God bless the day...

Casablanca Airport,
Morrocco
April 8, 2007
1:45pm

Taking a trip to Moroccos was to discover myself and to find out a new meaning for my life. I found out other things. I guess I have been needing a holiday for quite sometime so the trip doubled up as a holiday too which turned out to be quite a fascinating experience. I will recount this experience in the next few lines. One thing I have learned for sure is that the African continent is endowed with so much wealth and resources that we should be self sustaining. Well, I guess I did not discover this fact on this trip, it was just reasserted. For I have seen the rubber plantation in Liberia, to the Cocoa in Cote d'Ivore and Ghana, the Cashew, nuts and pulp in Guinea Bissau to the oil in Nigeria, the fish in Senegal, Guinea, Guinea Bissau and the gold in Sierra Leone, Liberia and Ghana. Not to talk of the finished products which we have not resourced maximally. We still eat swiss chocolate, made from Ghanian cocoa, nuts from Brazil made from Bissau cashew, tires from Italy made from Liberian rubber. I guess I am alluding also to the clothes bought in Nigeria by Nigerian traders, brought to Senegal to be designed, embroidered by the rather careful and meticulous craftsmen of Dakar. This is just a few instance of inter-country trade that happens in West African – the production line between locally produced resources and finished good. Even then, the pieces of fabrics used come from outside the continent hence it is not a completely 100% 'made in Africa' product.

Africa's raw/natural resources gets shipped out to other countries and then re-imported with high taxes, duties and rates that cripples the buying power of the average person. And because the average person sees this as a must have, goes to whatever length to acquire these designer goods further plunging themselves into a debt totally fabricated by the West. I have alluded before now to the fish from African's coastal countries being sucked out to the orient in exchange for infrastructure or Liberian rubber with production factories outside the continent. It is very rare to find 100% locally produced African goods, and 100% locally consumed. I may not have paid attention but I could only discover smuggled refined petroleum products from Nigeria to neighboring Benin – the quantity of which is perhaps less than .01% of Nigeria's petroleum export capacity. Yet African countries buy finished petroleum products from everywhere else but Nigeria. In fact it is mentioned that Nigerian petroleum smells hence cannot be consumed in Benin – such flimsy excuse! While this may be true, I reckon such issues can be dealt with during bilateral trade negotiations between these countries and of course could be on the table for discussion between Nigeria and other countries in the region and the continent as a whole.

It would be interesting to conduct a study aimed at discovering how much of locally produced goods are locally consumed. A lie is being fabricated by the West that African produced finished goods are not fit for consumption in the West as they do not meet their quality control standards. Incredible! Yet, the raw materials do! Fascinating enough is the fact that western produced goods fall within the sub standard, low African level of quality control. this is the case for cashew nuts from Guinea Bissau, which gets shipped out of that country into Brazil by shrewed Indian business men. No goods produced in Guinea Bissau can meet the QC standard of the International Standards Organisation. In fact, Guinea Bissau can never produce a QC mechanism that will meet up to international standard – so it is alluded. What QC can India produce that cannot be produced by Guinea Bissau? Or why do standards differ from country to country? Why are there shifting goal posts? Not withstanding the corruption factor, etc most of these fabrications are just but to keep Africans from playing in the global market.

Then is the solution trade amongst ourselves? As mentioned, very few cases of regional trade exists. Nigeria-Senegal traditional clothe trade aside. How much more of such exists? Indeed the Senegal tailors and fashion designers have met the standards of the Nigerian market. I hear the president of the country even wears these clothes! Was this standard defined by some international organisation? Was the standard defined locally in Nigeria? Was there a formal standards authority that defined a set of indicators/rules that should define well made Senegalese clothes for use in Nigeria? The point is that standards are relative and perhaps do not require the vetting of any international organisation. At least not within the African context. Do we then need to define rules for regional trade? Do we need to set up a formal structure for which trade must happen or should we just follow the free rules of allowing the river define its course? Should we leave the definition of these standards between the the producer and the consumer of the goods but then focus on catalysing the trade links? Initiating it such that the course for standards are defined later on? What is needed within and between our countries? What do we have and what do we need to share amongst ourselves? Perhaps then we can define rules that block the infiltration of substandard similar goods that flood our markets. These should be standards that should be created. Imagine the blockage of genetically modified canned or packaged goods from coming into the continent and the impact it would have on the West. And that being a decision made globally by the entire continent. By the way, there is food enough to feed the continent without depending on obese-causing GM foods.

