What sort of external help do you envisage that would help in that process of "evolution"?

[Bella]

It took 30 years to convince Kenyans to work for a new constitution. That is hard work, educating an uneducated populace on such a venture but we did it eventually. That takes patience and continually singing to the African, what the civil society do. Until everyone has heard something of a bad law, why that law is bad, why it needs to change etc etc. According to the "let him suffer for his foolishness and not get help" view, the efforts that went into that before it materialized, before the African finally got on board, would be a waste because the slow African kept making poor decisions. I'm sure you don't think so. So why is this different? The same African will need the same patient educating and helping with other areas, it will take time.
...
To put it differently, I think you and Moonki are guilty of impatience with the slow pace of "evolution" and ending up condemning rather than sympathizing with the African's slow progress.

Correct me if I am wrong, but the argument here seems to be that Africans and simply "evolving" at their own pace and we will just have to accept that time must be allowed for full "evolution".    That line of argument raises interesting questions of whether or not Africans are fundamentally as capable as any other human beings on the planet.    But we can save that one for later.   For now, I have a different question:

What sort of external help do you envisage that would help in that process of "evolution"?

They are as capable as anyone else in the same set of circumstances. And indeed everyone has evolved "at their own pace" sometimes at the great cost of war. Fundamental social changes cannot be engineered at the flick of a light switch, real life is far too complicated. So, yes, short of colonialism, you just have to be patient. You simply have to allow populations to learn and give them the best tools you can. What else would you suggest, besides force/war?

I'm not interested in the second question. That was the debate between you and pundit over the different kinds of developmental aid and their usefulness. I don't know what kind of "aid" is better, the West or East one, in the long run.  If I were to venture a guess, I would say if someone gets many more African children into school and keeps them them there till form four/end of high school, they, whoever they are, will have real impact with ripple political effects in the long term. A better educated electorate demands more because it expects more and therefore has more impact on institutionalism than a semi-literate or a barely literate one.

[MOON Ki]

You simply have to allow populations to learn and give them the best tools you can.

And who should do this giving?

If I were to venture a guess, I would say if someone gets many more African children into school and keeps them them there till form four/end of high school, they, whoever they are, will have real impact with ripple political effects in the long term.

One can try.    By the way this reminds me of government folks in Kenya eating money other countries had given to finance free education.

[Bella]

You simply have to allow populations to learn and give them the best tools you can.

And who should do this giving?

I'm guessing this would be those desperately desiring change in Africa. They can be found all over the place, within Africa, the diaspora...powerful departments of powerful nations. By the way, you are reintroducing the debate you said was useless, about all the "shoulds" of helping Africa.

If I were to venture a guess, I would say if someone gets many more African children into school and keeps them them there till form four/end of high school, they, whoever they are, will have real impact with ripple political effects in the long term.

One can try.    By the way this reminds me of government folks in Kenya eating money other countries had given to finance free education.

Does one have to deliver money directly to the corrupt government? How about funding school-building or teachers-training or book/facility-buying directly? I am not in "development" nor work with its agencies but somehow I think that if one really wanted to help, one could find a way to do so, unless there is a dictatorial regime.

[MOON Ki]

You simply have to allow populations to learn and give them the best tools you can.

And who should do this giving?

I'm guessing this would be those desperately desiring change in Africa. They can be found all over the place, within Africa, the diaspora...powerful departments of powerful nations. By the way, you are reintroducing the debate you said was useless, about all the "shoulds" of helping Africa.

I am not just reintroducing the debate.    I was trying to get some clarity in your reasoning and to see its logical conclusion:

(a) If it is people "within Africa", then you are primarily talking about Africans themselves, and in that case we are back to Africans doing for themselves.  Which makes it perfectly reasonable to ask just what it is that they are doing for themselves.

(b) Following from (a), I should like to believe that those most "desperately desiring change in Africa" are (or should be) Africans themselves.    I have seen little evidence that would lead me to believe that many people outside Africans (except for a few Africans) desperately desire change in Africa.  So, on that criteria, right off the bat, much of the external world may be excluded from those who are to provide the "best tools" that would help Africans evolve.

(c) You want to say that it includes "powerful departments of powerful nations" can help in that but you should also maintain that

"I'm not interested in the second question."

It would be nice to see your thoughts are reasoning reach a logically satisfying end.

(d) The point about the diaspora is interesting.   How large a change they can actually make is an interesting question, but we can save that for later.   What I can say for now is that in places like Kenya many in the diaspora find it difficult because of the endemic corruption that tends to stymie many well-meant efforts.

