Is Africa really poor or poor in managing resources and human development?

[Cookdata]

Burkina Faso is a good case study. Under Captain Ibrahim Traore leadership we have seen the country progress in economic strength and  GDP. The now prioritize home made products over importations and this alone is enough prove that all African countries need to tackle poverty is to have good and accountable leadership. The natural resources owned in African countries are controlled by top leaders and stakeholders which make development stunted with no future direction in view. If only accountability becomes the driving force of African leadership we might not see growth no matter how much we desire it.

You see this Burkina Faso guy wana be captain America, I refused to believe they are progressing. If the corruption has reduces, I will agree since they are now under military rule system, people will fear consequences of their actions but please forget what their media is feeding us. They are not doing fine and I can tell you they can't speak against military system. They wanted democracy to be scrap because it was worse but this is not better.

As much as we are going to hate western allies, you need them. You can't grow without them. There are countries that have done them before now that succeeded but what does exactly Burkina Faso has to offered the rest of the world to come for them, it's literally just a poor country that has had alot of suffering and corruption made it worse but economically, they are doing bad that I can tell you Lagos GDP is almost 2 times bigger than Burkina Faso.

[Umulala-alala]

Anyone that think or believe Africa is poor, should be considered as a person who doesn't know what he or she is saying, and should be considered as a clueless human being, I will not say Africa is poor but I will rather tell you guys that Africa is poor in terms of managing resources, but with the look of things I think they are becoming more wiser if not for the bad governance that has eaten deep into the continent, Africa have enough mineral Resources that can make it look more better than any other continent in the world, but yet they chose to over looked it and focus more on religions issues, which is making their politicians to milk a living hell out of them, but I really believe it's just a matter of time, and it's not much time, that era is almost here, so in deep truth Africa is not poor but among the richest continent in the world, but don't really know how to go about with the enough mineral Resources God has bestowed on to them.

I will agree with you that Africa is poor in term of managing their resources but saying that Africa is poor in terms of money then that person is wrong. Africa lack good governance there leaders have a very bad mentality of stealing from their country to invest across other continents, what is killing Africa is greedy and corrupt leaders, if we Africans can be united by putting every measures to make every greedy and incompetent leaders pay with there life you will see that Africa will be like other countries we admire how they look and also how their leaders do have the interest of there citizens at heart, Africa is a continent bless with enough mineral resources and knowledgeable humans.

[abhiseshakana]

Let's take a look at what happened in Burkina Faso. After Traoré seized power, he immediately stopped supplying raw gold to France and it was crazy how they generated much more money than they did in the past.
The exact same thing is happening in Nigeria. Nigeria has all the capacity and capability to refine their oil and gas and export them as finished goods, but what do they do instead? They export raw product and then import refined ones—isn't this the definition of stupidity and madness. Do you honestly think that this was done out of pure ignorance? We are still slaves to our colonial masters, but this time not in human slavery but economical slavery.

Now, let think for a moment.

If Burkina Faso can do it, what's stopping Nigeria from doing the same? Like I said earlier, we are still where we are today because we choose to and we have no more reason to blame the colonials. We deliberately sold ourselves and our economy to them.

There were paper agreements, we signed them and made ourselves subordinate to them. In the past, I agreed we don't have much options than to follow instructions but in this modern era, we have every option to resist and breakfree from modern economic colonialism. Yet, we can not stand our feet. Do you know why? Because you have corrupt leaders that are benefiting from being subordinate to western nations.

Our leaders are in the position to make the change but they will not. Either we hold them accountable or stop blaming the colonials for a mistake that's more than many decades ago.

I don't really follow updates about Africa, but if I remember many of African country still under hidden control of France neocolonialism which known as Francafrique.

The strongest control trough CFA Franc which pegged to Euro and France guarantees its convertibility. Funny bitter thing, for those guarantee, African nations have historically been required to keep the majority of their foreign exchange reserves at the French Central Bank.

