The coronavirus outbreak has exposed Africa, and the world, very badly.
One of the big lessons we should take away from the crisis — if we survive it — is, we should govern ourselves very differently. It is not just Covid-19 pointing us that way; the Ebola epidemics in Africa in recent years, the locust invasions, floods and other disasters have done the same.
Hollywood movies, scientists and deep-pocketed smart philanthropists like Bill Gates have been making the point a Covid-19-like virus would come our way, with a few of them predicting the outbreak (not necessarily the “origin”) would be in China.
It is almost impossible to believe that one of the earliest cases of coronavirus was detected in the city of Wuhan in China’s Hubei province last November. The Chinese tried to hide it (bad idea, like Zimbabwe trying to cover up hyperinflation by suspending publication of consumer price data) but it eventually went to war in late January, imposing unflinching lockdowns.
That was two months late and, in Africa, any muscular responses have happened only in March. With China the world’s manufacturing hub, and a key player in the global economy, it should have been clear that the virus would spread. Nobody acted in November, and it was not until early February that the rest of the world responded.
One reason for this is that most government and political structures respond to the immediate and short-term threats, not long-term ones.
In poor countries in Africa, Asia and South America, there simply aren’t the resources to invest in, for example, stockpiling surgical masks for an epidemic that might never come when there is a road to build as a voter bribe for an election in six months.
The West African Ebola virus epidemic (December 2013-June 2016) killed 11,310 people, mainly in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, and laid waste to their economies. Nigeria and Mali were also hit by small outbreaks.
However, there had been reports by rural journalists, social workers and regular folks about a “strange disease” as early as, according to some claims, February 2013! If there had been a response early, many deaths and much socioeconomic pain would have been averted.
Recently, desert locusts chomped a path of terror through East Africa and are going to return after they have bred. The region’s governments only started their dismal response to the menace in mid February, when the second wave of the invasion was sweeping through. Yet in Kenya the first recorded swarms landed in Wajir County in December 2019.
However, Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) experts trace the locust crisis back to May 2018, National Geographic reported, when Cyclone Mekunu passed over a vast, unpopulated desert on the southern Arabian Peninsula known as the Empty Quarter, filling the space between sand dunes with ephemeral lakes. Since desert locusts breed and reproduce freely in the area, this could have given rise to the initial wave.
Then, in October, Cyclone Luban spawned in the central Arabian Sea, marched westward and rained out over the same region near the border of Yemen and Oman. From there, they headed to East Africa. In other words, we had 20 months to prepare but were still caught out.
Collectively, then, 21st century society must urgently reorganise its system of political reward, and allocation of resources, to deal with problems that haven’t hit yet but, since it’s a highly interconnected world, will hit at a larger scale than before.
Secondly, it has to put resources into fundamentals and structural solutions and less in the aggregation and distribution economies — where the hugest fortunes are made. A clever Nigerian once observed wryly that the innovations making headlines in Africa were all about apps.
Then, there was excitement about apps to help farmers get the best prices for their produce and to connect them with buyers. But there were few solutions to producing the food and agriculture was falling on the continent.
Safaricom’s M-Pesa is one of the most successful inventions to come out of Africa in a long time, yes, but it only solves the problem of quick and wide transfer of money; it doesn’t make the original millions.
Everywhere, governments are unleashing hundreds of billions of dollars to cushion against the deadly coronavirus blow. Interest rates are being slashed, mortgage payments waived … name it. And there are the lockdowns.
Stock markets have refused to be impressed, and continue to plunge. They probably know that little of that money is going into the two things that would make the biggest difference: vaccines and treatment. And those needed to have been developed at least a year ago.
But then, we no longer make things for which there is no present rich market, just because we might need them in an uncertain future, do we?
Mr Onyango-Obbo is curator of the Wall of Great Africans and publisher of explainer site Roguechiefs.com. @cobbo3