[Kim Jong-Un's Pajama Pants]

Terminator, why are you so convinced that we "love those leaders" so much? Can you not grant that there are other reasons the very uneducated, poor, and unexposed-to-others-ways African may make poor decisions besides this strange idea that the African loves to suffer and hates to be happy?

I am going by election returns.  The leading candidates are not likely to change much IMO.  They thrive in that environment.  The people worship them.  I honestly can't say if people are suffering.  It's kind of mostly subjective. Most Africans look very happy to me. 

When it gets to atrocities, or there is starvation, the suffering is indisputable.  At that point, I feel unconditional help is called for.  When people feel they need to change, they will change.

[RV Pundit]

Do you have evidence that other people have developed more quickly. History should be compulsory. The last I checked the Western world took more than 500 yrs to develop to what they're now. Africa,Latin Americans, Indians and name any poor people in the world will get there with time. Africa in my view and in the view of others is making tremendous progress. That will escape you because you need to understand the historical context and base the Africa started from.

That line of argument raises interesting questions of whether or not Africans are fundamentally as capable as any other human beings on the planet.    But we can save that one for later.   For now, I have a different question:
t
What sort of external help do you envisage that would help in that process of "evolution"?

[RV Pundit]

You missed the argument completely. The argument was simple. Those fortunate enough like USA led by Obama ought to do more to help those unfortunate. Obama was suppose to be once in a blue moon guy who deeply understand Africa and it's problem and yet on the face of it has done NOTHING when he had the chance as leader of free world or superpower. I am totally disappointed that someone with such rare insight into Africa has done nothing. George Bush Jnr probably never had been to Africa before he was elected POTUS and yet his compassion for Africa is unmatched. Bill Gates has spent more dollars in Africa than US gov in the last few years. That has to be shameful. A world so rich yet many are starving!

Your argument has been Africa do not deserve any help either because they've elected bad leaders or have allowed corruption to thrive or well they just do not deserve any help..and should take 500 yrs like others have done to slowly develop. Or They will suddenly pull  themselves out of misery. Well they could..if they hit some natural jackpot like most of Middle East..but the majority including Kenyans will take very long long time...unless somebody was give them a boost..an helping hand.

Bella nailed the moral imperative. Leaving you scampering for anything!

I am not just reintroducing the debate.    I was trying to get some clarity in your reasoning and to see its logical conclusion:

(a) If it is people "within Africa", then you are primarily talking about Africans themselves, and in that case we are back to Africans doing for themselves.  Which makes it perfectly reasonable to ask just what it is that they are doing for themselves.

(b) Following from (a), I should like to believe that those most "desperately desiring change in Africa" are (or should be) Africans themselves.    I have seen little evidence that would lead me to believe that many people outside Africans (except for a few Africans) desperately desire change in Africa.  So, on that criteria, right off the bat, much of the external world may be excluded from those who are to provide the "best tools" that would help Africans evolve.

(c) You want to say that it includes "powerful departments of powerful nations" can help in that but you should also maintain that

"I'm not interested in the second question."

It would be nice to see your thoughts are reasoning reach a logically satisfying end.

(d) The point about the diaspora is interesting.   How large a change they can actually make is an interesting question, but we can save that for later.   What I can say for now is that in places like Kenya many in the diaspora find it difficult because of the endemic corruption that tends to stymie many well-meant efforts.

[MOON Ki]

Do you have evidence that other people have developed more quickly. History should be compulsory. The last I checked the Western world took more than 500 yrs to develop to what they're now. Africa,Latin Americans, Indians and name any poor people in the world will get there with time. Africa in my view and in the view of others is making tremendous progress. That will escape you because you need to understand the historical context and base the Africa started from.

I'm afraid that is all rather sloppy thinking.  It is the essence of a lame argument that I heard a couple of decades ago and which I didn't think people still trotted out.   

First, without getting into any definition of "development", it assume that development occurs at the same linear rate.  In the way you think, one of the implications would be that Africans will always be "500 years" behind the West; after all, they started "500 years" behind, and the West is not exactly sitting idle.    Try to read history as more than just "this happened when" and "that person did this and that when"; try to get a deeper understanding.

Today your African will go to school and university and come to grasp with law, medicine, technology, systems of governance, etc.   that took the West hundreds of years to develop; it is not necessary that the African himself go through the same process and same hundreds of years.  The argument that "the West took so long, so therefore!" would make sense only if Africa was totally isolated from the rest of the world and "starting from scratch".

A second point is that I don't know exactly what sort of history you have been reading.   I would urge you to look well beyond the sort of stuff that they dish out in your typical primary school curriculum.   In particular, if you wish to argue that, somehow, Africa has long been behind Europe and needs "500 years" or whatever, then I would urge you to take a better look at broader history  what sorts of systems Africans had and when they had them.