Military, France play as police in Africa and maintaining a permanent military base, there is a military pact granting France the right of first intervention in the event of a coup or internal conflict and many military operation conduct in Africa. Besid emilitary, economically and politically France also has big access such as France hold the right to be first buyer for Arican natural resources discovered in its former colonies. Beside that France also give support to dicatator as long as those leader remains loyal to Paris's geopolitical interests.

https://id.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fran%C3%A7afrique
https://www.ifri.org/en/media-external-article/france-starts-2025-fresh-controversy-questions-over-africa

[citywise2]

Africa is a rich continent endowed with natural resources but from the onset Africa is set up to fail. Could it be the geographical location of Africa? Africa as a continent shouldn't be struggling because it has various types of mineral resources that can turn Africa to one of the strongest continent in the world. The population is huge,there is knowledge etc. But like i said earlier it was set up to fail by those who claim to have discovered Africa. If African leaders think outside the box then surely Africa will become one of the best. Imagine Africa as a continent is using one currency to trade amongst themselves.

I can tell many developed countries owed their sources from Africa. Start from the forced colonisation to slavery - that amount of youthful man power stolen from a continent and then they forced themselves on us to see things only from their point of view. Imagine things like Mongo Park discovered the mouth of river Niger, very laughable. The Independence they gave to Africa was only a water shed as they remain in authority back stage, dictating who rules and what obtains. That explains why unfit and corrupt rulers are on center stage across Africa.

[fruktik]

Russia also has virtually all the resources, but the majority of the population lives in poverty and even destitution. The government brazenly disposes of all this wealth at its own discretion, unwilling to give even a penny to those who need it.

Cynical, mercantile, and greedy creatures rule the country. They've stolen everything down to the last penny. They've left the country in ruins, while owning vast amounts of real estate around the world. Is this fair? No, it's not. The only problem is that the population itself is powerless to do anything about it, since the "system" has created a huge number of special services that will shoot people on the first order if they protest.

[Curious T]

The effect of the past colonial masters has made huge effect on the mentality of the African leadership,

How long are we going to keep blaming colonial masters for how we are right now? I'm Nigerian, and my country is a mess. The president we have now is the worst in the world, but I am supposed to keep blaming colonial masters when actually Nigerians supported and voted for him, and actual Nigerians allowed themselves to be used to rig elections? What are we doing? When are we going to wake up and see that we are all responsible for the country is and we are the only ones who can make a change? It's convenient to say the colonial masters made us this way. The Europeans undeniably caused a lot of damage to the continent, but do you mean we cannot move past that? Do you mean we cannot grow above that? How long are we going to continue to be small because we were once victims?

on which I think the monarch form of leadership which was mostly/often used in the early years of the African countries remains undoubtedly the best way of African leadership. But the change of this system made everything look as if they are going backwards,

Almost every part of the world had a monarchy at some point in its history. Africa was not the only place that operated under a monarchy. So the excuse of changing from a monarchy to something else as the reason is a lazy one.

People evolve and grow, African can do the same. The Scandinavians and Vikings were savages. Iceland was filled with Vikings that go on raids, today, it is regarded as the country with the lowest crime rate. The people of Britannia, which is the modern day Britain, were "savages" too who had fought the Roman Empire, including Juluis ceaser foe their freedom. My point is, people evolve. No country or state just appears to be what it currently is. They grow. So why has Africa refused to grow?  It's all in the mindset. We have to know what we want, work for it, and fight for it. It's a fight that is passed down through generations, so that each generation will continue from where the previous one left. My country was better when the colonial masters left than it is today, so can we really say the colonial masters are the problem? We have to look at ourselves. Demand the most from ourselves instead of hoping on others.

[Decimetre]

Africa is a rich continent endowed with natural resources but from the onset Africa is set up to fail. Could it be the geographical location of Africa? Africa as a continent shouldn't be struggling because it has various types of mineral resources that can turn Africa to one of the strongest continent in the world. The population is huge,there is knowledge etc. But like i said earlier it was set up to fail by those who claim to have discovered Africa. If African leaders think outside the box then surely Africa will become one of the best. Imagine Africa as a continent is using one currency to trade amongst themselves.

You see, there are so many lies that Africans have been told. Starting from colonisation or even down to precolonial era, Africans have been fooled and made to believe how they mean less or nothing without the western world. I'm not debating it's reality after all Africans have refused to grow on their own. Years later after colonising many nations, those countries received what I see as paper independence but no real independence. The resources of African countries still get controlled from the outside of Africa coupled with many selfish leaders the continent has.

