This is not about Ivory Coast: Paternalism, Heroism and Other Smoke Screens

There is a debate this weekend on Ivory Coast Post Electoral Crisis Taking place next weekend on CNE and someone asked me to attend because of my "Pro-Ouattara" stand (whatever that means).

As a young African, I find it rather unfortunate that manicheaism has become the standard in appreciation of events. If you are not with us, you are against us: There are no if , and buts. I don't believe that there is one single sane person out there who wishes his country ill; Just like I do not believe that a group or individual has the monopoly of the solutions to all the problems of his country. Proof? even the worst dictators out there thread in the name of the greater good; the only difference is that they are on an egotistical megalomaniac trip that perpetrates in them the idea that they are indispensable. So they are not against their country, but just usually lose the insight of the consequences of their government on the people.

After all let's not forget that the road to hell is paved with good intentions and that only very few people can summon the courage to admit to failure and let someone else takeover especially when they are are in the public eye. We've all seen Hosni Mubarak on TV last wednesday talking like without him his country would spin out of control when he asphyxiated it for over 40 years...

Panafricanism and Nationalism To The Rescue

I once answered to a friend of mine who called me a sellout just because I did not see the evil french man hand's in every predicament of subsaharian Africa that I was a "Pragmatic African". Here is my position: Leaders must do what is right for the interest of their people at every given time; if they are scrupulous and decide to have regards for the rest of the world while doing so great! If they don't, let the rest of the world get leaders of their own that will protect their own interest.  In the meanwhile, no matter the philanthropic lefty idea they behold,  let not fool ourselves: most westerners are glad to enjoy goods and comfort emanating from the exploitation of others and if those said worldly humanists were to find themselves in the precarity in which we are dwelling in the 3rd world today in the name of same charitable principles, they would be rioting.
This is why I do not hold grudges against any western nation that preys on Africa but on Africans for victimizing themselves. It is a cynical vantage I concede, but it is as real as it gets. Our hunger for heroes has brought us to a dark place where we must have a vilain and must have a hero.
The problem is that the hero is never held accountable. Batman never gets arrested for being a vigilante,  or called out on his philandering ways... Does Superman ever gets questionned for his excessive use of force? So why would the "fathers" of our nations be challenged?
The essence of the Hero status is that he is doing something that the common of mortals is not expected to pull off and therefore cannot be questionned. He knows best and in that way is a tyrant depending on what side you are looking at; And if he fails, it must be a trick of the vilain who is at it again.
If you have any doubt about this analysis, just look at the opacity of the political life in most of our countries.
The reality is that if there is a billion to buy cars, presidential planes and watchanmacallit, There is money to build schools hospitals and roads: That being my premise, I only look at results and thereby refuse to swallow that infrastructures were not built in a country where leaders drown in luxury because another country only gives them a tiny portion of their natural ressources: it's plain Bullshit.
I think it's about time people STOP trying to save us whomever they may be whether it's from within or outside. Seriously, I would really like for each of us to take control of things and hold people accountable for their actions and you will see how we can all get along. Michael Moore once said on Jay Leno's "every government should be scared of it's people for democracy to be effective".