Firstly, Ethiopia is under US sanctions while Vietnam is not. And speaking of former French colonies, Haiti was the first to get independence (1804) and is still one of the poorest countries in the world because of the debt they had to take on to gain independence (it took them until 1947 to fully repay it!). Whereas, New Caledonia is still a French colony and is neither rich nor poor.
"If colonialism were the answer to why Africa is poor..."
This line completely ignores the European powers' (and US) post-colonial control over Africa. Patrice Lumumba, the first democratically elected leader of the DRC, was tortured and killed by Belgium and the US for being a nationalist. His body was dissolved in acid so he wouldn't become a martyr. His legacy is largely unknown even within the continent. Several other such "lessons" were meted out. Google Thomas Sankara (Burkina Faso) and Sylvanus Olympio (Togo).
Once you set the example, you gain obedience. The VietCong, on the other hand, didn't surrender even though 3 million Vietnamese died during the war, and several thousand more continue to die to this day (!) from Agent Orange exposure.
As for former French colonies in Africa, France still controls their currency and holds their central bank reserves in France. As Rothschild purportedly said, "permit me to issue and control the money of a nation, and I care not who makes its laws."
Third, the borders in Africa were drawn in such a way that conflict was inevitable. At the Berlin Conference in 1884-85, the European powers simply carved up the continent by drawing straight line borders. African leaders were conspicuous only by their absence at this historic event which shaped the next century. This is why Cameroon, a French-speaking country, has a minority English-speaking territory, ensuring it remains destabilized. Likewise for West Asia/the Middle East, where the Sykes-Picot legacy lives on.
@magattew conflates formal colonial rule with colonial control. Vietnam managed to fully kick out both France and the US, reunified the North and the South, and kept its sovereignty. All African leaders who attempted the same have been systematically eliminated (see Muammar Gaddafi, Libya's divisive leader, for a recent example), ensuring Africa forever bears the open wounds of its colonial legacy.
But Ms. Wade is right on one thing: Vietnam owes its prosperity to overcoming colonial rule. Maybe Africa can become prosperous if Africans do the same.
A proposed US Ebola facility in Kenya is sparking backlash at home and abroad. "I don’t think Americans should be proud of it," Professor @LawrenceGostin, global health expert, says.
Kenyan President William Ruto said allowing the US to build an Ebola quarantine facility in Kenya was the “right thing”.
At least two people were killed this week in protests against the facility, which is being built on a US air force base for Americans exposed to the virus.
You can talk with such bravado about caning children but you had nothing to say when the government decided to starve the kids in school with capitation of 90 bob.
Don't blame children for not accepting what you have accepted as the adults.
The race for; iridium, gallium, tantalum, beryllium, germanium, coltan, lithium, uranium, titanium, niobium, gold, manganese, tungsten, nickel, rubies, oil and gas, will be either what wakes up Kenyans, or finally breaks our fatherland.
We are a few steps away from being a superpower or being a failed state.
The current crop of leaders cannot usher in a golden age for our sacres land.
So I ask, to what end shall we be herded into poverty, enslavement to imperialism, indebted to international banking cartels and a dark future?
We have never known true sovereignty.
Our republic is still a colony of the British Crown.
Laikipia for example, even though it's endowed with trillions of dollars worth of precious metals, is owned by English lords, and registered in the United Kingdom- Laikipia Limited.
Our mineral wealth is also owned by the Crown, via World Bank.
Not a single gram of rare earths is touched without permission from The City of London.
Cue, Jacob Juma, he 'discovered' Niobium worth $300B in Mrima Hill, Kwale County, but only disclosed a third of the mineral wealth, $100B.
Why?
Because the two-thirds remainder would be owned by British/Scottish mining companies Cortec Mining Co and Stirling.
He was murdered by Kenya's excellent thugs; all of them not just PRESIDENT EBOLA.
In Turkana they discovered oil worth about $44B in Ngamia 1.
Then they did extra radar scans around Lodwar and discovered;
1. A fresh water aquiffer that had enough water to be supplied to all Kenyans, non-stop for 70 years.
It'd support irrigation and household utility and usher an agricultural boom.
Then an organization called the IDLO was involved and within 48hrs, Kenya's minister of water came out and declared the water saline and too expensive to desalinate, even though it was initially announced as fresh water.
Why?
The second discovery is.
2. Oil worth over $250B in only 4 wells.
Underline only.
Those who studied stratigraphy know we have more oil than Venezuela's $33 Trillion but that is a story for another day.
Yes, you heard that right.
Back to the 4 wells;
Tullows, a London registered oil corporation, the same one that had won the tender for Ngamia 1, claimed they couldn't extract the oil.
Because...they didn't have the technology.
Immediately after, Kenyan excellent thugs, rushed to privatise the land.
A firm allied to Moses Wetangula managed to privatise the land, endowed with two hundred and fifty billion dollars for only eight hundred and forty million Kenyan shillings.
A few years later, Tullows allowed for a subsidiary to be registered, Gulf Energy, majority owned by Kenya's political class.
And finally, they are extracting the oil.
They have the technology.
When the quest for independence grew and became uncontrollable, British government rushed to do geological surveys of Kenya.
To map mineral formations and endowment.
They discovered that our land had over 970 minerals, all economically viable.
So to hide them, they declared reserve concentration points as national parks, national reserves, animal sanctuaries, conservancies and forests.
Get it?
They don't care for the baby elephants, it's what the cute jumbo helps them conceal.
Economic freedom, absolute liberty and sovereignty won't be restored by digital anger.
I beseech you, take this fight for your livelihoods to the streets.
The streets is where they can't control you.
Non-stop mass action.
Mothers, fathers, children and the youth in the frontline.
It'd take you 30 minutes to get back your power.
Article one of the CoK clearly stipulates you can administer yourselves directly too.
Get up off your knees, let's get free.
Homeland✊🏿🇰🇪✊🏿
Kenya is razing thousands of shacks to make way for new homes, but hasn’t provided alternate accommodation to those who have been evicted https://t.co/hkuz2KVy5o
Hundreds of people took to the streets of Nanyuki in central Kenya to protest moves by the United States to set up an Ebola quarantine facility at a military base there https://t.co/MMe3kUMAn1