The western world thought Africans to forget themselves and they accepted. African nations accepting some records about them hook, line and sinker. I recently saw a post on X https://x.com/EjikeAkwolu/status/1775446789270737275 about how Nigerians carried mongo Park to show him the river Niger so that he can discover it and it was described with the picture above as mentioned by Knowngunman too.

By now the African leaders should have risen to be independent by industrialization and rapid infrastructural development. Instead, the bad leaders steal the money and sell the African resources to many of these western countries to mine just for their selfish interests. These leaders also cause divisions among the continent as we see in South Africa's recent hostility to fellow Africans.

Those who claim to have discovered Africa as you said may have set Africa up for failure but the real problem of Africa is mental slavery and bad leadership. If the leaders decide to prosper Africa, no one would stop them.

[Cossyblack]

Those who claim to have discovered Africa as you said may have set Africa up for failure but the real problem of Africa is mental slavery and bad leadership. If the leaders decide to prosper Africa, no one would stop them.

This was indeed mungo park and where they were taken him to was to the river Niger for him to discover it. See the real problem of Africa isn't because it was colonise but the leaders. The problem of Africa is the leaders,this is because they are corrupt, greedy and selfish. They are never satisfied with what they have and that is the reason why they never stop to loots. You have to understand that Africa isn't the only continent that was colonise by the Europeans,Asia, north America, south America and Australia were also colonise by the Europeans, but those continents are more developed and doing better than Africa despite that Africa has abundance resources that all of them combined. So why are those continents more developed than Africa? These are the questions that you need to ask yourself. In my opinion, this is because they have upright and reliable leaders.so the problems is bad leaders and western interference in Africa leadership. Therefore I think that If we elect trustworthy leaders in governments, then we can defeat poverty for good.

[L E G E N D A R Y]

We're rich with everything you can imagine. The only thing we're not rich in should be patriotic Africans, not generally leaders, ome should be patriotic but we have a lot of sellouts turned leaders who sell our natural resources to the west and tue rest of the world. That is one aspect to take a peep at it, the other should be strategical western powers doing all that they can to extract Africa and see them in ruins. We can not deny that, it is the sole reason why they the west gravitate towards corrupt Africa political representatives who can do their bidding.

And this has affected even the mindset of the normal citizens people who, people in power has painted the idea that corruption and exploitation are literally the only way to become becoming rich in a continent like ours, so even those who are aspiring to become leaders tomorrow already have their mindsets already corrupted, and they are only after their own personal interests and gains. Very few are actually patriotic and no matter how these few try to voice out, the corrupt majority will always overshadow and silent them.

[alastantiger]

Cynical, mercantile, and greedy creatures rule the country. They've stolen everything down to the last penny. They've left the country in ruins, while owning vast amounts of real estate around the world. Is this fair? No, it's not. The only problem is that the population itself is powerless to do anything about it, since the "system" has created a huge number of special services that will shoot people on the first order if they protest.

The problem of the leaders in the countries in Africa taking their money and other resources that was suppose to develop the counties to develop other parts of the world is what is really holding the development in the African countries back because the foreign countries benefiting from this corruption would not speak up but close then month and enjoy the development happening in their own country while the African countries keep on suffering in poverty. We can not depend on the leaders to help us anymore because all of them are corrupt and not trustworthy anymore. The development now has to come from within the people and not hope on the government anymore.

[Obulis]

Mindset makes the difference. Consigning the leading minds in Africa one can say they love wickedness which is not just poor management of resources but ultra poor management of resources which is obviously one of the major problem knowing the endowment of resources in Africa. Africa has never been poor because this resources didn't just appear today or yesterday, Africa lacks management as a result of selfishness and greediness a direct opposite of selflessness and kindness. There was colonialism here and there in Africa back then and now so-called independence happened but indirectly African so-called leaders loves colonialism because right now they have colonized Africa internally which is by implications not different from direct colonialism if foreigners. Inconceivably painful how the masses even go on applauding these level of mismanagement directly and indirectly.

[JoyceBTC]

Anyone that think or believe Africa is poor, should be considered as a person who doesn't know what he or she is saying, and should be considered as a clueless human being, I will not say Africa is poor but I will rather tell you guys that Africa is poor in terms of managing resources, but with the look of things I think they are becoming more wiser if not for the bad governance that has eaten deep into the continent, Africa have enough mineral Resources that can make it look more better than any other continent in the world, but yet they chose to over looked it and focus more on religions issues, which is making their politicians to milk a living hell out of them, but I really believe it's just a matter of time, and it's not much time, that era is almost here, so in deep truth Africa is not poor but among the richest continent in the world, but don't really know how to go about with the enough mineral Resources God has bestowed on to them.

