 Lesins from Sudan. In the morning of 15 April 2023, the world woke up to the news of open armed conflict in the city of Katsu, capital of Sudan, between rival factions within the government of Sudan. The conflict is escalating and threatens to explode into a full-scale civil war. To be sure, Sudan is no stranger to war. It seems to have worked into conflict soon after its birth in 1956, when its then southern parts unhappy with lack of autonomy went to war. Many years after and at the price amongst other things of an estimated 2 million dead, sotans would Sudan eventually emerge as an independent state in 2011, and its own internal conflicts promptly began. Nigeria has a human stake in the happenings in Sudan. Many Nigerians go for their education sometimes sponsored by state governments. Beyond this, technically Sudan has always been a refuge for Nigerians. If section 25 of the condition in Subali Red, it must not be forgotten for one that the children and followers of the last sutan of Sokoto, before the conquest of the Sokoto Empire by the British, Mohammad Atiruwan, live there and call it home. In many respects, our pre and post-colonial histories are not dissimilar. They are lessons to be drawn from their experience, the first one. Many years after independence, the fact is still not recognized, that our nations were arbitrarily cobbled together by our colonizers, living ethnic fishers that require understanding and careful handling. There can be no sustainable development without peace, but sustainable peace will not be guaranteed by fear and the martial boots. There must be a continuous and sincere discussion and bargains for the best arrangement of power that will move our nations forward. Here there have been much discussion on restructuring, some sincere, some in contempt. But what we must see is that serious intentions should be paid to it. Secondly, in general, we must do everything to limit foreign interference in our domestic politics. Every nation, like every human being, has its own interests. Implicated in Sudan's crisis is the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Russia, even the EU which provided funding to a faction there to police a fence against the wave of immigration. This is of course not a license to roll out the artillery against citizens who seek foreign aid against oppression. To the contrary, it is an ammunition to leaders to avoid creating the conditions that promote helplessness and the sense of oppression and injustice that leads to these interventions by constantly and sincerely taking into account the desires of all their people and not only some. Thirdly, there is a need for African nations, including Nigeria, to develop the capacity of their states to assume full control of the mining and trade of natural resources. One of the fractional heads involved in this crisis owns good mines. The UAE bunking now prevalent here is the causing of the illegal mining of solid minerals. Sudan teaches us we should not thereby allow ordinary citizens and even foreign bandits to become de facto states unto themselves. Lastly, increasingly the mozus of the African Union have grown flabby. Since the Arusha Accords that played a part in ending the Rwandan conflict, African leaders have largely stood by as the conflicts in the IRC, Libya, Cameroon, Ethiopia, South Sudan, Mali, and others have festered. The EU needs to rediscover its mission, especially in the area of mediation and peer-to-peer review of its leaders. You know what caught my attention there was the African Union. The conflict in Cameroon, I remember in 2019 I travelled to Cameroon via the sea from Orang. I took a speedboat to Cameroon. When I got there, it was not really very pleasant. The people are generally nice, but the situation at that time was war, civil war. We have seen the English speaking part. Yeah, the English and the French. Yeah, exactly. So at that point, at some point I was harassed close to the border because I was trying to have conversation with a French-speaking military officer, she's a woman, I think one of the gender marine. She was not very fluent in speaking English. I was not very fluent in speaking French. And I was trying to talk to her. She didn't really understand where I was coming from. And I was going back to Nigeria and I was rafandud just because of that. And you know what, the excuse, once I said that really broke my heart was that you know the countries at war, we can just liber you as one of the troublemakers. What's the meaning of that? As we Afrikas have gone to this level, killings in Cameroon. And they won't allow foreign pressure, especially not even the pressure, they won't capture anything. And yes, Africa Union, we sit down there and be having general assemblies. What did they discuss in general assemblies? The conflict in Ethiopia was one. And thank God Ulusya Gubasando was able to chairman the peace deal. But you know, we should not wait for outsiders to come and solve our problems as Afrikas. We can do more. Let's mozulop. I agree. The conflict in DRC for instance for me is very shameful. I mean you, and this is one of the misgivings I have about Kigami. Because you virtually have one small African state. Twisting in its tops, a bigger African state. And all that. You have other regional countries involved. These are countries controlled by the same leaders in the African Union that should be making the peace. At a point you remember there was a point in the conflict where even South Africa was involved. It's a shame. It's a shame. These are the things we should sit down in Africa. As we go into NAFTA and all that and we are trying to do free trade. We should think about and talk about seriously. We can't go on like this. This can't go on forever. The assignment we