Wakanda the charter city is coming to Africa but is it really what the African youths want?
First, we have to thank the governments of Zambia and Zimbabwe for the brave steps taken by them to agree to give many hectarers of lands to the African Union (AU) for the creation of „Wakanda One“ Village.
Many thanks also to the Ambassador of African Union to U.S.A Dr. Arikana Chihombori-Quao for her great effort too.
Many African in Diaspora, some of them refugees that fled oppression and misrule from the hands of their leaders have no idea that a Wakanda village is being planned on their behalf, if at all they are included in the plan. But soon, many of them will have the opportunities to come accross this good news through their Whatsapp.
Is Wakanda village for poor Africans or for the rich Africans? Is Wakanda village going to open its doors to many African refugees living in those terrible refugee tents in many parts of Africa.
The UN refugee agency chief was quoted as saying „he too would do “anything” to escape if he was stuck in a squalid refugee camp,“
Tell me, who would not try to escape death and humiliation? The whole Sub-Saharan Africa is „squalid camp“ for the less priviledge. It is a squalid camp for those who are not lucky to be relatives of criminal politiciants. It is a squalid camp to graduates who are not lucky to find job and it is a field of wild games for the criminals and corrupt politicians who exploit the poor Africans with inpunity.
What are these squalid refugee tents and where are they situated in Africa? Just name two; Dadaab and Kakuma are known to host more than 350000 refugees together. These are just two examples of squalid refugee camps.
There are still more of them. How many of the refugees living in those squalid camps would have opportunity to enter the wakanda village? Or they are not qualified to enter there?
But human biengs, black women and men who have the same blood inside their veins like every other Africans are living there in those tents. These people have no hope of today talkless of hoping for tomorrow but some criminals are busy carting away billions of dollars from the same continent that belongs to all of us and we are shouting African Unity! What is unity that we are celebrating inside this Africa?
Madagascar is a country in Africa and it was once considering the idea to create a Charter city but the president was ousted in a coup before he could realise his dream of a Charter City.
Now, „AU“ is ready to do it the African way. African Wakanda village by African people and for African people.
African Union has taken a bold step in this direction with a good aim. According to what came with the news;
“We are going to build the Africa that we want so those Diasporans who say I cannot go home because home is not what I am used to will make it what they want.”
It‘s a good idea at its best, at least for the reason of accepting that we Africans need such a village. Great would it also be, if that village could serve as an example at its best to most of our leaders about how western nations that keep attracting our young women and men are being governed.
If those cties in the west where most of us holled up now are just like those cities we fled i don‘t think we would stay in those cities for half a day. But we keep living there simply because they offer us the protection and security that most of our cities and villages deny us.
But if the proposed Wakanda village is going to be governed as an extention of any of those nations that we fled, then we are just about to create a modern refugee camp which is not really bad if only the inhabitants would enjoy adequate protection.
But if we follow the same old systems that operate in many of those African countries that we left, this Wakanda village may already be on its way to write the same histories written by most of the countries that many of us fled.
Wakanda Village is yet to be seen if it actually has answers to the problems blamed for forcing young people out of Africa and if it has the magnetic strenght to pull African Diaspora, the poor and the rich alike to this yet to be built beautiful valley Village where most of its activities would be headed by the same people that are presently in control of some of the situations that the youth are fleeing in Africa.
Young Africans have fallen in love with European values and nearly every single African has a friend or relative in Europe/America or on the transit countries to Europe. The rich Africans hide their wealth in many parts of Europe as well. Those young people in Africa are busy struggling and praying that the mother luck opens the way for them also to be able to escape to the lands of blessing where the life of every human being matters and well protected by law. Who cares about the life of poor people in Africa? Who? If you are in any country in Africa and you have no job, which government care about you? If you are sick and you have no money to pay your hospital bills in Africa who cares about you? If your parents are poor and could not pay your school fees who cares about you? African leaders and politicians care only about their pockets.
The arguments here is; is it possible to bring to Africa what exactly the young people seek for in Europe? Is Wakanda village in the position to bring this about? Freedom of expression, basic welfare, basic health care? Women right. Children right and protection of human right. Is it ready to protect many of the young people that would be escaping persecutions from mainland Africa? Or is it just a holiday resorts for rich Africans?
Is Wakanda village going to use the rules that most African states use or copy some of the rules from where the returnees are coming from?
It is a bright idea and a good challenge for the „AU“ in particular and for the whole of African in general. But another question that may arise in near future is; why has AU not used the same magic wand it intends using to bring about better life to Wakanda village in transforming one of the failed states in Africa to a paradise?
The Nigerian president Muhammadu Buhari said, „We will make Nigeria more attractive than Europe for Nigerian youths“ but the mothods that Nigeria is going to use that would be able to make Nigeria attractive after 60 years of independence is still yet to be made public.
But talking about creating a new city or village in Africa there looks to be no other short way and there is no cutting corners, if it‘s a charter city or charter village or charter state, it has to follow the rules of charter city as some professionals put it.
Except if we are creating an extention of the existing cities, most of which almost all of us are deserting or have refused to return to in Africa and which many have sworn never to return to.
But if the real aim is to create a village that has answers to what African youth are seeking in Europe, then, that city must be created using the rules that apply in those cities where the Diasporas and the rejected asylum seekers are residing now in Europe or in America.