Yeah most African countries aren’t poor at all, they have enough mineral resources to enrich their country but what is affecting most of them is failure to utilize this resources very well. Bad governance and high rate of corruption has kept most of this country’s that are to be developed underdeveloped, making it look like the country is poor.

[Issa56]

Africa is a rich continent endowed with natural resources but from the onset Africa is set up to fail. Could it be the geographical location of Africa? Africa as a continent shouldn't be struggling because it has various types of mineral resources that can turn Africa to one of the strongest continent in the world. The population is huge,there is knowledge etc. But like i said earlier it was set up to fail by those who claim to have discovered Africa. If African leaders think outside the box then surely Africa will become one of the best. Imagine Africa as a continent is using one currency to trade amongst themselves.

If you are from Africa, then you should know where our problem is coming from already. We have so many natural resources in Africa, with the natural resources we having, we are not even suppose to be struggling in African, but as we can see most of the people from African are just struggling to survive.

The main problem we facing in Africa is bad leaders, our leaders are so corrupt, and what they care about is just how they going to enrich themselves, and their family members, they don’t care about how other people are going to survive. It’s in Africa you going to see someone steal a huge amount of money that even his grandchildren won’t be able to spend it all even if they don’t work.

African leaders will sell the natural resources here, and they going to use the money to invest in European countries, they enriching European countries, and people in their country are suffering. There is no aspect thats good in Africa, we have poor road Network, poor electricity, insecurity in different countries, and other problems. If we have good leaders in Africa, then the continent will have been one of the best with the kind of resources we having.

[Juicyhome]

Africa is a rich continent endowed with natural resources but from the onset Africa is set up to fail. Could it be the geographical location of Africa? Africa as a continent shouldn't be struggling because it has various types of mineral resources that can turn Africa to one of the strongest continent in the world. The population is huge,there is knowledge etc. But like i said earlier it was set up to fail by those who claim to have discovered Africa. If African leaders think outside the box then surely Africa will become one of the best. Imagine Africa as a continent is using one currency to trade amongst themselves.

We lack management that's the only problem of Africa,  we have more resources than Europe yet we are dying in poverty because of lack of management,  those we entrust with leadership are business looting the resources to western world to invest, until Africa stop to elect criminals and think of sound minds wr can never get it right.

Africa will never develop like others, the day Africa develop many European countries will face poverty, so.many of them feed on Africa poverty,  they steal our resources to develop themselves, country like France is facing the hit now because many colonies in Africa are now chasing them away from their country. That's why they will never allow Africa to develop,  the foreigners enjoy when Africa is underdevelop. They support bad leadership in Africa to keep us in poverty,  the only liberation in Africa is fix our government and not poverty. If we can fix the government we can eliminate poverty.

[Obim34]

Yeah most African countries aren’t poor at all, they have enough mineral resources to enrich their country but what is affecting most of them is failure to utilize this resources very well. Bad governance and high rate of corruption has kept most of this country’s that are to be developed underdeveloped, making it look like the country is poor.

African countries are not poor, I can talk about my country called the African giants and you could write a novel concerning how public funds are managed inappropriately for private benefits over using it for the right purposes.

Governments are the bad eyes in the system, and reason why most African countries are still poor and not looking like escaping extreme poverty and side effects that shows how poor countries are living.

Nigeria has mineral resources, good soil for planting and everything needed to make us one of the richest countries in the world, but specific individuals are playing greed, what good comes out from greedy politicians in government offices.

[Dareo]

Africa is poor because of just the actions of the government alone, if the Government decides to take care of things and the mineral resources by handling things properly, I think Africa wouldn’t be seen as a horrible country, or under developed countries, if Africa have good leadership that have the interest of the people at heart, development would be easy coming.

However the lack of good governance is not the only reason for Africa's backwardness, but the historical and global economic structure plays a major role. Explaining Africa's problems only in terms of corrupt leaders leaves out a large part of the picture, In addition to the effects of the colonial period many countries are still very dependent on the export of raw materials, while the ability to process those raw materials to add more value is low. And still 45 out of 54 African countries are still excessively commodity dependent in terms of exporting goods.

