A UN Security Council with 13 permanent members, namely USA, China, Japan, India, Germany, France, England, Italy, Russia, Brazil, Mexico, Turkey, and South Africa, represents our multifaceted world far better than the 5-member 1945 ‘war college’.
In seven earlier articles, we referred to the three-day deliberations (on the impending UN reforms) that have been concluded on November 14th in the UN General Assembly. We briefly analyzed the historical developments that have produced an extraordinarily different international environment over the past 65 years, and we insisted on the importance of the values and principles declared in Charter of the UN for the forthcoming reform. We then called for a more representative UN Security Council able to reflect today's world, and pertinently address the overwhelming aspirations for Humanism, Democracy, Freedom, Justice, and respect of the Human Rights.
We subsequently advocated for Japan, India, Germany, Italy, Brazil, Mexico, and Turkey, as additional UN Security Council Permanent Members for historical, political, and economic reasons. Here are links to these articles: (http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=43169 -http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=43175 -http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=43181 - http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=43225 - http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=43245 -http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=43346 –
http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=43472).
In the present article, we will focus on Africa, advocating for a more representative UN Security Council. We do suggest Veto Right for South Africa, as the most suitable representative of the Black Continent.
Africa: a Colonized, Underdeveloped and Undemocratic continent of Poverty
Selecting Turkey for UN SC permanent membership may be the best solution as far as the Islamic World is concerned, but this choice leaves the entire Black Continent out of the Veto Club. In terms of civilization, population, surface, human cultural heritage, trade and economy, the African continent cannot be excluded and alienated.
In its totality, the African continent (with ca. 950 million people) is comparable to India in terms of population.
Africa presently includes many of the world’s poorest nations; more notably, according to the United Nations' Human Development Report in 2003, the bottom 25 ranked nations (151st to 175th) were all African nations. Despite this reality, Africa if considered in its entirety equals almost Germany in terms of GDP, with more than US $ 2.4 trillion. This signifies that Africa is a very important part of our world's economic reality that we cannot afford either to ignore or to alienate.
As a matter of fact, and quite similarly with the Islamic World, Colonialism brought about economic exploitation of natural resources, social turmoil, and political oppression. Even worse, the traumatic experience of the colonial times left a very heavy burden, namely misrepresentative and counter-representatively separated countries that do not correspond to the local ethnic-linguistic, cultural, and religious realities. The end result was doubly negative:
1. Politically Imposed Dissemination where National Unity should be the natural, free choice of democratically consulted indigenous populations, and
2. Militarily Forced Unity where Free-will and Separation should be the natural, uninhibited choice of democratically consulted indigenous people.
Contrast with a Great, Millennia Long Past
Africa was home to many great empires. We definitely do not need to go back to the times of Hatshepsut, the first Queen in the History of the Mankind, Thutmosis II, Ramses II, Taharqa, Psammetichus, Nechao, Ptolemy II, Hannibal, Arkamaniqo of Meroe (Sudan, i.e. Ancient Ethiopia), Zacharias III of Makkuria (Africa's largest Christian state before the 19th century, in the area of today's Sudan), Ibn Tulun (Islamic ruler of Egypt) and many other African rulers to encounter large empires and great civilizations.
It would suffice to recall that in 1798 the Ottoman Empire was in possession of African territories totaling no less than 7 million km2!
Still today, Africa accommodates some of the world’s largest countries, namely Sudan (largest African territory), Algeria, and Democratic Republic of Congo. Only these three countries control a combined territory as large as Australia!
Many countries have surface larger than 1 million km2, which is colossal if considered within European context: Libya, Chad, Angola, Niger, Mali, Ethiopia, South Africa, Mauritania, and Egypt are all above the 1 m km2 threshold, whereas many other African countries control territories between 800000 km2 and 1 m km2 (Nigeria, Tanzania, Mozambique, Namibia).
In terms of population, only one African country, namely Nigeria (135 million people), is at the level of Russia and Japan. In addition, there are three other African nations with population larger than the threshold of 50 million, namely Egypt (80 m), Ethiopia (76 m), and the DR of Congo (65 m).
Fifth largest African nation in terms of population, South Africa (44 m) leads Tanzania (40 m), Sudan (40 m), Kenya (37 m), Morocco (34 m), and Algeria (32 m).
As we already said, when it comes to socio-economic and technological development, most of the African countries are undeservedly sunk deep into the bottomless pit of depression, underdevelopment, and insignificance.
So limited, oppressed, and unsuccessful the overall economic activity is that at the level of per capita GDP, we are often met with figures under US $1100! No less than 16 African countries are at this level: Benin, Djibouti, Zambia, Niger, Abyssinia, Eritrea, Liberia, Madagascar, Guinea Bissau, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Burundi, DR of Congo, Somalia, Comoros, and Malawi.
In a dramatic comparison, Nigeria’s GDP is much lower than tiny (5.5 million people) Denmark’s (US $ 191 b and 202 b respectively); even Hungary, an Eastern European country (with just 10 m people) that only recently adhered to the EU, has GDP slightly lower than that of Nigeria, which is 13 times larger in terms of population.
