When the troubles broke out in Kenya after the elections, a TV commentator described the country as one of Africa's successes.
If this is success, what does failure look like? So is Africa a basket case? It does not have to be but the continent needs land reform. The right sort of land reform. Which is not just land distribution.
This photograph comes from the Church Missionary Society, which like other Christian bodies, has projects all over Africa. It is good work, but never more than tinkering. Sadly, Catholic Church organisations do not have any better grip on the problem and the underlying issues of economic justice.
I wrote to my MP on two entirely separate issues recently. The first was to do with the replacement for the Inter City 125 train, which at £2.6 million per vehicle, is twice as expensive as it ought to be. The second concerned the benefits of a switch from business rate and Council Tax to a tax based on site values. In both cases, the replies were full of spurious, unsubstantiated assertions and completely flawed arguments. This is typical. You will not get an iota of sense from the government on any area of public policy at all - finance, economics, trade and employment, agriculture, housing, health, transport, energy. All junk. If you write to your MP you will invariably receive answers that are an insult to your intelligence, no matter what subject you are writing about. Of course they cannot understand statistics. They are innumerate. Whitehall is staffed with idiots with a high IQ. Look at their IT projects. And mind your purse, they will have that too.
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