By Ebuka Onyekwelu, Ph.D
Every solution from Africa is often subjected to pretend-rigorous interrogations, but was actually dismissed on face value. From health and medical claims to economic and political leadership, Africa is often suspected of incapacity or, in fact, false claims. During COVID-19, we witnessed how various covid “medications” produced from herbs across Africa were simply dismissed with a wave of the hand, despite efforts by several African countries to sustain that claim. No one paid them any attention, and that was how they dissolved into obscurity, confirming the earlier suspicion. Many herbs in Africa make claims to have the potency to cure all manner of diseases, from viral infections to chronic organ failures, etc, but over and again, there is nothing the world is left with to hold on to as a piece of evidence to the efficacy of these claims. In governance and public leadership, it is even worse. There is a particular impression left on the world by any solution coming from Africa.
Only days ago, a story entitled “How Nigeria’s algorithmic apothecary finds a surge in risky herbal cures”, written by Isaac Ojo, featured on Al Jazeera, exposing the falsity of multiple claims by Nigerian orthodox medicine, specifically herbal medicine. In fact, the report observed that the use of herbal medicine escalates the medical conditions of users. It also acknowledged that there is some potential in some of the herbs, but that somehow, it ends up becoming a serious medical crisis for users. “Across Nigeria,…unverified herbal products are worsening health outcomes,” a part of the piece noted. Unfortunately, this is not an isolated case or a passing phase for that matter; a continent of mere potential, with nothing else to show, year after year. It is Africa’s reality both within and without, and this is crucial because no continent can give the world direction if it has failed to provide direction for itself.
Ironically, both Indian and Chinese herbs are a big deal in Nigeria and across different parts of Africa. Chinese cuisine has become mainstream in Africa. Chinese tea and Chinese soup are considered to be of extreme health benefits and are joyfully consumed across different parts of Africa’s high-end restaurants, packaged in city corners to fit their elite status-ascription. Yet, those are made from Chinese herbs. In major African cities, Arabian tea has assumed a status symbol for its health benefits. But Africa can’t boast of the veracity of its own herbs and shrubs scattered across the continent. This is only a graphic image of how Africa has been unable to put itself forward as a thinker and leader who has mastered its environment and taken custody of its destiny to fully leverage all its potential in solving its own problems first, and then, the problems of the world. As long as Africa continues to be unable to solve its problems, the world will continue to be skeptical of Africa’s value propositions to the rest of the world.
The problem with African solutions is a problem of reputation. The world does not come to Africa for scientific, economic, and governance solutions. They come to Africa for extraction. They take natural resources and leave. Decades upon decades, Africa has been unable to rewrite this narrative. The only thing the world can take from Africa with certainty is raw materials. Africa remains an extractive economy, but despite billions garnered in revenue over several decades, it still suffers from government instability and deeply rooted economic and social disorder, easily blamed on slavery and colonialism. Yet, unable to build itself a formidable resistance or chart its cause while other continents move on to become global spotlights for solutions. But for whatever reason, if Africa has a solution to the world, would it not make sense that it first solves its own basic internal dialectics and crisis of existence?
African solutions suffer from their own internal contradictions, just like the herbal medicines in Nigeria, which, rather than a solution, have become a part of the health systems crisis, fast-tracking the decay of Nigeria’s health ecosystem. Unfortunately, Africa has been unable to prove the viability of its solution within. Therefore, it is unlikely that the world will change its mind about its perception of solutions coming from Africa until Africa can confront its own basic problems of leadership, which have given it a reputation.
