Blame Sudan’s problems on the bigotry of elitism
By James Adiok Mayik
May 18, 2009 — Sudan is the largest country of the African continent but with the largest population of people to make up the poorest of the world if not of Africa. Being the richest in natural resources, however, a more vigilant look will help the wise to blame this poverty onto the few elites who have dominated the country’s public arena for decades. Many other factors including a culture of shortcuts also in the context of elitism will share this blame. Look at the gap between the poor and the rich in Sudan. In Khartoum, for example, 90% of north Sudanese own mansions similar to what can only be found in Dubai and most of the first world countryside. Some of these mansions are used as rentals to foreign workers and business investors while the common local market is absent. This is contrary to what you find in the impoverished areas of jebel El Aulia, Sahara Mayo, Mandela, and Ayusib where many immigrants from different corners of the Sudan have turned refugees in their own country’s capital.
Come to the South and all you see in Juba is the emerging first class of few citizens who have started similar hoarding process of public resources as that found in the north. When dinning in restaurants, it is not hard to spend a hundred US dollars; a value, which in the United States itself, would keep food on the table for one month in a wise family. Then you grapple to answer many questions that come to mind. These questions are summarized in a single one here, why did the south Sudanese picked up arms to go to war? Why did we allow the death of two million citizens only to see their orphans and widows join the slum dwellings?
It seems to me and many out there that SPLM/A was founded to protest and suppress marginalization brought about by elitism and classism practiced from time immemorial in the north depriving other parts of their rights to flourish. And it seems also that the same vices are replicating within the young semi-autonomous south; replacing marginalization with marginalization, elitism with elitism, and classism with the same classism. This makes me worry so much and I don’t know if I share these worries with millions of other citizens out there. Let me stress on few issues of top concerns in the Sudan’s social setting.
Democracy: elections are to commence in February 2010 as claimed in Sudan at the moment. But unanswered questions remain worrying many including me. Will these elections turn into selections as usual because of the persistent bigotry of the few elites who think are the most gifted thinkers to lead in the decision making process? Out of honest self reflections, I have of latest grown to believe in Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection which attributes mankind’s political struggle to “survival of the fittest.” That means a power which has been fought for must not be given away for free. What is the purpose of these elections then? Why waste money to carry them out anyway when we know for sure who the natural leaders are?
Corruption: but then, on the other hand, I wonder how to reconcile Darwin’s theory with Edward Wilson’s sociobiology, which in Sudan’s case will attribute rampant corruption to family loyalty. This fact, family loyalty, has once been cited by the International Anticorruption Agency to the root cause of corruption in the world. To many who have visited Juba so far, stories are told that the houses of those who are employed in the GOSS are full of relatives. So imagine being a public employer with many unemployed family members defending on you for your salary in your own house. How easy will it be for you to give away jobs under your power to distant job seekers other than the ones in your own house? It is common and easy in this scenario for good leaders to fall from grace into corruption slots when they fail to see that employing ones’ own relatives is a conflict of interest; a type of corruption indeed. Then you see few families dominating individual ministries. You see few people cropping up to create family dynasties with their children attending good schools in the neighboring countries. And the wealth ends up in few hands and then another rebellion by concerned citizens, which is exactly what the SPLM/A was founded on.
Economic Growth: Like I mentioned in the introduction, Sudan is blessed with many natural resources and a vast fertile land. This country would be the bread basket of Africa if it were gifted with diversity of ideas. Can anyone tell me that sustainable development can come to Sudan with its current status quo? I don’t think so. In my own opinion, plausible development of a country’s land only comes from its well developed people. How can Sudan develop when its top leadership doesn’t see the value of higher education? I am not suggesting that college education must be the only route to top leadership, don’t get me wrong here. What I am saying is that when the ratio of well trained citizens outnumbers the less trained, the net productivity will always be positive when it comes to economic growth in a country and the reverse is true.
Let me break this down in simpler details. I may begin by quoting Angelo Achuil whose article appeared earlier on the Gurtong editor’s page that investors like to live where they themselves and their money are safe. Can a hostile country like Sudan attract foreign and local investors who can create jobs? I once asked a male friend of mind in Khartoum whom I often talk out idle times with why they don’t get together to form small retail corporations. This friend responded by saying, “this cannot succeed here among us because participants will end up in terrible arguments and quarrels over whose decisions are vital.” I asked another female friend of mind from Kenya who said exactly the same thing. This is part of what I termed as the bigotry of elitism keeping the continent of Africa stagnant.
The Challenges of the Diaspora Population: Sudanese in Diaspora would be a great asset if they knew what they are doing. 44% of Sudan’s citizens live in Diaspora. Bulks of those have come from the south and have been resettled in the west through the refugee resettlement program which grants immigrants full rights to work. Sometime, an onlooker, however, will feel that these people from Sudan are a blessing to their home country. Other times, the same feelings are not so great.
If you look back through history of the United States’ immigration, you will see through the eyes of your mind that the Chinese and Japanese who have been massed into a concentration camp and denied the rights to work have made the Asian world to be what it stands for today. Most, if not all, worked filthy jobs in the railway and construction industry. The result of this, however, has engendered a strong and economically accomplished Japan and China racing to take the world’s economic lead in the coming years. These two countries and many others have benefited from the United States’ industrialization. But I am afraid that Sudan may not follow the same route by benefiting from the 44% of its population living abroad.
Part of this worry comes from the hostile environment of Sudan which makes it not conducive for investment. Another part is that Sudan’s people have been engaged mostly throughout their lives in trivial wrangles such that tribal, sectarian, clan politics have always dominated any kind of discourses. Sudanese in Diaspora pumps home billions of dollars every year, most of which end up in the neighboring countries of Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia, Egypt, Chad, and Congo. Besides, much of this money ends up in wedding feasts, unworthy spending such as paying bride prices, and celebrating elitism at the expense of the poorest. This is pathetic. Where is the future? Finally, blame all this on the bigotry of elitism which will continue to keep us at the edge of the global civilization.
The author is a Sudanese national who lives in the United States.
He can be reached at [email protected]