Africa is a vast continent with a total land area of over 30 million square km and a population exceeding 1.4 billion, representing about 18% of the world population. The African Continent is like a coin with two faces: a rich face, and a poverty face.
By the rich face of the coin, the African continent is undoubtedly the most resource-abundant. Resources such as gold, diamond, uranium, copper, cobalt, oil, and natural gas, among others, are abundant and mined in different parts of the continent. Almost every country in Africa has a deposit of natural resources.
By the poverty face of the coin, I mean that Africa is the poorest continent in the world. Per capita income is the lowest and most countries have failed to meet the Millennium Development Goals.
Underlying Problem:
Despite the availability of huge resources and being the richest continent, Africa is very much behind in international trade. The whole continent controls only about 3% of global trade. It also lags in other indicators of economic growth and development, and the fight against poverty is not successful in the majority of countries in Africa. The continent has also been recorded as the most unstable politically in the world. Political conflicts are prevalent in some African countries, and some countries have been described as failed states because of the complete breakdown of their government systems. The Sub-Saharan countries are the most affected. The current situation is dominated by poverty, social and financial corruption, mismanagement of land and resources, lack of proper infrastructure, and poor education and health services.
Resources in Africa:
According to The World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), the African continent is endowed with about 97% of the world’s chromium, 90% of the world’s cobalt, 85% of the world’s platinum, 70% of the world’s cocoa, 60% of the world’s coffee, and over 50% of the world’s gold and diamonds are present in Africa. By the start of the 20th Century, gold and diamond production in Africa took off on a large scale; first in South Africa and later in many other countries. During the first half of the last century, Africa produced 98% of the world’s diamonds and over 70% of the world’s gold.
One may think that by mining such great wealth, countries would be the most advanced by now. However, by producing such great wealth, countries created major conflict zones and became the poorest among nations.
Other natural resources in Africa including fertile lands, timber production, forestry, agriculture, fisheries, and natural tourism are among the largest in the world. African Development Bank Group has recently reported that Africa possesses 65% of the world’s uncultivated arable land with readily available water, if managed well can bring billions of Dollars annually but unfortunately, most are under development or poorly developed. West Africa alone produces over 70% of raw cocoa and over 85% of raw share butter but makes less than 1% of end products to the world.
Despite the abundance of these resources in every corner, African countries are still not developing. What are the reasons behind this situation in Africa, has been a question for debate for a long, but still, we haven’t found a meaningful answer.
What are The Reasons for Undeveloped Africa:
Many African Countries have been blamed for excessive dependence on the Western world. Capitalism has led to an unequal and exploitative international relationship between developed and developing countries, causing developed countries to dominate developing countries. This has created a big failure and underdevelopment in most African countries.
Others blame the underdevelopment of Africa on colonialism and its attendant exploitation, which gives less choice for Africans to manage their resources. Corruption and bad leadership have also been blamed for the lack of development in African countries. Other factors such as poor institutions and cross-border conflicts have also been blamed for the underdevelopment of Africa, even in the face of natural resource abundance. Many others blame poor educational systems in Africa, and despite having youth resources, they are not positively utilized.
In my opinion, all of the above reasons and others seem to have one common root, that needs to be identified. Let us Look at and analyze our history.
History of Africa:
Various ancient greater African civilizations were advanced, strong, wealthy, and cooperated with other world civilizations and interacted positively with greater global influence. The following are just a few many of the ancient civilizations, The Kingdom of Kush, The Land of Punt Empire, The Carthage Great Empire, and the famous Egypt Civilization.
From the 7th century, the influence of Islamic Civilization in Africa stems from the early spread and consolidation of Islamic power. Muslim geographers and traders from the Middle East reached many parts of Africa in the 7th century, and many parts of Africa started embracing Islam during the early 8th Century.
By the end of the 8th century, Islam has many strongholds in many parts of Africa including North Africa, Eastern Africa, Mid Africa, and Western Africa. Islam became stronger in Africa during the 10th century and had unique features that unified its power. People in many parts of Africa were united in one religion “Islam”, one language “Arabic”, and one currency “Dinnar”. Archeologists are continuously finding evidence of Islamic civilizations in almost all parts of Africa since the 8th and 9th Centuries, including they are finding gold and silver “Dinnar” which is the Islamic currency used all over the world since the 7th Century.