Even more striking examples can be produced in order to illuminate the political failure and the economic disaster of the remaining colonial structures of Africa. Abyssinia, fallaciously re-baptized 'Ethiopia', has GDP slightly larger than that of Croatia (US $ 73 b and 60 b respectively); yet, Croatia, a small former Yugoslavian state with 4.5 m people, corresponds to just 6.5% of Abyssinia's population.
Similarly, Egypt’s GDP is hardly larger than that of (9 m people) Sweden (US $ 334 b and 290 b respectively). Finally, DR of Congo produces a little bit more (US $ 44.4 b) than tiny (2.3 million people) Croatia (US $ 36.5 b).
To reach a conclusion, the only sizeable African country that is economically significant is South Africa. It is certainly not a coincidence that South Africa eclipses all the other African countries, when it comes to Freedom, Justice, Multiculturalism, Democracy, Minority Rights, and - overall viewed - Human Rights.
South Africa vs. Nigeria, Egypt, 'Ethiopia', and DR of Congo
South Africa is the only sizeable African country with strong economy that fulfils all the criteria for the UN Security Council Reform that we reproduce here as well:
The Criteria for the UN Security Council Reform
A. Population – it cannot be under 40 million people.
B. Economic Power – it cannot be under US$ 400 b (GDP).
C. Democratic Administration,
D. Social and Technological Development,
E. Cultural and Religious Identity,
F. Surface – it cannot be under 100000 km2, and
G. Literacy – it cannot be under 60% of the total population of a country.
We will further focus on the possible contenders to clearly demonstrate that they certainly do not represent possible choices.
Nigeria
Nigeria is the right African counterpart of Pakistan!
With last April's elections significantly flawed (according to international monitors), Nigeria is a totalitarian realm of quasi-permanent, half-dormant civil war between fanatic Muslim (50% of the population) and Christian (40%) parties, Nigeria is slightly larger than Pakistan in terms of surface, whereas the Indus river valley country is slightly more populated (164 million vs. 135 million). Nigerian population growth (2.45%) promises a worse future than Pakistan’s (1.98%). Nevertheless, Nigeria is the world's 9th most populated country.
Literacy figures are somewhat better (68% instead of Pakistan’s 49.9%), thanks to the extensive use of English.
Nigeria presents an abominable economic and social record, even if this is compared to Pakistan’s! Nigerian GDP is less than half of Pakistan’s, which shows the reason the African country's capita GDP is so dramatically low (US $ 1500). Nigeria’s exports are much higher than Pakistan's (US $ 57.4 b and US $ 17 b respectively), but this is all due to the Nigerian Oil (95% of the exports – as Nigeria is the world's no 1 in terms of Oil reserves). The two countries' imports are precisely at the same level (US $ 26.9 b and 26.7 b respectively).
However, the Nigerian government's budget (revenues US $ 17.5 b – expenditures US $ 18.7 b) is more limited than Croatia's (revenues US $ 17.9 b – expenditures US $ 19.2 b), despite the fact that the tiny former Yugoslavian country's population corresponds to just 3.4 % of Nigeria's!
The Nigerian underdevelopment is perfectly depicted in the following figures: 1.7 million fixed line subscribers (ca. 30% of Pakistan’s), 32.2 million mobile line subscribers (half of Pakistan's), 8 million Internet users (instead of Pakistan’s 12 million Internet users), and 3550 km railway network (less than half of Pakistan’s).
Under these circumstances, it becomes automatically clear why one can find in Google no less than 433000 references, when searching for ‘Nigerian scam’. The international community should consider the Nigerian administration’s involvement in the notorious scam more seriously, and take proper action as soon as possible.
Offering to such a country the Veto right within the UN Security Council equals to total commitment to the expansion of the Nigerian scam. If some delegates dared vote for such a criminal proposal, the international public opinion would demand details about the level and the extent of the bribery.
Egypt
One must never confuse the Ancient Egyptian Civilization with the underdevelopment, the illiteracy, and the poverty that currently prevail throughout the Valley of the Nile.
Before shedding light on the poor economic performance of today’s Egypt, one should explicitly denounce the incredibly erroneous work done by Western journalists and press establishments.
More specifically, when presenting features on Egypt, Western media focus on tourism and antiquities, and whenever they do not act in this way, they focus on international affairs, namely the relations between Egypt, Israel, and Palestine. This is not an acceptable level of information.
In reality, the Western public opinion has been totally misinformed about today’s Egypt. Although it is very common for a Western reader to find an article with details about the everyday life in the streets of Istanbul, Singapore or Tbilisi, about social life and economic development in New Delhi, Lisbon or Athens, about the favelas of Rio, and about the poverty of the Argentinean Patagonia, total obscurity characterizes the Western mass medias when it comes to daily life in the lower than average districts of Cairo and the provinces of Egypt. Yet, everything is necessary as information, if correct understanding is sought after.
One could contend that the same situation – and at times even worse – prevails in China (already a Veto Club member), India, Brazil, and Mexico (that we support for Veto membership). However, Mexico, Brazil and China have higher per capita GDP than Egypt's (US $ 4200), and India (US $ 3800) is expected to soon surpass Egypt as its GDP grows at a much higher rate (9.4% instead of Egypt's 6.8%). If we take into account the population growth rate (Egypt 1.721% and India 1.606%), we realize that Egypt has very poor chances to lead India in terms of per capita GDP in the years ahead.
