Greed and impunity is Africa’s curse

Even though kleptocracy (governance characterised by rampant thievery of public resources) has been largely synonymous with Africa’s immediate post colonial dictators, it is still very much alive today but perpetrated through sophisticated procurement processes that appear legit in the eyes of the gullible public.

By side stepping institutions of governance in various subtle ways, greedy politicians have proved to be disastrous for economic performance and are a cause of the rampant poverty faced by innocent citizens across the continent. In most cases, the success of kleptocrats rests in their ability to use divide and rule via patron clientalistic strategies to maintain power in weakly-institutionalised polities costly to society. Oversight institutions such as anti- corruption bodies do not work the same way in many African states so as to control corruption.