Of late we have been hearing about the shocking unemployment rates from Arzbeijan to Greece, from Australia to USA. A lot of skilled and professionally competent people are idle somewhere in Americas, Eastern and Western Europe and Asia. It seems because of habit most citizens are waiting for their politicians to solve their problems. Is it realistic today in the world of globalization and a situation where you can have more intelligence spread elsewhere and not among the top political elites?
Dear comrades in Asia, Europe and USA you may not know this fact: That while you remain idle and jobless and pyschologically suffering unexplainable diseases there is work in Africa and other developing countries.
Africa's infrastructure is obselete; it needs new roads and railways and bridges; it needs new and modern harbours; it needs new and modern airports; it needs tractors and harvesters and even simple things like bicycles, motorcycles and animal carts.
Africa's agriculture is as old and unmodernized as the continent. Industries lacking and trade rudiment and very basic indeed. This is a virgin territory. Far more, many opportunities, challenges and rewards than elsewhere in the world if one can take the trouble of being pioneers and do the needful!'
Almost three-quarters of Africa is yet to receive and use electricity; some parts of the continent don't know what is tap water; others have never lived in a house but what they call huts; the education infrastructure is dilapidated; there is dearth of doctors and teachers; some parts hear radio transmission from 'rich' neighbours; television if any belongs to the state and instead of opening their brains it close them; computers and internets are like technologies from completely another world.... and many, many other issues.
Where is Richard Branson and the men and women of the diaspora. Branson started a business out of almost the same situation. Virgin Airlines was born out of desperation perspirated into a business vision.
In Branson's case you had stranded travellers and no plane in one city, but many planes lying useless somewhere. In our case, it is skilled and competent professionals lying idle in US, Europe and Asia and a continent that mankind is denying an easy exit out of its backwardness misfortune Africa.
But let's not talk of waiting and depending on bankrupt state or national governments. Let us initiate links between such jobless professionals and African professionals who pretend to be doing something but actually are not delivering anything, because politicians have usurped theri posts and positions. Let there be a meeting of such people. A meeting of minds and ideas to consider what such men and women can do to lessen the pains of being jobless and broke as competent professionals, one one hand, and on the other the pains of being made redundant in the African quest for the development of their poor and suffering masses who are being deceived daily that one day the leader and the government shall come to their rescue. In the long-run all of us should indeed be dead. If we really want to help Africans develop themselves it should be today and not tomorrow. The financial and economic crisis is one golden opportunity for the whiteman to make up for the humiliation, degradation, exploitation and suffering that he has caused the blackman.
For instance, Tanzanians need a new and modernized railway network. There is an opportunity to build perhaps a doubleline railway line from Dar es salaam to Tanga, Tanzania and then from there to Mombasa.
There is an opportunity to build another double line railway lines fromTanga to Kampala, Uganda as well as two other double lines from Dar es salaam to Zambia, Malawi, Zimbabwe and South Africa as well as from Dar es salaam to Kigali and Bujumbura.
The Dar es salaam-Tanga line can be used as a demonstration plot by a joint venture of jobless Amriacans/Europeans/Asians in collaboration with Tanzanian engineers and railway builders. This will be the indisputable University for solving the railway problem in Tanzania. Those who graduate from here can take the challenge to build another line anywhere in Tanzania or Africa.
What is needed is for our African governments, Central Banks and politicians to realize the importance of such an udnertaking and give every incho of support they can muster for such a dream of development through world citizenry partnership to be realized.