are giving them is African Union. Try to foster unity and peace amongst African nation. Will integration. Economic integration. We can become a very strong economic bloc to the world. It's not that every time there is problem in Africa or there is problem in the world. You see different world powers. Russia, US, China. They will come and start picking different states and start giving them something. I want to use that influence. I'm happy you've mentioned it because actually that's what's happening in Africa now. You see above us in the Maghreb. You hear the Russian Wagner group is always there. Some say it's even in Nigeria here and some of the clashes you see for all these bandits and all that. Even in Malifu, Malifu. We are accusing France that they have. Yes, because where there is confusion they can mine more. You see what happened in Sudan. The man owned a gold mine. One of the generals. The general that is causing the... Is he the president of the vice president? No, no, the vice president. He is fighting the president. You see the problem with Sudan was that both of them could not remove the president then. I want his name again. He actually set up these two generals. He will remain in power. One will fight one. He teamed up and removed them. So what I'm saying is the point I was making with that was look, don't let individuals be bigger than the states. We see also... We talk of privatization. But let us be careful. And that's one of the lessons I was saying we should draw in Nigeria. Let us be careful that we don't move into Uligaki. Where... Exactly. Where the state is actually controlled by individuals. And the individuals are stronger than the government. Yes. We should build strong institutions that would live in Nigeria. Exactly. Not the other way round. So these are the lessons. You can have states. If for instance someone corners the oil in Nigeria. Imagine that person virtually owns Nigeria. It's a cautionary tale that will be happening. We are not going to say all of this. I think often times the enemy is within. The enemy that we are fighting is within and not without. If you can conquer the enemy within, then it's easier to, again, picking back what I said earlier, putting up a solid front. We must conquer the enemy within. We must conquer ourselves. We must conquer our self-centeredness. We must come together as much as... I mean, politics is played everywhere virtually, even in the United States and all of that. But there is an approach, right? There is always that... I mean, I've been seeing some of this U.S. government political service on Netflix. When you see how they govern, there's always that thin line. They're not going to go beyond. This is where we draw the line of this, right? So there's this balance in their political approach, where most of them... I mean, when you look at Africa, we don't even value the value of a human life. It's almost next to nothing. The value of a human life. What do you say? Give them a piece of bread and they kill so many people. Human life is like this. You just throw it away So we need to come back again to our values. And I also want to go to one extreme. If you look at the past history of Europe and wars and all that, you'll notice that the wars were fought by leaders to benefit not themselves but the states. If you look at Napoleon, if you look at Bismarck, even if you look at the Hitler you mentioned, it was not fighting so that it could become rich. That's the problem in Sudan. That was leadership but of course in the reverse. I mean that's leadership. That's leadership. Exactly. So they are fighting for their state, not for themselves. Bigger than them. This is what Africans need to do. Exactly. And of course like you said, build a global institution. If Napoleon was fighting for himself, he would probably have been the richest man in the world. But wasn't that what was... Something I still want to drop in our consciousness and to our viewers out there including government listing in African Union members of member states of African Union. How come we have beautiful countries like Egypt? Egypt. They always call them Middle East and North Africa. Middle East and North Africa. Why? I'm not saying it's wrong to form, anybody can form their own economic bloc but now we stand in. Can we associate more with Africans? Ya, they are always wanting to be referred to as Middle East. We want to, as you said, to stand in Libya. But when it comes to Africa, they don't want to be associated with anything good. We are Africans. When it's something bad, we are not Africans. Once free trade becomes fantastic here. Everybody wants free trade becomes fantastic here. Everybody has to play their part. President of Egypt, Ahmed ASC. He should play his part. Every other president including our own president or the incoming president. But you know right now what is going on is that every African wants to go out. But perhaps when we are trading together and we see the benefit of trading with ourselves and moving together in a collective and helping to solve our own problems. I mean sometimes you see a country want to borrow money. Some of the money they want to borrow is not something that cannot be raised in a prosperous Africa. You want to raise a billion. If we come together, if we say in eight billion dollars it's not something we can borrow within ourselves. Awesome. We'll get there. Anybody can do whatever they want. I think root of that point. Meet with whoever they want to meet. But more importantly your home. You should also make your home strong as much as you want to explore other continents, other countries, other states. Make your home strong. Africa is our home so make it strong. That's there there. 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