Time to remap Europe-Africa relations
THE story of thousands of Africans flocking to Europe and with thousands of the voyagers perishing in the Mediterranean Sea will no doubt go down in the annals of history as the most heart-breaking account this century. But not only that. Those migrants, or refugees, as various mass communications media around the world describe them, have discovered on reaching land that all was not rosy in the countries of their dreams after all, as they literally became prisoners in the host European Union countries.
Some countries have raised barricades against the new fortune seekers fleeing economic impoverishment and political strife back home and had them sent back or thrown into confinement pending a final decision on their status.
Not having previously been faced with such mass foreign human inundations, the recipient or potential recipient EU states took whatever measure was deemed necessary to protect their own people’s jobs as well as their national security.
The tragic story of the scramble for Europe by Africans who fall prey to smugglers waiting to pounce on them from the coast of Libya, raking in their fortunes as they ferry away the migrants on boats some of which are rickety and with some of the fugitives being sexually abused along the way, has long been trending in global news media.
Meanwhile, newspaper columns and airwaves have also been choked with impotent condemnation of or with pious sympathies over the suffering of the refugees from international bodies but with nothing more done to mitigate the plight of the refugees.
This is in stark contrast to the reception given Europeans in their scramble for Africa in the 19th century to begin the slave trade and the pillaging of the continent’s rich natural resources which the foreigners carted off to build palaces back in their native countries while setting up colonial administrations that oppressed blacks until “the wind of change” swept the foreign rulers away and replaced them with black governments.
In communicology, a strike or demonstration are described as eloquent statements by those involved in something that concerns them and which they want rectified.
Contextually, therefore, the migration of Africans to Europe which continues today should be viewed by all as an eloquent statement about something that the migrants want sorted out by Europe — which is the plunder of Africa’s wealth in the long years of colonialism and which must of necessity be reversed.
In the scramble for Europe “we (Africans) are following our wealth which Europeans plundered during colonialism”, commented Mr Felix Moyo, Director of Communication and Marketing at the National University of Science and Technology.
What was even worse, Mr Moyo said, was that the Europeans went on to “destabilise us”, leaving the Africans with no alternative but to go after what belonged to them.
Mr Moyo said had the Europeans who colonised the continent left Africans with a little something to fall back on, the exploited people would probably not have decided to go on a stampede to Europe.
Now one major European power has decided positively to respond to the African scramble for Europe by embarking on an increased investment programme to stabilise things on the continent, according to international media reports.
The Voice of America reported a few days ago that Germany would increase its investment to Africa in response to the flight of Africans to Europe, as a result of economic impoverishment giving rise to political instability.
[Countries formally colonised by Germany in Africa included South West Africa (Namibia); Tanganyika which became Tanzania after the union with Zanzibar; and Togo and Cameroon.]
Approached by this writer to talk about the reported plan by Germany to increase that country’s investment in Africa, an official at the German Embassy in Harare said: “I can’t comment on something that I’ve not read.”
However, if that country runs with the VOA report on increased investment, a strong possibility exists that, faced with the African migrant deluge, other European countries could reverse the African immigration bromide by lining up behind Germany with their own investment portfolios.
Should that happen, Zimbabwe and Sub-Saharan countries that have investment opportunities galore benefit immensely.
Specifically, Zimbabweans will no doubt increase their prayers for Britain, this country’s erstwhile colonial power, to unveil a huge capital investment portfolio to atone for the illegal economic and financial sanctions that it imposed along with the United States of America and their Western allies, leaving our country teetering on the verge of collapse but for the grace of God and the invincibility of our revolutionary people.
An investment renaissance by Europe will also naturally come as a fillip to re-map relations by revitalising economies other than Zimbabwe’s in Southern Africa as well as elsewhere in Sub-Saharan Africa.
What is even more, improved economies and political stability back home will persuade Africans who sought refuge in a Europe that had remained rather insular to them to retreat back to their motherland to be reunited with family and friends.
Thus, nothing could be better than home sweet home for our people.