However, the real answer is that in all our considerations, the selection of a country hinges on many parameters, not only on population and GDP. In an earlier article of this series, we discussed China's miserably poor Human Rights record. But contrarily to China's voluminous presence in our global economy and trade, Egypt's role is insignificant.
Even when compared to Indonesia, Pakistan and Nigeria, Egypt looks unimportant and secondary. It is true that Egypt’s per capita GDP is higher than the respective figures for Indonesia, Pakistan and Nigeria. But this makes no sense, since the country is much smaller in terms of population without being significantly better as regards any of the rest parameters.
'Ethiopia'
Already, the name of this country is false, and fallaciously conceived; the correct name is Abyssinia. The selection of the false national name (instead of Abyssinia) consists in an unprecedented act of historical usurpation of the name of Ancient Sudan. Ethiopia for the Ancient Greeks and Romans was Sudan, not Abyssinia. This usurpation was possible because of the Pan-Arabic idiocy that prevailed among the cruel and criminal dictators of Sudan, who – focusing on their totalitarian theory of Pan-Arabism and oppressing the various non Arabic ethnic groups of that huge country (the South, Darfur, Kordofan, and the Beja Red Sea coastland) – disregarded the country’s rich Ancient and Medieval Christian past.
As it occurred, opting for ‘Ethiopia’ – instead of the proper name ‘Abyssinia’ – was a necessity for the Addis Ababa dictators, who represent only a tiny ethno-religious minority’s interests in that impoverished country. Ever since the Amhara Abyssinian invasion of the Oromos, the Afars, the Sidamas, the Kaffas, the Shekachos, the Anuak, the Wolayitas, and others, a great number of unrelated peoples found themselves enslaved and confined within a territory of cruel and inhuman Amhara and Tigray Monophysitic (Christian heretic) Abyssinian tyranny.
Monophysitic Amharas and Tigrays, combined, do not represent even 20% of the country’s population, and due to their unacceptable racism, under royal, communist and pseudo-republican regimes, they have incessantly been in total control of the administration, the military, the police, the 'education' and the (state run) economy, plunging the entire country into incredible misery, starvation, pestilence and barbarism.
Oromos represent 40% of the entire population, and claim to Finfinne, which is the real name of Addis Abeba that was renamed after the Amhara invasion. Tigrays make up 12%, Ogadenis 10%, Sidamas total 8-9%, Afars 6%,, and in addition there are several smaller ethnic groups.
Oromos and Ogadenis – alone – inhabit approximately 70 to 75% of the entire territory. The current form of totalitarian Abyssinian regime is an experiment of cooperation between Amharas and Tigrays, the two ethnically close – Semitic and non Kushitic (like all the rest) – groups of the country.
Tigray Dictator' Zenawi's administration and the Amhara-controlled pseudo-opposition party Kinijit (the leader of which is a former minister of the bloodthirsty Amhara Communist ruler Mengistu) try to limit the political game of the obsolete tyranny among themselves.
However, this trick did not make of Abyssinia a more democratic country. The country is expected to split to several pieces, and the Amhara territory will fall apart, since it is the poorest and the most barren part of the country’s territory.
Expropriating itself from its own – Abyssinian – cultural identity, the Amhara ruling minority opted for the false name of ‘Ethiopia’ in order to pretend that the name and the country can possibly reflect 'democratically' the cultural identity of the Oromo Ethiopians, who descend from Ancient Ethiopia (Meroe) in Sudan. This is a baseless political trick, because the only permitted and predominant culture, religion, and language are, under false cover name, the Abyssinian Amhara culture, the Abyssinian Heresy of Christianity (Monophysitism), and the Amharic language – all alien to the Kushitic – outright – majority of the there tyrannized nations.
Beyond the fact that Abyssinia features the world's worst Human Rights record, the obsolete African country cannot be possibly taken as representative of the Black Continent for one extra – but most determinant – reason pertaining to the genuinely racist nature of the two Abyssinian tribes. Amharas and Tigrays do not consider themselves as Black, and they are not of African – but Yemenite – origin. Even worse, they consider the Black nations as inferior, and have provided historians and sociologists with a dramatically long list of insults addressed against the Black people they have tyrannized over more than a century, and all the rest. Amhara and Tigray Abyssinians are alien in – not delegates of – Africa.
It would be however useful to check for a while this totalitarian country’s disastrous economic performance. Despite the fact that Abyssinia's population is slightly smaller than Egypt’s, Abyssinia's GDP is less than one fourth (1/4) of Egypt's.
Totaling US $ 2.6 b, the Abyssinian government's revenues are less than 10% of Egypt's!
With exports totaling just US $ 1 b, Abyssinia exports less than the miniscule state of San Marino (territorial enclave in Italy) that is inhabited by just twenty nine thousand six hundred (29600) people. The Abyssinian exports are equivalent to just 5% of Egypt's.
Not only miniscule European states, but tiny Central Asiatic countries like Mongolia (with less than 3 m people as inhabitants) export more that Abyssinia!
The racist policies of the Amhara and Tigray Abyssinian establishments condemned all the tyrannized peoples of the country to illiteracy. Most of the people in ‘Ethiopia’ are illiterate (literacy reaching only 42.7%), and among the Amharas the illiteracy may rise to ca. 80%.
