RE-THINKING ALOUD: Ever asked ‘of what use is politics?’

Danger is lurking in the hearts of Africans. Having been betrayed and sold by their own chiefs centuries ago and now by own presidents, our people are loosing courage.

All over this ‘endowed’ continent, majority are in need of reassurance - we are technically almost done. And the danger is not from without – it is from our political elites.

Africa’s own political class is a dagger to the people partly because of failure to live their words or worthiness and partly because they have become a disease on the wealth of nations.

The worst is that the sickness is ‘maladie contageuse’. We are confused as to what politics is! Whether you went to the Maghreb, West Africa, East Africa or deep in the SADC bloc, a simple question that people do not answer is “why do we need politicians?”

When you ask ease-going laymen on streets the question ‘why do we need politicians?’ you learn immediately that the people already have thrown in the towel and do associate politicians with ‘a self-gratifying lot’ and ‘money worms’.

You learn a politician is viewed as ‘a cunning liar’, ‘a person who tricks people for votes’ and/or worse ‘a treacherous fellow who cannot keep his words’.

Above listed are few of many, yet, constitute the danger facing Africa today. Disbelief in the role of the political class is increasing as people are suspicious of ‘our kind’ of politics. This isn’t about ordinary people only. It isn’t reference to street goers: the docile, the fanatics and the critical mass. It is so among the elites as well.

Risks of associating ‘politicking’ with money

At this stage scholars like Patrick L.O. Lumumba of Kenya are worried that African politics have become a money making guild.

Prof Lumumba argues: “if you want money – real hard cash in Africa today – join politics. You become rich overnight and you get all stately comfort your country can offer.”

He says more – visit YouTube. I affirm to what the professor is saying. The moment you walk on the streets, your eyes see the same.

What does that observation mean? It means the wealth of our nations isn’t guaranteed to hard working and prudent investing.

Lord! What is this!? - It means our wealth is for the cunning and the mediocre. Jobless poorly trained graduates are streaming into politics. Professors and PhDs rush into politics.

Medical doctors, outstanding bankers, savvy engineers and eagle-eyed pilots are gobbling up the lucrative new business on the block - politics. God!

At the end of scrambling we are left with countries whose middle to upper elite are politicians or have connections thereto. Politicians are not producers, they are consumers who reap where they didn’t sow. We are nations full of ‘hares’! - Homes of ‘lodilofas’.

The nature of politics

Politicking as an undertaking and leadership as a conduit for politicking are as old as man. Rudimentary phases of politics go to the emergence of community.

By the time people started living interdependently politics were born. Therefore man is ‘a political animal’- Aristotle. Politicking is a tool for cohesion. As long as mankind lives in society and thus has to influence each other politics and leadership are necessary twins.

Of what necessity is politics? That comes from the root of the word ‘politics’ – the lexicon ‘polis’. Its Greek origin means ‘city’.

The undertaking was ‘politikos’ which means ‘running the affairs of the city’. Among the ancient Greeks where the word was born there were no nations but communities had grown into ‘cities’. Authority that ran a city was a ‘city state’ therefore politikos meant running affairs of the city state.

The Greeks recognised they couldn’t sustain their own egos and that of jealous neighbours unless they had ‘visionary and responsible’ politicians. Realistically politikos meant doing “diplomacy, influencing, cohesing and leading”.

Seeing our leaders using politics for base ends – piling up personal wealth and lavish material gains – or as a whip for sowing discord is regrettable because politics wasn’t “invented” for the purpose of running affairs.