Donald Trump’s road to Damascus
It is not often that you get to pity the global news behemoths. In Africa, tears are very expensive these days and we have had to ration their use. With poverty on the rampage, the very few whose lachrymogenic glands still produce this essential commodity are forced to hoard it. They have need of it for the passage of those loved ones who still needlessly succumb to ethnocentric clashes that are now commonplace from the Middle Belt regions of Naija through the Karamojong plains of Kenya.
In South Sudan, they need it to wet the parched lands not recovering from the devastating famine caused by the fight of the two elephants - Salva Kiir and Riek Machiar. In Somalia, they need it for the unceasing onslaught of Al-Shabaab waging a war against those who think they have survived a fractious politico-religious war. On the borders of the Congo, the living need it to mourn the passage of victims of Ebola as they furtively glance at each other uncertain as to who goes next. The people of the Saharawi don’t waste precious larmes on mundane things when the nearly 30-year quest for self-determination has been lost in the annals of history by the so-called international community.
Pardon me you so-called international media if the things that make your farmers cry only induce a cackle from my partridge. All these analysis about what brother Trump promised and what he pursues or delivers is neither news nor a surprise to us who live in Africa. Brother Trump and candidate Trump are not the same. Candidate Trump told the American electorate what they wanted to hear - a harsh rhetoric on China when in reality he was only looking for equitable inroads into the global market that China continues to dominate. Yes candidate Trump promised to roast China but brother Trump has hosted Chinese leaders and now refers to them as his friends. This calls for Canadian wrestler, Chris Jericho-style of - breathe it in, mehn!
Candidate Trump promised to make Mexico pay for that wall and shut down anyone who tried to ask him how he intended to make that happen; brother Trump still has no idea how to make Mexico pay for that wall. Candidate Trump promised to clean the Aegean stables in Washington, brother Trump has no idea how to make that happen. Candidate Trump promised to teach the North Korean leader a lesson he won’t have time to regret; brother Trump begs for an opportunity to meet this unknown hero of his.
None of this is unknown to Africans. We are very familiar with the irredeemable promises of politricians. We have heard ingenious politricians promise to rebuild the tower of Babel to finally get that direct access to God that our pastorpreneurs swear they have. Thus far, only Paul Sanyagore of Zimbabwe has ever made a direct phone call to heaven and the way he’s done it, he’s not about to share the number.
Every African voter knows how to make a politrician pay for his daily bread on campaign day than wait for the reality of his campaign promise. On the other hand, it would appear that the oyibo are just learning from brother Trump and it sounds strange to the feelers of their fake newshounds. Candidate Trump had promised a clampdown on Muslims and went as far as issuing presidential decrees to make it look real. As usual, when the politrician makes a rule he wishes to implement, it only targets the less fortunate.
Last week, brother Trump went to the holiest city in the Islamic world and unlike Sai Baba, he didn’t go there to pray or get an executive pass to the Ka’abba; no, he went there to convince the House of Saud to part with $110 billion of their petrodollar in exchange for obsolete American arms. No matter how wicked you may be when political promise collides with Saudi oil money, forgiveness comes as fast as it does with Allah.
So please somebody tell ‘fake news’ to stop dwelling on the past and help us face the future! Candidate Trump promised to balance the books, but brother Trump has proposed a $440 billion budget deficit. On the road to American balanced budget, there are potholes called budget cuts. Brother Trump doesn’t give a damn because with Saudi cash America is on the road to being great again. If anyone doubts that, maybe they were beneficiaries of scrapped Obamacare. Obama should consider himself lucky for not being arrested and questioned for failing to show his birth certificate. As for brother Trump, his tax papers are in an escrow vault and if America shows gratitude, brother Trump may release the papers to the public. If they heckle him too much, he would adopt Sai Baba’s posture of keeping personal things private.