With fixed line subscribers less than 0.8 million, with mobile users less than 1 million, and with Internet users less than 200000, ‘Ethiopia’ is truly the realm of ignorance, barbarism, regression, and Monophysitic religious fanaticism and extremism.
When it comes to railways, one must admit that the entire country is rather a museum! Tiny Belgium had a greater rail network already before 150 years! ‘Ethiopian’ railways total 681 km!, and the paved highways (36500 km) are equally scarce.
Finally, allover the world, many individuals and businessmen have greater property that Ethiopia's Foreign Exchange and Gold reserves (US $ 833 m)!
Last but not least, ‘Ethiopia’ is one of the world's most extremist and religiously fanatic states, run by the illiterate but hateful debteras, the filthy Abyssinian monks, who still today guide the uneducated and fanatic masses against Western scholars and missionaries, advising at times for brutal assassination of the most bold explorers.
Odd but true! More Christian, Catholic and Protestant missionaries have been killed in heretic, pseudo-Christian, Abyssinia than in Yemen, Arabia or any other place of the Islamic world.
As we can conclude, an Anti-Western and anti-Christian hatred and hysteria emanate from that backward country; if people allover the world do not know about it, the only responsible are simply the Abyssinian dictatorial rulers and the Western mass media. The archaic structure of the Abyssinian state consists in the most flagrant rejection of the concept of the Human Progress towards Humanism and Democracy.
In fact, the Abyssinian Debteras, driving up ignorant and starving people to attack Christian Catholic or Protestant monks in Abyssinia, are just the Abyssinian counterparts of Ossama bin Laden.
Obscurantism runs high, as thousands of valuable Gueze manuscripts – totally incomprehensible to the quasi-illiterate Monophysitic monks of Abyssinia – are out of reach because the Amhara Debteras do not want others to know more about their forged historiography and pseudo-faith.
DR of Congo
Although literacy in the central African country is higher than in ‘Ethiopia’ and Egypt (65.5%), the DR of Congo is plunged in absolute chaos. The government has absolutely no money at all (revenues: US$ 700 m). Apparently, all the world's billionaires are richer than that 'government'.
When it comes to Foreign Exchange and Gold reserves, any beggar in the streets of New York or Karachi has as much as the 'government' of DR of Congo! Just nothing, not a single penny! The amount earlier available has been properly abducted in-between!
With insignificant trade, and with external debt mounting up to US $ 10 b (‘Ethiopia’: US$ 3.4 b only), the DR of Congo has properly speaking mortgaged its gloomy future. The country never had a real fixed line telephony infrastructure, the Internet users are as scarce as in ‘Ethiopia’, and the existing rail and paved highway network is to be accredited to the Colonial past. If the various factions of this deeply divided territory do not make peace, managing to control their army’s dissidents, kick out foreign armies, and establish a minimum state structure, how can this country be seriously taken into consideration?
South Africa: an African Exception to Award!
South Africa is by far the wealthiest and the most democratic country throughout the Black continent. With just 44 million people, South Africa's GDP (US$ 587 b) is slightly smaller than Iran's, or to put it otherwise, almost double than Egypt's, 3 times larger than Nigeria's, 8 times larger than Abyssinia's, and 13 times larger than DR of Congo's.
South Africa’s per capita GDP (US $ 13300) is at the same level with that of several European countries, like Poland (US $ 14400), Croatia (US $ 13400), and definitely higher than Bulgaria's, Turkey's, Romania's, Mexico's and Brazil's.
Literacy in South Africa runs as high as in Turkey (86.4%), and the country’s governmental budget may be almost half of Turkey’s (income: US $ 69 b and 120 b, and expenditures: US $68 b and 123 b, respectively for South Africa and Turkey) but it is triple than Egypt’s, and quadruple than Nigeria’s.
South African trade is far larger than Nigeria’s and Egypt’s, with exports amounting for US $ 64 b (Turkey’s US $ 91 b, but Nigeria’s 57 b, and Egypt’s 20.5 b only) and imports totaling US $ 70 b (Turkey’s US $ 132 b, but Nigeria’s 27 b, and Egypt’s 33 b).
When it comes to high tech, South Africa is the Black continent's undisputed leader with 34 m mobile telephone users (Egypt: 18 m) and 5.5 m Internet users (Egypt: 6 m, but with double population). Quite indicatively, the railway network in South Africa is almost five times larger than that of Egypt (20900 km instead of 5000 km)!
There are more important advantages and more serious reasons for which South Africa – and not Nigeria, Egypt, ‘Ethiopia’ and DR of Congo – is entitled to represent the African continent within an enlarged UN Security Council. This pertains to the prevailing multiculturalism, the institutionalized multilingualism, the political freedom, the respect of Human Rights, and the democratic life, as daily practiced and experienced in South Africa; this situation consists in a midsummer night’s dream for the other African candidates for UN Security Council permanent membership.
The fact alone that the South African government institutionalized no less than eleven official languages (namely Afrikaans, English, Ndebele, Pedi, Sotho, Swazi, Tsonga, Tswana, Venda, Xhosa, and Zulu) shows to the other pseudo-candidates the only way for future progress.