So, just saying that there are mineral resources will not lead to development. For example one country sells ore cheaply, and another country processes it and sells it as a product at a much higher price. Where is the real profit then, that is the important question. If we cannot increase our own industry, technology and value addition along with good governance, the same dependence will continue despite having resources.

[Achalugo BTC]

Yeah most African countries aren’t poor at all, they have enough mineral resources to enrich their country but what is affecting most of them is failure to utilize this resources very well. Bad governance and high rate of corruption has kept most of this country’s that are to be developed underdeveloped, making it look like the country is poor.

Exactly, bad governance the major reason why most African countries are not developed. The potential for their growth already exists, but selfishness has made the leaders focus and work for their own interest, as there is little to show for it. That is why many young people in Africa are ensuring they are self employed to take care of themselves, as the government is not doing much to help the people. And the rate at which this is becoming a serious problem and raises concern, as some young people are forced to become idle and cause a nuisance in their society.

[Synchronice]

Africa is a rich continent endowed with natural resources but from the onset Africa is set up to fail. Could it be the geographical location of Africa? Africa as a continent shouldn't be struggling because it has various types of mineral resources that can turn Africa to one of the strongest continent in the world. The population is huge,there is knowledge etc. But like i said earlier it was set up to fail by those who claim to have discovered Africa. If African leaders think outside the box then surely Africa will become one of the best. Imagine Africa as a continent is using one currency to trade amongst themselves.

African countries have major oil, gas, gold, cobalt and other resources. Basically, they are rich in natural resources, the population is huge, as you said but maybe there isn't knowledge? And knowledge doesn't only mean the ability to build an infrastructure but an ability to manage the country and the population in the right destination? Maybe corruption and that kind of mentality that I can pay and bribe the person kills every perspective of development in the country? Yes, corruption and lack of education is the key. Investing in education, which not only means science but the ability to understand that corruption is bad and honesty is a better policy, will completely reshape African countries in a very good way but seems, they lack the desire because for people in the power, corruption feels too good and too pleasant to keep.

[Abiky]

Africa is a rich continent endowed with natural resources but from the onset Africa is set up to fail. Could it be the geographical location of Africa? Africa as a continent shouldn't be struggling because it has various types of mineral resources that can turn Africa to one of the strongest continent in the world. The population is huge,there is knowledge etc. But like i said earlier it was set up to fail by those who claim to have discovered Africa. If African leaders think outside the box then surely Africa will become one of the best. Imagine Africa as a continent is using one currency to trade amongst themselves.

Africa doesn't have a "resource problem". It has a "corruption problem". Corrupt leaders have taken away the continent's resources for their own benefit. The government stays rich, while the people stay poor. That's the way this works. Not only this is a problem in Africa, but also in other regions of the world. It's most noticeable in socialist/communist/authoritarian countries than democratic ones. If governments started to work for the people instead of serving their own interests, our world would be a much better place. Don't you think?

As for Africa using one currency to trade amongst themselves, I think we're closer to seeing this become a reality. Especially with rising geopolitical tensions. We're shifting into a multi-polar world. The BRICS bloc already has several African nations as "member states". Those are Egypt, South Africa, and Ethiopia. They are developing a unified financial system to counter the West. So anything's possible in the future. With no signs of corruption declining in Africa (and the world), we should only expect the worse.

[Franklyn-wood]

Africa is not poor but only lacks full exposure in discovering its potential; this emancipation from their leaders and how they have belittled themselves, to reason on how they could utilize every opportunity they have to explore their abundant natural resources for their development.

Africans think they are independent whereas theyy are not, because it is not possible that you have everything needed to be rich and still yet depend on other countries to survive and develop, the leaders are not helping the situations as well because they are more selfish to themselves rather than being committed to National building, sometimes you don't tend to appreciate on what we have until we begin to lose it.

Africans are blessed with resources and talents to mention but a few, but lack of confidence in it citizens by leaders makes it impossible to invest in ourselves with the believe that we can't do anything by ourselves, except with the help of others civilized countries. Meanwhile we travel out into other countries only to become legends because of our intellectual abilities.
We Africans are expose but greed and hatred won't allow us mostly from the leaders to put in enough in our economy, they rather invest outside the country where the will get more gains for themselves.