Back to my Moroccan trip, I guess another very striking moment is the thousands of European license plated cars that traverse Moroccan roads. Its the holiday season in Europe, hence the 'world' floods Morocco. A quick glance on the license plates show an almost one for one statistics to locally numbered vehicles. These range from motorcycles to trucks. The taxi driver from the Corniche in Casablanca to the airport mentioned that there is an 'accord' by the Moroccan government to allow cars traverse their routes for some one or two year without matriculation What generosity!. The influx of cars from other parts of the world to Morocco – Africa makes me wonder what the reverse really is and if there is a possibility that the reverse can happen. If any government of the West or Europe has allowed or would allow an accord permitting cars with African matriculation traverse their territories. Again, a question of standards is called in. Are the vehicles on African roads worthy enough to be driven on European roads? These standards are invoked when needed for if a car can travel into the continent without a road worthiness check then it should believe that a road worthiness exist for the reverse.. This imbalanced standards are invoked as in trade issues mentioned above. A remarked observation is the rudeness expressed by these drivers of foreign numbered plates on African roads. Things they would not do in their countries. It seems that they operate under some invincible immunity clause. Thats beside the point.

Morocco exports oranges to most world countries. I have seen Moroccan oranges in Senegal. I do not know of any other African countries that import Moroccan oranges. It could be that they are not needed as most African countries perhaps produce oranges or some fruit that can be substituted for oranges. But was there a formal trade agreement between Senegal and Morocco for the import and export of oranges? Are there other goods produced in the Margreb that can be consumed in other parts of Africa and vice versa? And perhaps also take this informal trade routings and not so clearly defined standard rules of trade between the countries within the continent?

African is a popular destination for tourism. Loads of tourists flock key destinations in the continent annually and throughout the year to experience the sunshine in the continent, its beautiful waves, beaches and hospitable people. January to December sees people to Capetown and Durban in South Africa, the Safari parks in Kenya, the mountains in Ethiopia, the beaches, tranquil and lovely teranga welcome of the people of Senegal, the secluded and nicely endowed beaches of the Gambia, and the akwaaba of the Ghanaian people. Thousands visit these destinations annually. Bus loads after bus loads are emptied into hotels. Chartered flights help cope with the volume of travel at special times defined by the climate in these counties.

Another popular destination that this trip has afforded me an experience is the desert dunes of the Merzouga in South Morocco, the winding and breath taking strips of roads up the atlas mountains between windy Ouarzazate and homely Marrakech, the historic souqs of Fes and the camel ride to see the sun rise over the hills. Beaches and deserts alike are flooded annually!!! Anything in Africa is indeed a tourist attraction! Imagine the opportunities available for tourism in the deep forests in the Congo, Ghana and Nigeria. God bless the day a guided tour can be made through one of the forests! A popular tourism destination is created! And guess who it is sold to? The West of course! Marketed to the same Europeans who colonized but ensured that we remained below standard – as defined by them. Chances are, such businesses will be owned by the west themselves. Who said colonialism was over?

The bottom line here is that we may not be popular tourism destinations for ourselves, which is rather unfortunate as our continent should be discovered by ourselves well before another set of Mango Parks, Robinson Crusoes, and Vasco Da Gamas embark on another exploratory voyage of our luscious continent. I should pay to go visit South Africa, Kenya or even Cape Verde – one of Africa's best kept secret islands , Sierra Leone and its beautiful 7 beaches before spending my hard earned 'sub standard' cash in 'popular destinations in Europe and the rest of the world. Perhaps we would be able to market ourselves better to ourselves, cut down the bureaucratic visa tapes that shut ourselves from visiting ourselves. That enables us to sever the links with our colonial past – God bless the day the Kenyan government would give authority to another African country to issue its visas rather than the present United Kingdom embassy in Senegal!

Moaning aside, it is tiring to see our continent being enjoyed by others when we could ourselves 'occupy' our residence. It seems a curse has been placed on our heads. Who said voodoo was only African? Where did Harry Porter come from? It must be something of the sort – spells and bondages imposed by witches that keep our eyes closed to very simple and basic realities. How else can one explain this quagmire we find ourselves. It must be that, or we simply cannot organise ourselves in a way that makes us use our resources for ourselves.. God bless the day we see our continent as one state. Where the boundary lines totally disappears from our eyes. Where visas are a thing of the past, where regional trade becomes a normal occurrence. God bless the day we sell our continent to ourselves. Yes, thats what we need to do. We should sell ourselves to ourselves and for once forget about the day that liberation would come from the west. We have waited 50 years (Ghana's independence) for this to happen and yet it has not. It will never happen. Reality must hit us like a ton of bricks and we must ourselves take the battle to ourselves. It lies in the moment. My child wont do it. I will play my part and s/he will when their time comes. Just that we must seek to achieve the one goal and objective – liberate our continent and thus ourselves!