Our suggestions end here, and we are definitely convinced that a UN Security Council with 13 permanent members, namely USA, China, Japan, India, Germany, France, England, Italy, Russia, Brazil, Mexico, Turkey, and South Africa, represents our multifaceted world in a far better way than the 5-member 1945 ‘war college’.
Note
Picture: the Parliament of South Africa
We subsequently advocated for Japan, India, Germany, Italy, Brazil, Mexico, and Turkey, as additional UN Security Council Permanent Members for historical, political, and economic reasons. Here are links to these articles: (http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=43169 -http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=43175 -http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=43181 - http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=43225 - http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=43245 -http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=43346 –
http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=43472).
In the present article, we will focus on Africa, advocating for a more representative UN Security Council. We do suggest Veto Right for South Africa, as the most suitable representative of the Black Continent.
Africa: a Colonized, Underdeveloped and Undemocratic continent of Poverty
Selecting Turkey for UN SC permanent membership may be the best solution as far as the Islamic World is concerned, but this choice leaves the entire Black Continent out of the Veto Club. In terms of civilization, population, surface, human cultural heritage, trade and economy, the African continent cannot be excluded and alienated.
In its totality, the African continent (with ca. 950 million people) is comparable to India in terms of population.
Africa presently includes many of the world’s poorest nations; more notably, according to the United Nations' Human Development Report in 2003, the bottom 25 ranked nations (151st to 175th) were all African nations. Despite this reality, Africa if considered in its entirety equals almost Germany in terms of GDP, with more than US $ 2.4 trillion. This signifies that Africa is a very important part of our world's economic reality that we cannot afford either to ignore or to alienate.
As a matter of fact, and quite similarly with the Islamic World, Colonialism brought about economic exploitation of natural resources, social turmoil, and political oppression. Even worse, the traumatic experience of the colonial times left a very heavy burden, namely misrepresentative and counter-representatively separated countries that do not correspond to the local ethnic-linguistic, cultural, and religious realities. The end result was doubly negative:
1. Politically Imposed Dissemination where National Unity should be the natural, free choice of democratically consulted indigenous populations, and
2. Militarily Forced Unity where Free-will and Separation should be the natural, uninhibited choice of democratically consulted indigenous people.
Contrast with a Great, Millennia Long Past
Africa was home to many great empires. We definitely do not need to go back to the times of Hatshepsut, the first Queen in the History of the Mankind, Thutmosis II, Ramses II, Taharqa, Psammetichus, Nechao, Ptolemy II, Hannibal, Arkamaniqo of Meroe (Sudan, i.e. Ancient Ethiopia), Zacharias III of Makkuria (Africa's largest Christian state before the 19th century, in the area of today's Sudan), Ibn Tulun (Islamic ruler of Egypt) and many other African rulers to encounter large empires and great civilizations.
It would suffice to recall that in 1798 the Ottoman Empire was in possession of African territories totaling no less than 7 million km2!
Still today, Africa accommodates some of the world’s largest countries, namely Sudan (largest African territory), Algeria, and Democratic Republic of Congo. Only these three countries control a combined territory as large as Australia!
Many countries have surface larger than 1 million km2, which is colossal if considered within European context: Libya, Chad, Angola, Niger, Mali, Ethiopia, South Africa, Mauritania, and Egypt are all above the 1 m km2 threshold, whereas many other African countries control territories between 800000 km2 and 1 m km2 (Nigeria, Tanzania, Mozambique, Namibia).
In terms of population, only one African country, namely Nigeria (135 million people), is at the level of Russia and Japan. In addition, there are three other African nations with population larger than the threshold of 50 million, namely Egypt (80 m), Ethiopia (76 m), and the DR of Congo (65 m).
Fifth largest African nation in terms of population, South Africa (44 m) leads Tanzania (40 m), Sudan (40 m), Kenya (37 m), Morocco (34 m), and Algeria (32 m).
As we already said, when it comes to socio-economic and technological development, most of the African countries are undeservedly sunk deep into the bottomless pit of depression, underdevelopment, and insignificance.
So limited, oppressed, and unsuccessful the overall economic activity is that at the level of per capita GDP, we are often met with figures under US $1100! No less than 16 African countries are at this level: Benin, Djibouti, Zambia, Niger, Abyssinia, Eritrea, Liberia, Madagascar, Guinea Bissau, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Burundi, DR of Congo, Somalia, Comoros, and Malawi.
In a dramatic comparison, Nigeria’s GDP is much lower than tiny (5.5 million people) Denmark’s (US $ 191 b and 202 b respectively); even Hungary, an Eastern European country (with just 10 m people) that only recently adhered to the EU, has GDP slightly lower than that of Nigeria, which is 13 times larger in terms of population.
Even more striking examples can be produced in order to illuminate the political failure and the economic disaster of the remaining colonial structures of Africa. Abyssinia, fallaciously re-baptized 'Ethiopia', has GDP slightly larger than that of Croatia (US $ 73 b and 60 b respectively); yet, Croatia, a small former Yugoslavian state with 4.5 m people, corresponds to just 6.5% of Abyssinia's population.
