Do Black Lives Really Matter In Africa?

An image that went viral of a two-year-old Nigerian child accused of being a witch and rescued by a Scandinavian woman, Anja Ringgren

Before Africans will be genuinely accepted by the developed world as normal human beings like everyone and be free from oppression, discrimination, racism, and sub-human conditions, they must first learn to respect and love themselves.

There is no love at all in Africa, and the cruelties emanating from every part of the continent against fellow Africans because of poverty, greed, nepotism, tribalism, and corruption are dividing the people and causing hardships to others.

Decades after the abolition of slavery, colonialism, and Apartheid, Africans and African-Americans continue to suffer in the hands of successive governments that are interested in building high walls of institutional racism to deny the black man equal opportunities.

Thanks to the late George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter Movement, things have changed for African-Americans today, but what about Africa, a continent plagued by the viruses of hate, corruption, tribalism, nepotism, and contract assassinations?

It's dehumanizing and barbaric to see children and old people accused of witchcraft and being lynched by people across Africa, in videos on YouTube. Do Africans know what Europeans or Americans think about the continent if they watch such videos on YouTube?

Africa, the place often referred to as the dark continent in terms of color, in reality, is inhabited by tribes and clans that, from the ancestral period influenced by traditional custom and superstition, often accuse old people as witches. 

Nobody talks about or accuses someone of witchcraft in the developed world, but only in Africa, where such issues are very common, and to me, illiteracy, hardships, and superstition play roles in these accusations.

As one of the centers of underdevelopment, Africans face many problems and hardships beyond their control. These unfortunate circumstances are often blamed on innocent old women accused of witchcraft.

In sub-Saharan Africa, long-term unfavorable population trends are combined with dire poverty and high-income inequality, dire health care, education, high unemployment, and large-scale forced migration. 

Most struggling Africans don't consider these problems; instead, they blame innocent people, accusing them of witchcraft, and it's really agonizing to watch these videos in an open window across the world and wonder what the developed world thinks about Africa.

In terms of the diversity, scale, and intertwining of social problems, Africa stands out as a poverty-stricken continent in the developing world. There are so many resources on the continent of Africa than on any other continent in the world, yet Africans continue to live in miserable conditions.

Till now, many societies in Africa are completely immersed in beliefs such as witchcraft, ghosts, spirits, etc, putting the lives of many people, including children and old women, in danger.

An ugly scene of a 90-year-old woman accused of being a witch in Ghana

AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis are among the main causes of high mortality in the African population, and all these problems affect and frustrate others to accusations of witchcraft.

Therefore, it doesn't make sense at all when old women are beaten up and the videos are uploaded on YouTube. That is not the trademark of Africa. In whatever we do, Africans must show maturity and wisdom to convince the developed world that we have aims and objectives.

If African leaders are not interested in protecting old women accused of witchcraft in Africa, they must ban the upload of such videos on YouTube because it not only degrades Africans but also allows the developed world to commit more crimes in Africa.