Mystery thriller with a background of revolution in an African nation.
Wednesday, September 10, 2008.
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Africa and Asia - well, all other continents - have been the playground for Europe with their residents given scarcely a thought and their rights, forget it. This is all the more so when it comes to mineral or other wealth of those continents. Business of Europe is of supreme importance and less so only compared to interests of aristocracy or royalties of those nations of Europe that have them, and even then only if they are alert to being taken in by business.
So when it is a small nation of Africa with abominable status in every way one could think of, as of the time line of the story, that is, when most of Asia and Africa is either independent or looking forward to it or struggling towards it, certainly a businessman who has accidentally come across information about tremendously rich mineral deposits of the said small African nation is not going to stop short of murder and coup and take over of the nation in name of a civil war in that nation which in reality is mercenaries sent by him so he could put up a dummy of his choice. To that end he bribes the scientist to shred his real report and one realises the scientist's daughter being handicapped perhaps saved his life - else he might have refused to sell his integrity and been straight murdered and been written off as accident.
Then there is the matter of the mercenaries. Africa has been overrun by them across the continent, and they are from Europe, and know Africa and can assess the situation and do the job for a price he can well afford, with competence and without fleecing him. So he and his chosen underlings are content to play their part and sit back until they can take the place over.
What they do not count on is that some of these mercenaries care not only for their own lives but for one another, and that includes more than skin colour, and beyond the comrades in arms from Africa. There are those that care for Africa itself - and what is more most of them do, more than they care for rich businessmen of Europe. So instead of selling the poor nation with hidden wealth to the men who plan to take it away and not care a whit for the poor of Africa, they put in place a plan all their own, with a man who would be good for the poor nation and men who would serve him and grow in numbers enough to guarantee he shall survive and rule and do well by the tiny nation.
The mineral here is platinum. But the story could have been about diamonds, only, that story went in favour of the rich businessmen of Europe.
But the heart rending part is the description of the nation of Zangaro with the abominable state of affairs which could have been better if only someone had cared before the band of mercenaries did, and the heart rending part is not that it can happen in a small nation of a poor continent, but that one suspects it is so in most of the continent, or major parts anyway.
The description here is all too real one fears, and not in a small measure due to Europe running away after exploiting the various nations of the continents and then leaving with the convenient excuse of giving in to demands of independence, instead of facing a mirror and asking if it is not selfish to leave after taking what they could and long before they could empower the populations of the subjugated nations to rule with education and culture of civil administration.
Not for nothing have millions starved through the continent even as the rich world keeps enjoying everything it can provide, from diamonds to coffee to cocoa to vegetables fresh for tables of Europe, while lands in Europe grow wines too expensive for any poor and flowers for perfumes more or less equally expensive, and other rich nations of other continents across oceans do no less.
Friday, March 21, 2014.
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