Similarly, Egypt’s GDP is hardly larger than that of (9 m people) Sweden (US $ 334 b and 290 b respectively). Finally, DR of Congo produces a little bit more (US $ 44.4 b) than tiny (2.3 million people) Croatia (US $ 36.5 b).
To reach a conclusion, the only sizeable African country that is economically significant is South Africa. It is certainly not a coincidence that South Africa eclipses all the other African countries, when it comes to Freedom, Justice, Multiculturalism, Democracy, Minority Rights, and - overall viewed - Human Rights.
South Africa vs. Nigeria, Egypt, 'Ethiopia', and DR of Congo
South Africa is the only sizeable African country with strong economy that fulfils all the criteria for the UN Security Council Reform that we reproduce here as well:
The Criteria for the UN Security Council Reform
A. Population – it cannot be under 40 million people.
B. Economic Power – it cannot be under US$ 400 b (GDP).
C. Democratic Administration,
D. Social and Technological Development,
E. Cultural and Religious Identity,
F. Surface – it cannot be under 100000 km2, and
G. Literacy – it cannot be under 60% of the total population of a country.
We will further focus on the possible contenders to clearly demonstrate that they certainly do not represent possible choices.
Nigeria
Nigeria is the right African counterpart of Pakistan!
With last April's elections significantly flawed (according to international monitors), Nigeria is a totalitarian realm of quasi-permanent, half-dormant civil war between fanatic Muslim (50% of the population) and Christian (40%) parties, Nigeria is slightly larger than Pakistan in terms of surface, whereas the Indus river valley country is slightly more populated (164 million vs. 135 million). Nigerian population growth (2.45%) promises a worse future than Pakistan’s (1.98%). Nevertheless, Nigeria is the world's 9th most populated country.
Literacy figures are somewhat better (68% instead of Pakistan’s 49.9%), thanks to the extensive use of English.
Nigeria presents an abominable economic and social record, even if this is compared to Pakistan’s! Nigerian GDP is less than half of Pakistan’s, which shows the reason the African country's capita GDP is so dramatically low (US $ 1500). Nigeria’s exports are much higher than Pakistan's (US $ 57.4 b and US $ 17 b respectively), but this is all due to the Nigerian Oil (95% of the exports – as Nigeria is the world's no 1 in terms of Oil reserves). The two countries' imports are precisely at the same level (US $ 26.9 b and 26.7 b respectively).
However, the Nigerian government's budget (revenues US $ 17.5 b – expenditures US $ 18.7 b) is more limited than Croatia's (revenues US $ 17.9 b – expenditures US $ 19.2 b), despite the fact that the tiny former Yugoslavian country's population corresponds to just 3.4 % of Nigeria's!
The Nigerian underdevelopment is perfectly depicted in the following figures: 1.7 million fixed line subscribers (ca. 30% of Pakistan’s), 32.2 million mobile line subscribers (half of Pakistan's), 8 million Internet users (instead of Pakistan’s 12 million Internet users), and 3550 km railway network (less than half of Pakistan’s).
Under these circumstances, it becomes automatically clear why one can find in Google no less than 433000 references, when searching for ‘Nigerian scam’. The international community should consider the Nigerian administration’s involvement in the notorious scam more seriously, and take proper action as soon as possible.
Offering to such a country the Veto right within the UN Security Council equals to total commitment to the expansion of the Nigerian scam. If some delegates dared vote for such a criminal proposal, the international public opinion would demand details about the level and the extent of the bribery.
Egypt
One must never confuse the Ancient Egyptian Civilization with the underdevelopment, the illiteracy, and the poverty that currently prevail throughout the Valley of the Nile.
Before shedding light on the poor economic performance of today’s Egypt, one should explicitly denounce the incredibly erroneous work done by Western journalists and press establishments.
More specifically, when presenting features on Egypt, Western media focus on tourism and antiquities, and whenever they do not act in this way, they focus on international affairs, namely the relations between Egypt, Israel, and Palestine. This is not an acceptable level of information.
In reality, the Western public opinion has been totally misinformed about today’s Egypt. Although it is very common for a Western reader to find an article with details about the everyday life in the streets of Istanbul, Singapore or Tbilisi, about social life and economic development in New Delhi, Lisbon or Athens, about the favelas of Rio, and about the poverty of the Argentinean Patagonia, total obscurity characterizes the Western mass medias when it comes to daily life in the lower than average districts of Cairo and the provinces of Egypt. Yet, everything is necessary as information, if correct understanding is sought after.
One could contend that the same situation – and at times even worse – prevails in China (already a Veto Club member), India, Brazil, and Mexico (that we support for Veto membership). However, Mexico, Brazil and China have higher per capita GDP than Egypt's (US $ 4200), and India (US $ 3800) is expected to soon surpass Egypt as its GDP grows at a much higher rate (9.4% instead of Egypt's 6.8%). If we take into account the population growth rate (Egypt 1.721% and India 1.606%), we realize that Egypt has very poor chances to lead India in terms of per capita GDP in the years ahead.
However, the real answer is that in all our considerations, the selection of a country hinges on many parameters, not only on population and GDP. In an earlier article of this series, we discussed China's miserably poor Human Rights record. But contrarily to China's voluminous presence in our global economy and trade, Egypt's role is insignificant.
