By Nneka Okumazie
Africa is a continent where the little that people have is never enough. What people have is never maximized for purposes. The problem is always that more is not available. So, when things get worse, it is never because of a lack of prudence, since several opportunities in the past, when things were easier, had been lost.
Africa is a continent where those who observe that they are better than others in some respects, forget to notice how many more are far better than they are. They sit on how they are better and lose out on what could be been if they had looked beyond.
Africa is a continent where what should be development efforts from different corners seems to be off target. The primary factors of growth, in recent decades in any society, from European to Asian are not the metrics of growth, but certain qualities that need to be mature, such that while the process is ongoing, they are likely to make it and sustain it.
Individual success is easier than collective success. There are several possibilities towards achievements to have the nice things of this world. There are several directions to legitimate wealth that do not require sophistication. The possibilities of individual success for many in Africa without a collection, for most, show how deficient the common vision is.
Africa is not winning. The fault is everyone’s. There are several aspects of the economy where people already have success, but rather than use that to branch into new anchors for what would produce even more success, everything is still.
In the past, Africa had a government as a hindrance problem, but not anymore. There are too many possibilities for success that are free enough without the government troubles. Using those angles could have resulted in better outcomes for the people than what is currently obtainable.
Africa still has a talent problem. It is either available, but in the wrong places or otherwise. There are too many activities in Africa, especially the private sector where the products and services are too pedestrian, an indication of a lack of talent epidemic.
How does Africa go forward, given how successive governments seem to be worse? The hate that many have for Christianity is that prayer is not like a chat, where you send and receive immediately, as demanded. Yes, there is asking and receiving, there is also the faith factor.
RCCG and their pastor, Adeboye often find themselves in the crosshairs of social media. Those who cannot figure out that government is not the problem cannot figure out that the church is not the problem. Development is often a result of multiple individuals giving their best from every angle, with their abilities. It is not the government that is doing nothing, so we cannot. It is likely to be a problem of lack of capacity, veiled by blaming others.
For many Africans, life is not more than an experience of looking better than others and showing it, or exposing that they are now equal to others.
There are several advancements that the people of Africa benefit from that were works of decades.
Many of those works were started with little resources than what became of the sources after the works were ready.
The works were often from people in their efforts, far away from the government. There are many places in several countries in Africa where there is peace and stability, where options for resources can be sought and found, or tried, for those who want to do so.
Nothing is good in Africa, so run away, is the accepted way of thinking, but how much is different for some when they leave other than the marginal?
What would it look like when many leave, it would look like what it is, now. Just like how it would look when African music goes global. The goal for development, ignoring the government’s ineptitude, is still adrift.
The focus for many is what the RCCG pastor says or what he wishes for the people of the church. The pastor can have spiritual experiences, no matter what it is. The pastor can say prayers or make prophecies as the church chooses. It may cross the mind, but what is the significance of the criticism? How does what the pastor says hold back a country? What is the tangent of development problems in Africa to the existence of RCCG?
The use of criticism against the church, as a show of enlightenment, to others is likely a talent problem.
Before government can be so worse in a country, as obtainable across Africa, the people must have fully failed, or be lacking or be diverted to being critical, perennially.
[2 Corinthians 12:2, I knew a man in CHRIST above fourteen years ago, (whether in the body, I cannot tell; or whether out of the body, I cannot tell: GOD knoweth;) such a one caught up to the third Heaven.]