The State of Africa: A History of the Continent Since Independence Paperback – 29 April 2021

This is the most depressing history book I have ever read, apart from accounts of the holocaust. It is a damning indictment on Africa's political leaders, and the short sighted naïve 1960 liberals, supported by the jealous empire hating Americans, who allowed it all to happen. From north to south, east to West, as the colonialists left, so dictators supported by tribal cronies took over and established regimes specialising in economic rape, terror, and war. Nkrumah, leader of the first country to get independence, was hailed as a saviour, jailed his opponents, turned Ghana into a one party state in 1964 and utterly ruined the economy with useless projects and constant corruption. The army eventually took over, but to no effect. After a string of coups by 1982 the country `was a wasteland, crumbling in ruins at every level'. Eventually Rawlings established a viable dictatorship. In the Congo the first ruler Lumumba was brutally murdered by his tribal enemies in 1961, with the connivance of the Belgians. The revenge from Lumumba's tribe was awful. Over a million died. Out of this blood bath emerged General Mobuto, who ruled by terror from day one and was soon considered a semi god, `who grew the trees and plants...'. Actually he bankrupted this rich country, shifting millions to those notorious Swiss banks. Corruption and waste spread, making men in the words on one bishop into `assassins'. Kenyatta turned Kenya into a one party state in 1969, but under his watch, apart from the slaughter of 70,000 elephants for the profitable ivory trade, the country stayed reasonably intact. Moi took over after his death and tightened the screws of the dictatorship, and corruption became epidemic and critics disappeared. In Uganda the brutality of Idi Amin is well known, though the suspicion of blood rituals over his victims and even eating their body parts was new to me. At least 25,000 had been killed before he was removed from power in 1979. If Haile Selassie had died in 1972 when he was eighty he would have been remembered as a firm but sensible autocratic ruler: unfortunately he lived on and utterly failed to deal with the famine that killed thousands in 1973. There was an uprising and the old emperor was ousted. Major Mengistu Mariam took over and made Marxism the country's new religion. The result was economic chaos and constant war, both internally and with neighbouring Eritrea. And then in 1984, while Mengistu's stooges were preparing lavish celebration for the revolution's tenth anniversary, famine again struck, not just because of precarious mother nature, but also because of the inefficiency of the new state farms, and most damningly because Mengistu used food as a weapon against rebels. During the anniversary celebrations not a word was said about the appalling famine. But then came surely one of the BBC's finest hours, or rather ten minutes, when their correspondent Michael Buerk made a short news film on the famine. The Western agencies (and Bob Geldof) moved in, but were too late to save the estimated million who had perished while Mengistu had sipped champagne in praise of his revolution. And so in country after country - Somalia, Zimbabwe, the Sudan, Ruanda, Algeria -Meredith takes us on this hugely depressing journey, and there's no time here to get onto AIDS. He is a superb writer, and while the detail is never lacking, he never loses the wood for the trees and keeps on reminding us of different parts of the stories, so at the end we really have just one depressing canvas of Africa's last fifty years. There is no political posturing, he just lets the account speak for itself. Sane people should come to two conclusions. First of all the depravity of man is a reality; and secondly benign colonialism operated by people who know how to rule fairly and set up stable institutions is a million times better than rampant tribalism. The rush to get out of Africa was a disgrace caused by the fact Europe could not afford to rule there anymore if it meant keeping down nationalistic insurgencies, and by a woeful naivety on the part of the Americans who on the basis of biased history about the tragedy of their separation from England, had concluded all colonialism was wrong, so a part of the deal for their joining in the Second World War was that Europe got rid of her empires. What a happier place Africa and the world would have been if they had joined the colonial enterprise. They should have taken the mantle from the Europeans; instead they have relied on quick fix solutions that have proved disastrous. But we are straying from Meredith's outstanding book, an absolute must if you are interested in world history and don't want to waste money on aid.

This is an excellent book for anyone who has interest in post colonial Africa.Well researched and written in a very readable style.Highly recommended.

Gives a historical perspective of Africa since the colonial time. Looks at each country and the challenges. Easy to read and understand though I have to say that I encountered the most number of new words ever in any book (impressive).As an African, who never liked history in school, I found the book extremely educational and on different levels, it explains the African psyche and greed, which appears to have been exacerbated by the greed and inhumane attitude of the West.I recommend this book to Africans primarily, and anyone else interested in understanding the Africa challenge. Clearly Africa is a gem, which the West chose to exploit at the detriment of the indigenes. It is time for Africans to learn from history in order to change the future.

I read this book shortly after finishing "The Scramble for Africa" by Thomas Pakenham. Together, they make for a grim telling of the history of Africa in the last 150 years."The State of Africa" is arranged more or less chronologically, starting with the story of how the Gold Coast broke away from British colonial control and finishing in the penultimate chapter with the transition of power from Mbeki to Zuma in South Africa before a final, brief chapter in which the serial wrongs and excesses of Africa's "Big Men", imposed on their fellow citizens, are reviewed. It is sobering, repetition of early hope followed by cruelty, greed and ultimate despair with only the slightest sign of hope in post-apartheid South Africa.I have first-hand knowledge of South Africa and am impressed by the even-handed and acute discussion of that country's governance under the neo-conservative Nationalist governments of the 50s - 80s and the transition to power under the ANC led by Mandela. On that basis, I assume Mr. Meredith's writing on other countries and aspects of the continent's recent history are equally balanced and insightful. His description of the Rwandan genocide is particularly noteworthy for the gutless way in which the United Nations acted .... or rather didn't act ... and the equally craven behaviours of the USA, UK and Belgians.Indeed, this is a recurring theme of the book - the indifference of Western powers, with occasional intrusions when it suited their perceived strategic needs, without any seeming regard for the rights and needs of the local populace. After all their excesses and wrongs of the Scramble for Africa, it's hard to understand that the European powers in particular still felt they had any role to play other than help rebuild and compensate for past wrongs, But this is clearly not the case.That being said, the worst excesses were those committed by Africa's own warlords and "politicians" on their own peoples. It beggars belief reading the way in which almost every country in Africa endured the same pattern of a rise to power by some factional leader, the ruthlessness with which power was consolidated through placement of family and tribal supporters in key roles and then the economy used as a plaything for the leader and his acolytes. Along the way, torture, murders and often civil war became tools to cement power.Grim, sobering reading and Mr Meredith is to be complimented on his ability to remain objective.My only criticism concerns the all too brief final chapter. There appears to be one minor but telling typo: Nigeria's leaders are accused of stealing $220M over a forty-year period". Given the wealth accumulated by Nigeria's oil and minerals industries, I suspect this figure should be $220B. $5.5M per annum is almost insignificant compared to the excesses of Africa's other "Big Men".But more important than this minor mistake (if it is that) is the lack of analysis as to how all this has happened. It is a question I have asked myself many times and I am no closer to an answer now. Perhaps this is just the way in which new nations emerge from totalitarian control but for every example of a nation which shifted from one to a different form of totalitarian control, I can think of another where the transition was much more progressive. But I cannot think of any example where every country in a continent followed the same, regressive and ultimately doomed path. If there were a second edition of this book, I believe it would be strengthened by the author's thoughts on this issue.