Even when compared to Indonesia, Pakistan and Nigeria, Egypt looks unimportant and secondary. It is true that Egypt’s per capita GDP is higher than the respective figures for Indonesia, Pakistan and Nigeria. But this makes no sense, since the country is much smaller in terms of population without being significantly better as regards any of the rest parameters.
'Ethiopia'
Already, the name of this country is false, and fallaciously conceived; the correct name is Abyssinia. The selection of the false national name (instead of Abyssinia) consists in an unprecedented act of historical usurpation of the name of Ancient Sudan. Ethiopia for the Ancient Greeks and Romans was Sudan, not Abyssinia. This usurpation was possible because of the Pan-Arabic idiocy that prevailed among the cruel and criminal dictators of Sudan, who – focusing on their totalitarian theory of Pan-Arabism and oppressing the various non Arabic ethnic groups of that huge country (the South, Darfur, Kordofan, and the Beja Red Sea coastland) – disregarded the country’s rich Ancient and Medieval Christian past.
As it occurred, opting for ‘Ethiopia’ – instead of the proper name ‘Abyssinia’ – was a necessity for the Addis Ababa dictators, who represent only a tiny ethno-religious minority’s interests in that impoverished country. Ever since the Amhara Abyssinian invasion of the Oromos, the Afars, the Sidamas, the Kaffas, the Shekachos, the Anuak, the Wolayitas, and others, a great number of unrelated peoples found themselves enslaved and confined within a territory of cruel and inhuman Amhara and Tigray Monophysitic (Christian heretic) Abyssinian tyranny.
Monophysitic Amharas and Tigrays, combined, do not represent even 20% of the country’s population, and due to their unacceptable racism, under royal, communist and pseudo-republican regimes, they have incessantly been in total control of the administration, the military, the police, the 'education' and the (state run) economy, plunging the entire country into incredible misery, starvation, pestilence and barbarism.
Oromos represent 40% of the entire population, and claim to Finfinne, which is the real name of Addis Abeba that was renamed after the Amhara invasion. Tigrays make up 12%, Ogadenis 10%, Sidamas total 8-9%, Afars 6%,, and in addition there are several smaller ethnic groups.
Oromos and Ogadenis – alone – inhabit approximately 70 to 75% of the entire territory. The current form of totalitarian Abyssinian regime is an experiment of cooperation between Amharas and Tigrays, the two ethnically close – Semitic and non Kushitic (like all the rest) – groups of the country.
Tigray Dictator' Zenawi's administration and the Amhara-controlled pseudo-opposition party Kinijit (the leader of which is a former minister of the bloodthirsty Amhara Communist ruler Mengistu) try to limit the political game of the obsolete tyranny among themselves.
However, this trick did not make of Abyssinia a more democratic country. The country is expected to split to several pieces, and the Amhara territory will fall apart, since it is the poorest and the most barren part of the country’s territory.
Expropriating itself from its own – Abyssinian – cultural identity, the Amhara ruling minority opted for the false name of ‘Ethiopia’ in order to pretend that the name and the country can possibly reflect 'democratically' the cultural identity of the Oromo Ethiopians, who descend from Ancient Ethiopia (Meroe) in Sudan. This is a baseless political trick, because the only permitted and predominant culture, religion, and language are, under false cover name, the Abyssinian Amhara culture, the Abyssinian Heresy of Christianity (Monophysitism), and the Amharic language – all alien to the Kushitic – outright – majority of the there tyrannized nations.
Beyond the fact that Abyssinia features the world's worst Human Rights record, the obsolete African country cannot be possibly taken as representative of the Black Continent for one extra – but most determinant – reason pertaining to the genuinely racist nature of the two Abyssinian tribes. Amharas and Tigrays do not consider themselves as Black, and they are not of African – but Yemenite – origin. Even worse, they consider the Black nations as inferior, and have provided historians and sociologists with a dramatically long list of insults addressed against the Black people they have tyrannized over more than a century, and all the rest. Amhara and Tigray Abyssinians are alien in – not delegates of – Africa.
It would be however useful to check for a while this totalitarian country’s disastrous economic performance. Despite the fact that Abyssinia's population is slightly smaller than Egypt’s, Abyssinia's GDP is less than one fourth (1/4) of Egypt's.
Totaling US $ 2.6 b, the Abyssinian government's revenues are less than 10% of Egypt's!
With exports totaling just US $ 1 b, Abyssinia exports less than the miniscule state of San Marino (territorial enclave in Italy) that is inhabited by just twenty nine thousand six hundred (29600) people. The Abyssinian exports are equivalent to just 5% of Egypt's.
Not only miniscule European states, but tiny Central Asiatic countries like Mongolia (with less than 3 m people as inhabitants) export more that Abyssinia!
The racist policies of the Amhara and Tigray Abyssinian establishments condemned all the tyrannized peoples of the country to illiteracy. Most of the people in ‘Ethiopia’ are illiterate (literacy reaching only 42.7%), and among the Amharas the illiteracy may rise to ca. 80%.
With fixed line subscribers less than 0.8 million, with mobile users less than 1 million, and with Internet users less than 200000, ‘Ethiopia’ is truly the realm of ignorance, barbarism, regression, and Monophysitic religious fanaticism and extremism.
