We live in interesting times when leading imperialist countries have stopped pretending about the international rules based international order. They are now engaging in imperialist action without ideological cover, shame or constraint to continue their control over world resources and engage in 19th century style gunboat diplomacy. This is what we see in the abduction of the sitting President of Venezuela and his wife and takeover of the country’s vast petroleum resources, the murders of the Libyan and Iraqi presidents and takeover of their petroleum resources, the Syrian debacle and now the battle to take
over Iran’s resources. While the façade was the protection of the international rules-based system, the reality has been that MIGHT IS RIGHT. From the Korean war, to Vietnam, Afghanistan etc external
aggression has led to over 40 million people killed since the end of the Second World War under American hegemony. Extractivism has always been the guiding principle. Nonetheless, Comrade Mao tells us that
American imperialism is a paper tiger.
US imperialism is a paper tiger
“Now U.S. imperialism is quite powerful, but in reality, it isn’t. It is very weak politically because it is divorced from the masses of the people and is disliked by everybody and by the American people too. In
appearance it is very powerful but in reality, it is nothing to be afraid of, it is a paper tiger. Outwardly a tiger, it is made of paper, unable to withstand the wind and the rain. I believe the United
States is nothing but a paper tiger.”
Chairman Mao Zedong
Imperialism has been effective in controlling Africa because from the outset of colonization it adopted a policy of divide and rule to prevent the colonized from uniting against their oppressor. It
categorized Africans as tribes defined by the limitation of their communal horizons and perspectives that could not collaborate with the others. They were not even ethnic groups, not to speak of Nations and
therefore could not lay claims to the colonial state domain which is a civic space beyond their comprehension. As Professor Okwudiba Nnoli, showed in his work, the colonial project limited Africa to the communal space that was small, narrow and kin based.
The second phase of the colonial project was to create and or promote differences between the African people. To separate groups from their neighbours and to produce collaborators for the colonial regime.
Binary divisions were created between indigenes/settlers, Muslims/animists, herders/farmers, leader/follower groups and so on. These divisions were then fanned by modes of inclusion/exclusion to
create rupture between them. In Nigeria for example, the Fulani Emirate aristocracy were presented as natural rulers while the others were naturally fit to be ruled. In the neighbouring Niger Republic, the French colonisers looked at Nigeria and decided the Fulani Emirate rulers on their side of the border were not fit to rule, in case they sided with their brethren on the Nigerian side. The Zarma were chosen
as the group with leadership qualities and were massively recruited into the civil service and army while the Fulani aristocracy was marginalized.
In Burundi and Rwanda, the Tutsi were defined as a royal society with regal leadership abilities while the Hutu were only capable of being led and directed by their superior Tutsi brethren. The fact that they
spoke the same language, lived together and had the same culture was de-emphasised and their differences promoted. The expected result was repeated incidents of violence between the two groups in 1969 1072,
1988 and 1990. In 1994, the Hutu organised genocide in which about 800,000 Tutsi were massacred. Since then, the Rwanda regime has been able to sustain these divisions by promoting the development of Tutsi
ethnic militias in the Democratic Republic of the Congo to raid and kill as a tactic to steal the country’s natural resources in conjunction with the Americans. This was symbolically conveyed to the
whole world in an Oval Office meeting where President Trump spoke proudly about an accord to exploit the Congo’s resources with the selected African presidents clapping enthusiastically at their support
for the foreign exploitation of their resources.
Africa is rich in natural resources with vast deposits of oil, gas, uranium, rare earths, lithium, gold and other strategic minerals. The continent also has a lot of arable land and water resources for
agricultural development. These resources have been subjected to rapacious exploitation by mainly external actors for two centuries. Through this process of extractivism, Africans have been denied the
right to enjoy and benefit from their resources. Imperial countries have used their powers to physically kill or remove from power postcolonial leaders who have attempted to correct the imbalance and
use African resources to benefit the African people. Across many parts of the continent, these same resources have become focal points of violent contestation rather than engines of inclusive growth.
The sad reality is that this natural resource abundance has resulted in very poor governance, sustained manipulation and promotion of violent conflicts by imperialist forces. In so many African countries,
small arms and light weapons have been deliberately distributed to promote civil strife by religious bigots and ethnic militia. Research shows that the presence of valuable natural resources, especially oil
and minerals, is associated with a higher likelihood of civil conflict and organised violence, particularly where state capacity is weak and resource revenues are unevenly distributed. Jihadi groups and ethnic
militias emerge not only as instruments of economic predation but also as actors claiming to defend communal rights to land, oil fields, grazing areas, or mineral deposits. The intersection of resource
competition and ethno-religious identity thus transforms distributive disputes into organised armed confrontation.
At a recent conference by Trust Africa in Abuja, a former United
Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Secretary of the UN
Economic Commission for Africa, Abdoulie Janneh, said Africa needs to
quickly strategize to confront current challenges generated by global
conflicts that have led to a breakdown of the international order and
have direct political and economic consequences for African countries
that are not direct parties to such wars. He added that war is a
destruction of rules and regulations. We live in a world in which one
country will wake up one morning and decide that it will completely
destroy another. Even the African countries that are not directly
affected by on-going promoted conflicts continue to bear economic
consequences of distant conflicts, particularly through inflation and
shortages of grains, fertilizers, fuel and so on.
Another participant, Professor Marwa El Darly of the American
University in Cairo stressed the importance of collective action and
civic engagement in addressing insecurity across the continent. She
drew attention to the current crisis precipitated by the attack on
Iran by the United States and Israel which is currently raising
fundamental questions in Egypt on the Sunni-Shiite war in the Muslim
world where people are finally realizing that the real problem is
American imperialism in liaison with Israel rather than Iranian
Shiism. She concluded that “We are currently living in a world of
insecurity. The solution to the issues in Africa is unity, and unity
is power.”
Africa must produce more and must trade within itself and priorities
the activation of the Free Trade Agreement. The African Union must put
in place mechanisms to trade among ourselves, which can help minimise
the impact of the war.
For too long, we accepted the lie that the West is out to promote the
forces of democracy, rule of law and liberalism. President Donald
Trump has one virtue. He has thrown out the veneer that presented the
West as the good guys. He is upfront in delivering the narrative that
their prosperity depends on their seizing our resources. With that
message resounding clearly, let us brush up our little red book and
confidently declare that imperialism is a paper tiger and fight them
so that we can use our resources for the development of our own
people.
Professor Jibrin Ibrahim
Senior Fellow
Centre for Democracy and Development, Abuja
Follow me on twitter @jibrinibrahim17
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