I have thought for many years that Africa, a continent made up of many countries should be adopted by the United Nations and managed by them until Africa is ready to join the league of nations. Wow - did that sound harsh? I hope not. On the contrary - I want Africa to succeed, to flourish and not to fail.
Ever since I can remember, there has been some kind of turmoil in Africa. Some tribal, some nation against nation and some civil unrest. Whatever the case of the conflict is, the end result is suffering, starvation and death. In a continent, which is thought by many as the cradle of civilization, which has vast natural resources, this is wholly unacceptable.
For example, in the Congo, a nation of 63 million people in the heart of Africa, a peace deal signed more than three years ago was supposed to halt a war that drew in combatants from at least eight other countries, producing a record of human devastation unmatched in recent history. The International Rescue Committee estimates that 3.9 million people have died from war-related causes since the conflict in Congo began in 1998, making it the world's most lethal conflict since World War II.
Then we have Sudan. A former U.N. humanitarian chief recently stated there is no question that tens of thousands more people have died since a 2006 estimate of 200,000 killed. He cited the dramatic increase in the number of people affected by the conflict and the recent upsurge in fighting, and said 400,000 dead is probably closer to the truth. Think of this happening to a country in Europe of a state in our country. Unthinkable and unacceptable - yet we have watched this from the sidelines for years.
However, one of the more insidious examples of the barbarism in Africa was the Rwandan Genocide from April 6 to mid-July in 1994. During this time period the world witnessed the mass killing of hundreds of thousands of Rwanda's Tutsis and Hutu political moderates by Hutus under the Hutu Power ideology. Over the period of 100 days, from 6 April through mid-July, at least 500,000 people were killed, although some estimate the total could be over 1,000,000 (which is about 20% of the population. As we saw on the news most every night during that time period, AK-47s, grenades but mostly machetes were the weapons of choice to carry out this butchery. Again, the world did very little to stop this carnage.
Ethiopia/Somalia conflict is a trouble spot right now. In fact, the number of minor skirmishes and unsettled truces within the continent are too many to mention in this post. So what is the answer? Keep looking at the distended bellies from malnutrition and hunger on the nightly news? See young people maimed by having limbs cut off with machetes? See young women disfigured by having their breasts cut off so they cannot feed their young? No - this carnage and suffering needs to stop now!
The world needs to use the United Nations to "adopt" Africa. The U.N. needs to be peacekeepers, nation builders and teachers to every dysfunctional nation that exists in the African continent. Much of the starvation that exists are not due to lack of food - it is due to food being withheld from people either by an existing government or one from a neighboring country. The U. N. could put a stop to this immediately. Aid has poured into Africa from all over the world, in particular the United States.
Once Africa has proven to the world that it can govern itself as a collection of individual autonomous countries, the U. N. can return control to the African people. Until then, like a troubled child, Africa needs parental control and guidance.
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