The blackholes in African leadership - by Phareal Noel Ansah

THE BLACKHOLES IN AFRICAN LEADERSHIP

Black holes (a dark mass that does not even allow the massless light to escape) have always been the villains in the story of the universe. They are present in almost every galaxy. Our very own Milky Way Galaxy has a supermassive black hole lurking at its centre, which makes its study, once pioneered by physicist Stephen Hawking, critical, according to astrophysicist Maximiliano Isi of Massachusetts institute of technology.
Unfortunately, this black hole concept of astronomy fits perfectly in our political and governance structure on earth.

One of Hawking’s most famous theorems states that it is impossible for a black hole to decrease in size over time. This theorem is derived from Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity that defines gravitational waves and black holes. This principle relates with a similar thermodynamic principle that entropy (disorder) cannot decrease over time. It consistently increases.

The black hole style leadership in the sub-region functions very much like its mothership – in a very opaque manner without accountability to its respective subjects.
The media is under a subtlely ferocious attack in places like Nigeria, Ghana to mention but a few. Who would have thought that in an era of technology where inalienable rights of citizens like speech are expressed on diverse platforms, a government that reflects the will of the people will ban this speech platform like what happened to Twitter in Nigeria.
Who would have thought that natural rights like the right to protest will be fiercely contested by law and brute force by people who came to power through the power of the media and such protests – the very mistake Benjamin Franklin committed in the (18) Eighteenth century which gave him a bad name.

This begs the question “why should the demand for basic amenities like portable water, motorable roads, consistent and stable electricity lead to the death of patriots like we are witnessing in Ejura in the Ashanti Region of Ghana?”
The governance structure seems to thrive on entropy, leading to us getting saddled with several judgements debt costing hundreds of millions of dollars.

In 1Co 11:14 KJV, the Apostle Paul admonishes the church saying, Doth not even nature itself teach you, which stands to reason that nature is a teacher. Essentially, the black hole principle happens to illustrate the above egregious wrong.

Astrophysicists posit that black holes are formed and also enlarged from the death of a star with such a high gravitational field that the matter gets squeezed into the small space under it, trapping the light of the dead star.

We once had promising governments, and young people with a patriotic desire to see our country thrive. Then this desire died, and was put under the radar. Now journalists are being killed, and dissenting voices being silenced – consumed by the ferocious and ever-expanding governmental black hole.
When citizens choose to be nonchalant about activities of those who govern, the black hole increases in size. When those in academia choose to be passive to happenings for fear of being hounded, the black hole increases. When traditional authorities are unable to speak truth to power and instead become sycophants to the central government, black holes become larger.
When religious organizations are scared to criticize government instead avail their platforms for them to engage in their mischievous activities, the black hole increases.

I know I do not want to be in a society which is a supermassive black hole, an overwhelmingly anarchic state. Do you?

“True, I used to see a lot of hope. I saw men tear down the veils behind which the truth had been hidden. But then the same men, when they have power in their hands at last, began to find the veils useful. They made many more”
Ayi Kwei Armah

Phareal Noel Ansah D.