By unifying the people of Africa under a single religion, language, and currency, the Islamic civilization allowed for significant growth and created major trade cities throughout Africa. Great Civilizations emerged from North Africa to South, and from East Africa to West. Among these Civilizations is the ‘Great Zimbabwe Kingdom’ an Islamic empire that ruled over a large chunk of modern-day Zimbabwe, Botswana, and Mozambique from the 10th century to the 13th century. It was particularly rich in precious metals and stood astride a trade route that connected the region’s gold fields with ports on the Indian Ocean coast. The remains of artifacts such as Arabian glass and architecture, Chinese pottery, and European textiles indicate that The Great Islamic Zimbabwe Kingdom was once a well-connected mercantile center.
The Great Ghana Civilization was founded approximately 750 A.D. by Wangara people influenced by Arab geographers and traders. Many historical events during the Ghana Civilization were recorded and written in the Arabic language which is still found in various libraries, like the “Book of Geography and People of West Africa” which was written in the Arabic language during the 8th century. Civilization was at its peak during the tenth to thirteen centuries.
The Greatest Mali Empire, which emerged after the Ghana Empire in Western Africa. The Mali Empire still stands as the greatest and richest civilization known by humankind. The Empire tightened its grip over a large portion of West Africa and beyond and grew rich in trade, politics, sciences, and justice.
The Songhai Empire reached its zenith in the 15th century under the rule of the devout King Muhammad I Askia, who forged an alliance with Egypt’s Caliph and established hundreds of Islamic schools, universities, and trade centers in Timbuktu Lands.
The above Civilizations and Empires were renowned for their elaborate adobe schools, universities, and trade centers. One such institution, the great Sankore University included a library with over 700,000 books and manuscripts and offered thousands of scholarships from Africa, the Mediterranean, and Europe for the study of science, social studies, trade, astronomy, and Islamic laws. The Sankore University was one of the biggest academic institutions for over 500 years. The greatest King Manse Musa of the Mali Empire was very generous and helped build many other Civilizations across Africa and around the world during the 14th century.
These Civilizations and others throughout Africa brought development, knowledge, skills, wealth, and trade. Although people were united with one language and one currency, local languages were also encouraged, and Indigenous ways of life were maintained.
Under Islamic rules, there was no discrimination between people and no superiority between blacks and whites; all were equal in justice, education, and possession. For almost a millennium, Islam was the main religion in North Africa, West Africa, the Horn of Africa, Sahel, the Swahili Coast of Eastern Africa, and part of Southern Africa. These civilizations promoted trade between Africa and the Mediterranean and opened the door for African people to trade with the Middle East, Europe, and Asia.
Throughout all these great civilizations and empires, the African Continent was the source of trade, education, and wealth that greatly influenced and exported its cultures and skills to the world. However, all of that was about to end. The seventeenth century brought about changes in human history in Africa and other parts of the world. So far we are realizing that for almost one millennium, from about the 7th Century to about the 17th Century, the African Continent was wealthy and politically active.
Colonization of Africa:
The Islamic civilizations started to weaken in Spain during the 16th Century in which Europeans took advantage and got their way to the world. They found great wealth in the African Continent, and the only thing on their mind was to conquer Africa and slander the wealth for their development. For the next 200 years, The African continent was targeted and re-shaped by different colonial powers including Great Britain, France, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Italy, and Belgium. However, the race was not easy, the resistance from local people to defend their land, their tradition, their culture, and their wealth was great. The only way those colonial powers could do it was to weaken and destroy Islam in Africa and wipe it out from the minds of people. Indeed, Islamic Culture was the biggest resistance to their expansion, not only in Africa but all over the world.
Colonial governments used strategies to weaken African countries by promoting their theology and European Churches were given authority to conquer Africa and plan for missionary programs. They believed that through Christianity they could gain the hearts of people, and the main message was to follow “Loving God” that mainly targeted young generations through well-established “Missionary Schools” with well-programmed teaching curricula that promoted colonization as a way forward for Africa and to forget the past. The resistance was high everywhere but in time the colonial powers destroyed past civilizations including the demolishing of trade centers, schools, universities, libraries, and mosques. The Arabic language, as the united language of Africa, was abolished, and their languages were introduced and promoted at all levels and in missionary schools. People were forced to convert to their religion. Great massacres happened everywhere, and weapons of mass destruction of that time were used to wipe out any kind of resistance. An estimated 110 million were killed in Western and Central Africa and 18 million were enslaved and transported to Europe, America, and South America.
