George Ayittey
George Ayittey
George Ayitteyis a Ghanaian economist, author and president of the Free Africa Foundation in Washington DC. He is a professor at American University, and an associate scholar at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. He has championed the argument that "Africa is poor because she is not free", that the primary cause of African poverty is less a result of the oppression and mismanagement by colonial powers, but rather a result of modern oppressive native autocrats. He also goes beyond criticism...
NationalityGhanaian
ProfessionEconomist
CountryGhana
African history is filled with experiences of people shooting their way to power and then splintering into factions, like in Somalia and Liberia.
In the West, the basic economic and social unit is the individual; in Africa, it is the extended family or the collective.
Getting rid of the dictator is only a first step in establishing a free society. The dictatorship must also be disassembled.
Dictators are allergic to reform, and they are cunning survivors. They will do whatever it takes to preserve their power and wealth, no matter how much blood ends up on their hands. They are master deceivers and talented manipulators who cannot be trusted to change.
The solutions to Africa's problems lie in Africa, not in Live Aid concerts.
Africa's salvation doesn't lie in begging and begging for more aid, and as an African, I find it very, very humiliating.
Virtually all of Africa's civil wars were started by politically marginalized or excluded groups.
Traditionally, Africans hate governments. They hate tyranny.