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04.09.2015 Opinion

Freedom, Independency, And Democracy!

By Attah Chukwuma
Freedom, Independency, And Democracy!
04.09.2015 LISTEN

These words( freedom, independency, and democracy) have eluded my understanding. Everybody wants freedom, yet the undefined puzzle is the scope of freedom. Freedom is relative. The idea of freedom, like other human cravings, has been hijacked and reduced to a cash and carry affair by the secret mafias of the world. The quest for the control of the world’s resources has remained the chief motivator of the “external proponents of freedom fighters”.

In practice, what does it mean to be independent, when no nation can survive on its own? Is independency the official termination of the physical dominance of a nation over another?

Since in a democratic dispensation, the majority wins, what is the fate of the rights of the minority? If the votes of 51% defines democracy, what happens to the rights of the other 49%?

If till date, the president of most African countries are endorsed in Europe and America, what does it mean to be independent? What is freedom, democracy when a journalist gets arrested for writing an article that indicts a former head of state? What is democracy, when a political seat is being zoned to a particular locality, or tribe years before election? Why deceive people with the concept of democracy when the result of an election is known even before the said election?

How can the dividends of democracy be materialized, when a nation is eternally impoverished by its leaders with the cost of governance and foreign aids?

Why the hunt for Edward Snowden? Isn’t liberty, freedom of speech and expression supposed to be one of the dividends of democracy? Isn’t America a democratic state?

The war against the “dictator” of Libya is over, how free is Libya now? Libya is free of Col. Gadaffi but are in the chains of the power drunks who ousted, and killed Col. Gadaffi. The ousting or killing of a leader whose ideologies differs from the west, and institutioning another with affirmative views, is that what is called democracy? Is it better to be in the chains of a brother or in that of a foreigner? I guess Libyans were not drowning in the Mediterranean sea during Gadaffi's government.

Literally, all Africa nations are free from colonialism, only to become slaves of ourselves. What is freedom when is glaring that a government is so corrupt, yet you become an enemy of the state once you write or speak against such ills? If freedom existed, to what extent? Even if we are free from colonialism and imperialism, are we free from bad government, corruption, embezzlements, or vision ess and direction less leaderships?

How can we be independent when we can’t harness, refine, and manage our respective natural resources, even if we wanted? Are we independent when our institutions, and systems are modelled after our colonial masters, without any prove of the efficacy of these systems? Are we free from slavery and savagery in the hands of our brotherman? Which is preferably, to be a well fed slave or a hungry free man?

Since the inception of the world, nations and peoples have and will continue to fight for freedom. Once there is oppression, the cry, wail, and struggle for freedom abounds, irrespective of who the oppressor is-whether a brother or an enemy. So far as we live in this world, freedom from a thing begets bondage from another. One man’s freedom is another slavery. The only difference is that oppressor has a new name. In the contemporary Africa, brothers, Countrymen they are, the oppressors and the oppressed. The fight for freedom is an eternal fight. There is no such thing like total freedom.

The concepts of total freedom, independency and democracy are at best delusive and illusive. The illusion of total freedom, independence, democracy is only but a deceptive tool in the hands of few who swing and wind their strategies for dominance over the wealth of the nations, and resources of the world.

Africa is in chains of illusions and trickeries. We are in chains of systems, institutions, and models that not only blind us but serve the course of the silent enemies of progress. The physical dominance is over but its scars have endured. For Africa to progress, we need systems, institutions, models that can tackle our problems. We have failed to integrate and harness and employ our copied and borrowed systems/models to serve the wellbeing of the common man. We need to define or perhaps redefine our concept of freedom, independency, and democracy. And reexamine where we are headed as a people.

Conclusively, freedom, independency, and democracy are relative not total. I long to live in a land of freedom, independency, and democracy. Till we collectively create such a place, am still trapped in this delusive and illusive system called democracy.

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