Eventually, during the eighteenth century, colonization got its way to Africa. The history of Africa was changed, and history was wiped out from people’s minds, civilizations were destroyed, religion was changed in many parts of Africa to Christianity, and discrimination against locals was high. All the superiority was for whites while African blacks were nothing but the working force and slaves and were preached that they were the descendants of slaves. People were forced to surrender all their wealth and must sacrifice everything for God through newly built Churches. Churches in coastal areas were used as centers for exporting slaves. New generations were taught in their school curriculum that their ancestors were nothing but forest people with no religion and didn’t believe in “Loving God”, and colonialism is bringing civilization, development, and religion.
Wealth including gold, diamonds, precious stones, coffee, tea, sugar, timber, etc. was exported. Girls at their rose age were spared for enjoyment of whites, and many girls were also exported abroad for dancing and entertainment at nightclubs.
The imposition of colonialism on Africa altered its history forever. African modes of thought, patterns of cultural development, and ways of life were forever impacted by the change in political structure brought about by colonialism. The African economy was significantly changed by the Atlantic slave trade through the process of imperialism and the economic policies that accompanied colonization.
Prior to the "Scramble for Africa," African economies were advanced in every area, particularly in the area of mining, agriculture, and trade. Colonialism aims to exploit human and economic resources of an area to benefit the colonizing nation. The development of colonialism arrested the natural development of the African economic system.
Africa after colonization:
The African continent was completely different after the colonization compared to before. It is very unfortunate to see many recent commentaries from African people themselves highlighting the benefits of colonialism and defending colonialism that brought development and wealth to Africa. What development and wealth are they talking about? Are they serious about what they are saying or have their mind taken that don’t recognize the light and darkness? Let's see how Africa after the colonization is.
The following are highlights of some features of Africa after colonization:
Poverty:
Most African countries lack provisions to satisfy the basic human needs of the population. The continent typically falls toward the bottom of any list measuring small-size economic activity, such as income per capita or GDP per capita, despite a wealth of natural resources. In 2015, 22 African countries were identified as having "Lowest Human Development" on the United Nations (UN) Human Development Index, and as of 2022, 460 million people (nearly 35% of people) in Africa were reportedly living in extremely severe poverty conditions that they don’t have very basic living needs such as food and clothing. A recent list by the United Nations (UN) of 50 countries that are “Least Developed Countries” of the world, 34 of which are African countries.
According to the World Bank, A segment of Africa's population receives low wages or does not have stable employment, the continent's average real wages have since been declining and over 85% of people in Africa subsist on less than US$5 per day. In addition, Africa's share of income has been consistently dropping over the past century by any measure, all measures are far better in other parts of the world compared to Africa. The widespread availability of cheap labor has often perpetuated policies that encourage inefficient industrial and agricultural practices, leaving Africa further impoverished.
Mismanagement of land:
Despite large amounts of arable land in Africa, the export is extremely low. Agricultural lands are poorly managed, and land degradation is very common. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reported in 2015 that an estimated 180 million people in Sub-Saharan Africa are affected by land degradation, which costs about 68 billion dollars per year in economic losses as a result of damaged soils that prevent crop yields.
Misused Money:
In 2002, the president of Senegal, economist Abdoulaye Wade stated, “I've never seen a country develop itself through aid or credit. Countries that have developed have all believed in free markets. There is no mystery there, Africa took the wrong road after independence.”
Despite of huge wealth, the African continent has been a recipient of foreign aid or loans for basic infrastructures, health, and education. The consensus is that these monies have had little long-term effect. For example, the World Bank reported that, as of 2005, the budget of Ghana was more than 50 percent aid-dependent. In many instances, a large percentage of the African budget is either invested in weapons or is directly misappropriated by corrupt governments. Large debts usually result in little being spent on social services, such as medical care, education, or pensions.
In addition, most of the debt currently owed by African countries represents only the interest portion on the debt, and that far exceeds the amounts that were borrowed. According to the World Bank, Sub-Saharan Africa's government debt rose from 28% of gross domestic product in 2012 to 57% of gross domestic product in 2021. This situation hinders any sort of development.