Let us consider some concrete cases of  things that I would like to see in what I would consider "human development".   I will take Kenya as my example:

(a) Food: "At the national level, 35 percent of children under five years are stunted, 16 percent  are underweight, and 7 percent  are wasted. While the levels of wasting and stunting have remained almost constant in the last 20 years: between 6 percent  and 7 percent for wasting and 30 percent and 35 percent for stunting, there has been a slight decline in underweight from 22 percent in 1993 to 16 percent in 2008."    http://globalnutritionreport.org/2014/07/18/the-nutrition-paradox-in-kenya/

Those are grim figures.   And they are in addition to what happens with the perpetual cycle of famine and begging for food.

Now, Kenya has land and there is nothing magical about irrigation, large-scale agriculture, and so on.   Nothing that cannot be learned from those who have done it right.   So, what is it that required hundreds of years?

(b) Health: That many Kenyans do not have a place to shit is tremendously costly to the country---easily preventable diseases, deaths among the young.  The financial costs in one year actually greatly exceeds what it would take to provide the right facilities.    (And the provision of clean drinking water is   another similar issue.)

Dealing with the problem is not something that requires hundreds of years of development.   It can be done right now if the will is there.

(c) Corruption:   I cannot add to how Bella has already described it.  Again, there is nothing magical that would be required to deal with it.  We know how other countries have dealt with it, and there is no reason why we cannot learn from them and aply the lessons if we wish to.

I want to urge people like you to give up this idea that the African is some backward and helpless unfortunate victim whose best hope is to wait for evolution to do its thing.    As you go around your daily life, enjoying the products, in whatever form,  of hundreds of years of Western "development": (a) reflect on the fact that you don't have to go through much of that "development" because the products have been handed to you; (b) you should then reflect on how best to use all that to improve the African lot.     

[MOON Ki]

You missed the argument completely.

No, I think it is you who missed my argument.  But I do not find that surprising.

Bella nailed the moral imperative. Leaving you scampering for anything!

I have no problem with that view.   Who nailed what and who was left scampering for what are certainly not things I  see as worth discussing or arguing about.   

I will, however, again point out that the "moral imperative", however strong and however pushed will not substantially change anything; I certainly see no signs that would suggest otherwise.   Indeed, as you yourself point out, it is a rich world but many are starving.  In such circumstances, my view is that the starving would be better off doing more to feed themselves.   (Nothing wrong with "help", but it obviously cannot be relied on.)

[Bella]

I'm guessing this would be those desperately desiring change in Africa. They can be found all over the place, within Africa, the diaspora...powerful departments of powerful nations. By the way, you are reintroducing the debate you said was useless, about all the "shoulds" of helping Africa.

I am not just reintroducing the debate.    I was trying to get some clarity in your reasoning and to see its logical conclusion:

(a) If it is people "within Africa", then you are primarily talking about Africans themselves, and in that case we are back to Africans doing for themselves.  Which makes it perfectly reasonable to ask just what it is that they are doing for themselves.

(b) Following from (a), I should like to believe that those most "desperately desiring change in Africa" are (or should be) Africans themselves.    I have seen little evidence that would lead me to believe that many people outside Africans (except for a few Africans) desperately desire change in Africa.  So, on that criteria, right off the bat, much of the external world may be excluded from those who are to provide the "best tools" that would help Africans evolve.

(c) You want to say that it includes "powerful departments of powerful nations" can help in that but you should also maintain that

"I'm not interested in the second question."

It would be nice to see your thoughts are reasoning reach a logically satisfying end.

(d) The point about the diaspora is interesting.   How large a change they can actually make is an interesting question, but we can save that for later.   What I can say for now is that in places like Kenya many in the diaspora find it difficult because of the endemic corruption that tends to stymie many well-meant efforts.

Actually, ALL you are doing is going roundabout the same undisputed points you've been making in response to mine, while strangely expecting that I will not repeat my own points. In essence, you are reintroducing the debate while asking that you be allowed to keep singing the same points that NO ONE has even argued against even as a HINT, while saying we should not make ours because, per your unilateral conclusion, it's "useless" to do so.

@MoonKi, and I've made this point to you already, WHO here have you seen argue that Africans do not have primary responsibilities for themselves? This is the point you keep repeating over and over as if it has ever been in dispute.

You said that the bazungu had no obligation to HELP--note emphasis on help-- this is what I disputed. You are dismissing it by saying they "won't do it" so lets not discuss it. Well, Africans wont flip a switch tomorrow and turn into good little Western clones overnight either, so I could flip this manner of argument on you too and ask you why you want to discuss it.

