Poor Man You Are On Your Own

‘Black man you are on your own.’ These are the words of the late founder of the Black Consciousness Movement (BCM), Steve Bantu Biko. He was contemplating the socio-political and economic conditions of his time (the late 60s and 70s), and therefore came up with the foregoing opening statement. Blacks were a disenfranchised people who had been shoved to the fringe of South African society (that is the so-called homelands or Bantustans) and, had no business in “whites only” areas unless their passes suggested otherwise.

   But, the gist of this article is not necessarily about the marginalisation of the black community, than it is about the marginalisation of the poor in society. The latter are seldom included in decision making processes that affect their lives, and if consulted, the tendency by governments and other well-meaning non-governmental organisations is to adopt a paternalistic role vis-à-vis their dealings with them. The relationship is often a filial one, where the less privileged are treated as little children, with whom it is important to take decisions for, lest they make the “wrong” ones. The fact that most of the people—for whom the help by these benevolent institutions is meant for—have lived in their communities for all their lives, and therefore, by extension, understand their environment better than anyone, counts for nothing.

   It is therefore not surprising that we have seen a litany of development failures than successes in Africa. My home country Swaziland is no exception. Her development plans since independence have yielded little or no edible fruits at all. At the heart of these development failures in Swaziland is the question of land and its use. There has been no attempt to deal with the issues of land security in areas under Swazi Nation Land, that is, land administered by the King, held in trust for the Swazi nation. Such land cannot be admitted as collateral by most banking institutions should a peasant farmer seek for a loan. Therefore as a result, the peasant continues to engage in subsistence agriculture as a means of survival, as opposed to commercial agriculture, which could result in progress. And, our government, as many in Africa, is no exception; there is a bias towards funding industrial projects as opposed to funding agricultural pursuits in the rural areas that form the heartbeat of our society.

   Currently, the Rural Development Fund (RDF) is struggling to produce the desired impact. For one, the money allocated to this fund is simply paltry vis-à-vis the need in rural communities, and the lack of stringent controls in the manner the fund is disbursed does not make things any better. According to media reports in the country, the RDF has been the target of corrupt activities from many quarters of our society and has been grossly misappropriated. Hence there are no prizes for guessing why we are still confronted by a staggering number of the population scrapping around for consumables below the poverty line.

Related to the development failures of Africa in general is the correlation between the politics of the continent and the growing inequalities between the rich and the poor. Analysts have, in the recent past forecasted economic growth in double digits, yet there hasn’t been fundamental improvement in the lives of the majority of the rural peasantry. Governments continue to focus in the politics of appeasement and co-optation, which is really the game of the elite. Consequently, state security takes the front seat, while the most important kind of securities; food and human securities perch on the rather uncomfortable back seat of the development automobile.

   Indeed, the aforementioned arguments point to a key point: the complacency among the political and bureaucratic elite of many an African state in retaining the reactive state apparatus inherited from colonial governments. At least with colonial governments, the poor knew what to expect: nothing. Yet in the present dispensation, the yearnings of the masses have been a cry in the wilderness, in spite of independence.  Any changes that have been implemented since then, have been superficial and have not served to transform what was essentially a weak and partial state.

   Many African countries, including Swaziland, still need to engage in a deliberate process of transformational politics, where the state: its legislative, executive and judicial arms, serve the majority of its citizens. The disadvantaged must have faith in these arms of government, that is, they must be perceived to be serving a common good, and not only seen as instruments of the elite and those in power. But, as things stand, one gets the feeling that leaders are still content as they were when they first had the sweet taste of power at independence. One therefore, can only hope that with the steady development of civil society and interest groups in African countries—who are more often at loggerheads with the authorities—state configuration and its relation with the governed will be questioned, and by extension the problem of increasing inequality addressed at its fundamental base.

   I reckon Steve Biko would have agreed with me that, as the case stands, the poor man is on his own.