That's the part about the UN that worries me. When independence came to Indonesia they got Irian Jaya, because it had been part of the Dutch East Indies. That way, one set of colonial masters was simply replaced with another set, arguably worse than the previous one!
In some cases, the UN appears to be worse than useless, such as how Unesco fell into line behind that vile little toe-rag Arafat. Brrr!
Here at school, among a crowd of starry-eyed idealists, I often feel like a visitor from some strange planet. The professor of African Politics asked me over lunch about "the future of Nigeria," when, after all of two seconds to think, I blurted out that "they are f@cked!"
"What? What did you just say?!"
"Uhh, doomed, they are doomed!" (The liberal mind-set at work: she heard me just fine. I don't mumble. But, what I said, no, no, no... one cannot say that about Nigeria; it just has to have a bright future, in the face of all the very obvious facts about a teeming population living hand-to-mouth off their oil.)
Then she told me about a conference in a wonderful new capital, Abuja, that she attended, how it was chock-full of young people with tremendous ability and promise, and how if Africa goes then we go too, and all that sort of hooey.
I told her that I was counting on the Mediterranean and the Atlantic to help with that one. She never bothered to speak to me again. I have no idea why.
Here, Mr. Spike, you are being twitted about ignorance of the situation behind the headlines, one that is very different from what you may think it is. Even if you adjust by 50% from what CNN is saying, that still leaves you laughably far from the truth of so much of Africa. I am sure that you mean well, but Africa is very different from what you seem to think it is.