The West has been helping, so I don't even think the premises of your dismissal is established. What Pundit and those who think like him have been doing is showing them a better way to do it. One that actually gets results, which for him was the Chinese model. You decided he had no right to point that out because supposedly, the West had no obligation to help, which prompted me onto the thread.

Now, tell me how anything you've said in this post is not just the same merry-go-round argument?

Lets be clear: No one is absolving the African of his duty to help himself. The idea is just silly and has not been made here by anyone, you are just presuming it.

The debate was whether Obama's coming is anything to celebrate. I was reading that debate until you decided the very asking of the question was something to be fought.

[MOON Ki]

You are dismissing it by saying they "won't do it" so lets not discuss it.
...
The West has been helping, so I don't even think the premises of your dismissal is established.

Huh?

Actually nowhere have I said that the West has not been helping or that they won't help.   On the contrary, I have repeatedly (on this and other threads) pointed out the enormous help that has come from USAID alone, far more than has been suggested.

What I have argued is that all such external help will not produce long-lasting positive change.   For that all that one has to do is look at 50 years of foreign aid. 

I have no problems with the idea of discussing the West's "moral obligation" to help.   Nor have I suggested that we not discuss it.   Mine has been to argue that people should not have too much expectation in it.

You decided he had no right to point that out because

I decided no such thing.   I was simply presenting my side of the argument.

Lets be clear: No one is absolving the African of his duty to help himself. 

I'm glad to hear that, and it does imply that we have reached some sort of common ground.    We shall now leave it for him to get on with it.

Is Obama's visiting Kenya something to celebrate?   That too can be argued over endlessly, but the fact is this: when he visits, Kenyans will celebrate like nobody's business.

[Bella]

Do you have evidence that other people have developed more quickly. History should be compulsory. The last I checked the Western world took more than 500 yrs to develop to what they're now. Africa,Latin Americans, Indians and name any poor people in the world will get there with time. Africa in my view and in the view of others is making tremendous progress. That will escape you because you need to understand the historical context and base the Africa started from.

I'm afraid that is all rather sloppy thinking.  It is the essence of a lame argument that I heard a couple of decades ago and which I didn't think people still trotted out.   

First, without getting into any definition of "development", it assume that development occurs at the same linear rate.  In the way you think, one of the implications would be that Africans will always be "500 years" behind the West; after all, they started "500 years" behind, and the West is not exactly sitting idle.    Try to read history as more than just "this happened when" and "that person did this and that when"; try to get a deeper understanding.

Today your African will go to school and university and come to grasp with law, medicine, technology, systems of governance, etc.   that took the West hundreds of years to develop; it is not necessary that the African himself go through the same process and same hundreds of years.  The argument that "the West took so long, so therefore!" would make sense only if Africa was totally isolated from the rest of the world and "starting from scratch".

A second point is that I don't know exactly what sort of history you have been reading.   I would urge you to look well beyond the sort of stuff that they dish out in your typical primary school curriculum.   In particular, if you wish to argue that, somehow, Africa has long been behind Europe and needs "500 years" or whatever, then I would urge you to take a better look at broader history  what sorts of systems Africans had and when they had them.

Let us consider some concrete cases of  things that I would like to see in what I would consider "human development".   I will take Kenya as my example:

(a) Food: "At the national level, 35 percent of children under five years are stunted, 16 percent  are underweight, and 7 percent  are wasted. While the levels of wasting and stunting have remained almost constant in the last 20 years: between 6 percent  and 7 percent for wasting and 30 percent and 35 percent for stunting, there has been a slight decline in underweight from 22 percent in 1993 to 16 percent in 2008."    http://globalnutritionreport.org/2014/07/18/the-nutrition-paradox-in-kenya/

Those are grim figures.   And they are in addition to what happens with the perpetual cycle of famine and begging for food.

Now, Kenya has land and there is nothing magical about irrigation, large-scale agriculture, and so on.   Nothing that cannot be learned from those who have done it right.   So, what is it that required hundreds of years?

(b) Health: That many Kenyans do not have a place to shit is tremendously costly to the country---easily preventable diseases, deaths among the young.  The financial costs in one year actually greatly exceeds what it would take to provide the right facilities.    (And the provision of clean drinking water is   another similar issue.)

Dealing with the problem is not something that requires hundreds of years of development.   It can be done right now if the will is there.

(c) Corruption:   I cannot add to how Bella has already described it.  Again, there is nothing magical that would be required to deal with it.  We know how other countries have dealt with it, and there is no reason why we cannot learn from them and aply the lessons if we wish to.