Large sums of money that are in Africa are often used to develop mega-projects when the need is for smaller-scale projects. There are 100s or even 1,000s of examples of such wasted billions of dollars for useless projects. For example, Ghana was the richest country in Africa when it obtained independence. However, a few years later, it had no foreign reserves of any consequence, the huge monies were spent on many useless mega-projects that turned out to be a waste of resources.
Human Resources:
The population of Africa has grown rapidly over the past century and consequently shows youth population is over 60%. The total population is now over 1.4 billion. Across the vast and vibrant continent, Africa is the home of the world’s largest youth population, a generation brimming with talent, innovation, and the potential to reshape the continent’s future.
Tragically, many African nations fail to capitalize on this potential, leaving behind a trail of wasted talent and stunted growth. The harsh reality is that the International Labor Organization estimates that in the year 2019 less than 40% of African youth are formally employed. This mismatch between demographics and opportunity creates a breeding ground for poverty, social unrest, and mass migrations of educated youth to outside Africa. Furthermore, the lack of basic education skills severely limits young people’s ability to compete in the modern workforce, as Africa’s education systems are failing to equip youth with the digital literacy, critical thinking, and technical skills needed to thrive. The situation often brings social unrest conditions, unemployed and frustrated youth are more likely to be drawn into crime and social unrest.
Education:
Education is a major problem, and illiteracy rates are higher compared with the rest of the world. Higher education is almost unheard of in some societies, and some African nations have a scarcity of persons with university degrees, and advanced degrees are rare in most areas. As such, the continent has a severe shortage of scientists, engineers, and qualified teachers.
Diseases:
The greatest mortality in Africa arises from preventable water-borne diseases. The principal cause of these diseases is the water crisis and lack of safe drinking water in most African regions, primarily stemming from mixing sewage and drinking water supplies. Fatal infections such as the Ebola virus and other diseases that are now almost unknown in most parts of the world, like malaria, tuberculosis, tapeworm, and dysentery often claim far more victims in Africa, particularly among the young.
Sexual Transmitted Diseases (STDs) are another threat to African youth, in Sub-Saharan countries over 70% of the adult population carries some or more of such diseases. According to statistics, over 3,000 Africans die each day of AIDS and an additional 12,000 are infected daily, in which less than one percent are treated. This is only AIDS (HIV) daily victims, combined with all STIs the number is extremely unacceptable by any standard. WHO recently reported that Sub-Saharan Africa ranks first in yearly incidence of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) compared to other world regions. Youth are encouraged for alcohol abuse, drugs, music, and discos which lead to sexual arousal that leads to increased unlawful sexual actions.
Poor Infrastructure:
In many African countries the roads, railway tracks, railway rolling stock, and ports are often old and badly maintained and many transportation systems have barely been updated. Some areas completely lack hospitals and schools. Clean portable water is rare in most of Africa even though the continent is crossed by several major rivers and contains some of the largest freshwater lakes in the world. Few major cities have adequate sewage treatment systems. Electricity cutoff is common almost in all Sub-Saharan African regions.
In conclusion:
In this short communication, we realized that the history of Africa from the 7th Century to present has been influenced by three major types of civilization:
Islamic civilizations were dominant in most of Africa for about a millennium from the 7th century to the 17th century. In this civilization, the African continent was known for its advanced economy and trade, education and knowledge, wealth, proper management of natural resources through exploitation and trade, cultural development, and political power.
The colonization era was dominant in the destruction of cultures and civilizations, enslavement, and plundering of resources. Millions of people were killed and enslaved and the economy was brought almost zero.
Post-colonization era is the current era of Africa that is characterized by poverty, poor health services and education, mismanagement of resources, lack of infrastructure, and wide corruption. Alcoholism, drugs, music, and sexualism became a feature of life in most African countries resulting in a continuous increase in sexually transmitted infections and diseases.
Many current African thinkers, writers, and historians are coming forward and writing the history of Africa. Many of them link African civilization to the colonial era, and they mention certain examples that the colonial brought to African civilization such as the railway, ports, missionary schools, and road infrastructure. They are trying to forget all the advanced civilizations that were before colonial. Unfortunately, many of our thinkers are not able to analyze simple historical facts, and instead of using common logic, they accept themselves to be narrow-minded using their writings for the benefit of colonialism and supporting what is dedicated to them to mislead their people. They are happy to appease the enemy of their nations by gaining an unworthy reputation and temporary material benefits, and they are happy to open more channels for post-colonialism and support more corruption and the plundering of their wealth.