When it comes to railways, one must admit that the entire country is rather a museum! Tiny Belgium had a greater rail network already before 150 years! ‘Ethiopian’ railways total 681 km!, and the paved highways (36500 km) are equally scarce.
Finally, allover the world, many individuals and businessmen have greater property that Ethiopia's Foreign Exchange and Gold reserves (US $ 833 m)!
Last but not least, ‘Ethiopia’ is one of the world's most extremist and religiously fanatic states, run by the illiterate but hateful debteras, the filthy Abyssinian monks, who still today guide the uneducated and fanatic masses against Western scholars and missionaries, advising at times for brutal assassination of the most bold explorers.
Odd but true! More Christian, Catholic and Protestant missionaries have been killed in heretic, pseudo-Christian, Abyssinia than in Yemen, Arabia or any other place of the Islamic world.
As we can conclude, an Anti-Western and anti-Christian hatred and hysteria emanate from that backward country; if people allover the world do not know about it, the only responsible are simply the Abyssinian dictatorial rulers and the Western mass media. The archaic structure of the Abyssinian state consists in the most flagrant rejection of the concept of the Human Progress towards Humanism and Democracy.
In fact, the Abyssinian Debteras, driving up ignorant and starving people to attack Christian Catholic or Protestant monks in Abyssinia, are just the Abyssinian counterparts of Ossama bin Laden.
Obscurantism runs high, as thousands of valuable Gueze manuscripts – totally incomprehensible to the quasi-illiterate Monophysitic monks of Abyssinia – are out of reach because the Amhara Debteras do not want others to know more about their forged historiography and pseudo-faith.
DR of Congo
Although literacy in the central African country is higher than in ‘Ethiopia’ and Egypt (65.5%), the DR of Congo is plunged in absolute chaos. The government has absolutely no money at all (revenues: US$ 700 m). Apparently, all the world's billionaires are richer than that 'government'.
When it comes to Foreign Exchange and Gold reserves, any beggar in the streets of New York or Karachi has as much as the 'government' of DR of Congo! Just nothing, not a single penny! The amount earlier available has been properly abducted in-between!
With insignificant trade, and with external debt mounting up to US $ 10 b (‘Ethiopia’: US$ 3.4 b only), the DR of Congo has properly speaking mortgaged its gloomy future. The country never had a real fixed line telephony infrastructure, the Internet users are as scarce as in ‘Ethiopia’, and the existing rail and paved highway network is to be accredited to the Colonial past. If the various factions of this deeply divided territory do not make peace, managing to control their army’s dissidents, kick out foreign armies, and establish a minimum state structure, how can this country be seriously taken into consideration?
South Africa: an African Exception to Award!
South Africa is by far the wealthiest and the most democratic country throughout the Black continent. With just 44 million people, South Africa's GDP (US$ 587 b) is slightly smaller than Iran's, or to put it otherwise, almost double than Egypt's, 3 times larger than Nigeria's, 8 times larger than Abyssinia's, and 13 times larger than DR of Congo's.
South Africa’s per capita GDP (US $ 13300) is at the same level with that of several European countries, like Poland (US $ 14400), Croatia (US $ 13400), and definitely higher than Bulgaria's, Turkey's, Romania's, Mexico's and Brazil's.
Literacy in South Africa runs as high as in Turkey (86.4%), and the country’s governmental budget may be almost half of Turkey’s (income: US $ 69 b and 120 b, and expenditures: US $68 b and 123 b, respectively for South Africa and Turkey) but it is triple than Egypt’s, and quadruple than Nigeria’s.
South African trade is far larger than Nigeria’s and Egypt’s, with exports amounting for US $ 64 b (Turkey’s US $ 91 b, but Nigeria’s 57 b, and Egypt’s 20.5 b only) and imports totaling US $ 70 b (Turkey’s US $ 132 b, but Nigeria’s 27 b, and Egypt’s 33 b).
When it comes to high tech, South Africa is the Black continent's undisputed leader with 34 m mobile telephone users (Egypt: 18 m) and 5.5 m Internet users (Egypt: 6 m, but with double population). Quite indicatively, the railway network in South Africa is almost five times larger than that of Egypt (20900 km instead of 5000 km)!
There are more important advantages and more serious reasons for which South Africa – and not Nigeria, Egypt, ‘Ethiopia’ and DR of Congo – is entitled to represent the African continent within an enlarged UN Security Council. This pertains to the prevailing multiculturalism, the institutionalized multilingualism, the political freedom, the respect of Human Rights, and the democratic life, as daily practiced and experienced in South Africa; this situation consists in a midsummer night’s dream for the other African candidates for UN Security Council permanent membership.
The fact alone that the South African government institutionalized no less than eleven official languages (namely Afrikaans, English, Ndebele, Pedi, Sotho, Swazi, Tsonga, Tswana, Venda, Xhosa, and Zulu) shows to the other pseudo-candidates the only way for future progress.
Our suggestions end here, and we are definitely convinced that a UN Security Council with 13 permanent members, namely USA, China, Japan, India, Germany, France, England, Italy, Russia, Brazil, Mexico, Turkey, and South Africa, represents our multifaceted world in a far better way than the 5-member 1945 ‘war college’.
Note
Picture: the Parliament of South Africa
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