I want to urge people like you to give up this idea that the African is some backward and helpless unfortunate victim whose best hope is to wait for evolution to do its thing.    As you go around your daily life, enjoying the products, in whatever form,  of hundreds of years of Western "development": (a) reflect on the fact that you don't have to go through much of that "development" because the products have been handed to you; (b) you should then reflect on how best to use all that to improve the African lot.   

You are arguing things no one is denying. No. It certainly will not take 500 years to develop. 200 years ago, bazungu were not where we are now, especially in Europe. Immediately after independence, Africa was ensnared in all sorts of wars, for three decades. It has only been since the 90s that that phase has been coming to an end, the reason for all the positive indicators of growth that development analysts have been noting throughout the 2,000s. Certainly, Africa will be radically different in 2050. Almost all the population will be educated, institutions will be more mature, infrastructure far more improved and regional integration more complete as more tarrifs drop and borders open. It certainly will not take 500 years, but neither will it take two decades like you seem to expect is the only way.

[Bella]

You are dismissing it by saying they "won't do it" so lets not discuss it.
...
The West has been helping, so I don't even think the premises of your dismissal is established.

Actually nowhere have I said that the West has not been helping.   In fact, I have repeatedly (on this and other thread) pointed out the enormous help that has come from USAID alone, far more than has been suggested.

What I have argued is that all such external help will not produce long-lasting positive change.   For that all that one has to do is look at 50 years of foreign aid. 

I have no problems with the idea of discussing the West's "moral obligation" to help.   Nor have I suggested that we not discuss it.   Mine has been to argue that people should not have too much expectation in it.

You decided he had no right to point that out because

I decided no such thing.   I was simply presenting my side of the argument.

Lets be clear: No one is absolving the African of his duty to help himself. 

I'm glad to hear that, and it does imply that we have reached some sort of common ground.    We shall now leave it for him to get on with it.

Is Obama's visiting Kenya something to celebrate?   That too can be argued over endlessly, but the fact is this: when he visits, Kenyans will celebrate like nobody's business.

MoonKi, yes we will celebrate. You know what? I celebrated the very moment I heard it, call me African. The most powerful "African" on the planet is coming home, as an African, somehow that feels like a big reason. Still, I don't think it is a sin to expect much from this particular son of ours. I understand the frustration of others and the criticism does makes sense to me. Back in grad school, my group of African friends from all over the continent had the same sentiments as Pundit regarding Obama. Its still not enough for me to disown Obama though, and I have serious beef with him over what I view as his unnecessary wars with Christians in his own country and such. Well, the man IS black. For a reason I can't logically explain, that makes a huge difference to me. Perhaps I need evolution myself.

[RV Pundit]

So according to you, for the last 50yrs Kenya has made no progress whatsoever in any human development indicator or well in areas you think are "priority". There is overwhelming evidence to show the contrary. Kenya and Africa are making progress in Health, Food Security,Education,Leadership and name any indicator. You can nitpick from some report but if you want to have sober debate with me..choose dataset that are credible...try IMF,WB,OECD,EIA,UNDP and such credible source..pick any indicator...say Health or Nutrition..and make your arguments.

I refuse to fall for any link you keep dropping in every thread...to desperately make a point. There are a dime dozen such links including those with evidence of UFO sightings.

The kenya we are talking about is one which just become a Middle Income Country (albeit Low middle Income) last year, that has impressive quality of educations, has seen living standard and life expectancy rises (despite scourge of HIV and other diseases), has big cities sprouting up, is speeding up electrification from nearly zero in 1950s to now about 35%, etc etc.

The kenya that is undisputed global leader in things Financial innovation(Mpesa), Althetics, Black tea,Horticulture and many other areas.

(b) Health: That many Kenyans do not have a place to shit is tremendously costly to the country---easily preventable diseases, deaths among the young.  The financial costs in one year actually greatly exceeds what it would take to provide the right facilities.    (And the provision of clean drinking water is   another similar issue.)

Dealing with the problem is not something that requires hundreds of years of development.   It can be done right now if the will is there.

(c) Corruption:   I cannot add to how Bella has already described it.  Again, there is nothing magical that would be required to deal with it.  We know how other countries have dealt with it, and there is no reason why we cannot learn from them and aply the lessons if we wish to.

I want to urge people like you to give up this idea that the African is some backward and helpless unfortunate victim whose best hope is to wait for evolution to do its thing.    As you go around your daily life, enjoying the products, in whatever form,  of hundreds of years of Western "development": (a) reflect on the fact that you don't have to go through much of that "development" because the products have been handed to you; (b) you should then reflect on how best to use all that to improve the African lot.