Through their wrong understanding of the truth and the rigidity of their minds and their attempt to please others, they have deluded themselves into believing that the civilization that came to destroy their values is superior. These writers have forgotten that colonial civilization is the source of all corruption and problems in Africa.
Can't they realize that we were at the forefront of nations and now we are at the bottom? Can’t they realize that before colonialism, many active ports along all coastal areas of Africa were effectively used for importing and exporting goods? Trade centers and trade routes were well-established in which goods were traded and exchanged. These and other infrastructures were common and well-advanced as per the standards of their times and periods.
Can’t they realize that Africa before colonialism was not economically isolated from the rest of the world? Indeed, Africa was engaged in international trade from the time of ancient Egypt, and West Africa specifically had developed extensive international trading systems during the eras of Ghana, Mali, and Songhai Islamic Civilizations.
Can’t they realize that the previous African Civilizations and Empires brought development, knowledge, skills, wealth, and trade? People were educated with useful knowledge and skills enabling them to effectively use and manage natural resources to interact properly and efficiently with the outside world through well-organized strong trade centers.
Can’t they realize that Colonia governors and writers admitted that they destroyed almost all infrastructures and wiped out past African civilizations, later they built infrastructure, like railways, ports, and roads, that was required for the transportation of and export of their goods. The resources used to build this later colonial infrastructure were local, and human power used was from enslaved young strong black people. Plenty of Missionary Schools were built specifically to brainwash young generations and feed them propagated knowledge so they forget their past glory and accept myths and illusions so that they can be confronted not as per their will but as per what the colonizers wants. The study published by Havard University in 2008 shows that in total 18 Million slaves were shipped from West Africa, West Central Africa, and Eastern Africa to the European Colonies. Both colonialism and post-colonialism regimes removed the concepts of decency, modesty, and chastity in people, which resulted in increasing adultery in societies and diseases.
Are they proud of this? Unfortunately, these African writers are foolish themselves that before colonialism African people were illiterates living nomadic lives and forest hunters, not believing in God. This ridiculous thinking never makes any sense and is not compatible with the history of Africa. Most of these civilizations and empires were Islamic, and Islam believed in one God and it is a pure Monotheistic culture that worships one God. The only reason these writers are trying to manipulate the truth is to defend the Christianity that colonialism brought to them, not knowing that the ideology of Christianity made Western nations plunder their wealth, killing and enslaving their people, dominating them, and indeed is the major source of corruption of Africa today.
On the other hand, these writers intentionally or unknowingly failed to acknowledge that past greater civilizations from the 7th century were indeed Islamic Civilizations, and our ancestors proudly called these civilizations Islamic Civilizations. Islamic civilization works under the framework of the Qur’anic teachings that work under religious principles, morality, knowledge, justice, laws, regulations, sustainable development, and peace. Under Islamic law, it is forbidden to kill people, invade nations, plunder wealth, or enslave people.
In my opinion, had Colonialism and Post-colonialism never been imposed on Africa, its development would be significantly different and many of the problems that plague it today would not exist.
Now, the crucial question is, what system do African people need? The choice is ours, whether we need a Colonial Christian system that promotes corruption or an Islamic system that brings development, wealth, and justice.
I Rest My Case..!
Was this article helpful? Let us know your opinion and thoughts in the comment section below.
References:
Africa: GDP by Country 2024, Statista, www.statista.com.
African Independence: How Africa Shapes the World, Published by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Incorporated, 2016, USA.
Discovering African Past, Published by Davidson Publishing LLC, 1978. U.K.
Encyclopedia of World History, Published by Houghton Mifflin, 1972, USA.
Every-Man’s Encyclopedia, Published by Dialog Information Services, 1978, USA.
Shackled to the Past: The Causes and Consequences of Africa’s Slave Trade, Published by Scholars at Havard – Havard University, https://scholars.havard.edu.
The Encyclopedia Americana, Published by Scholastic, Online Version – 1996, USA.
The Encyclopedia Britannica, 15th Edition, 1996. U.K.
The Last Two Million Years, Published by Readers Digest, 1975, USA.
The World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), www.wbcsd.org.
United Nations Development Program (UNDP) Reports, www.undp.org.
Various Journal Papers about Africa: Social, Education, Health, Development and Economy. University of Ghana Library.
World Bank Group, International Development Reports, www.worldbank.org.
World Health Organization (WHO) Reports, www.who.int.