From Ghana With Much Live To Uriva Village In The DR Congo

Hello Rodolphe,

I really do admire what you are doing to help those less fortunate than yourself, in the village of Uriva, in your native Democratic Republic of Congo.

It is often said that men don't cry. However, when I read the latest posting by Uriva's adopted son, Ned Meerdink, your American friend and helper from the University of Wisconsin, about those poor little children, in your village page at http://www.nabuur.com/ , tears welled up in my eyes - and I felt that I had to write to you.

Rodolphe, that story about those little children, is an indictment of all the corrupt leaders of our continent.

Your young president, Joseph Kabila, is obviously doing his best to stabilise the DR Congo, and appears to be well-meaning.

It is sad that whiles little children like those Ned has befriended starve, some of the idiots we allow to rule us, are using tribalism to fuel wars.

I do not know what exactly are the fears of General Nkunda - but it is outrageous that Africans, all of whom are descendants of the same early inhabitants of our continent, think of ourselves as Tutsis and Hutus, etc. etc.

And because of this absurd belief that we are different from each other, some of us, are even prepared to murder each other - our fellow humans and fellow Africans!

Your country sits on top of unimaginable wealth, which could rebuild your shattered nation, and make all of you live happy and contented lives.

It is sad that it takes a vulnerable American youth, to stand up to local officials suspicious of his motives, to try and build a multimedia centre for his adopted village: with the help of others, serving as online volunteers, from many nations around the world. What does it matter even if he were a spy?

If he can help to make a difference to the future of those dear children, who cares?

Our leaders build sumptuous presidential palaces, and drive around in bulletproof air-conditioned luxury vehicles, to impress the world - forgetting that it is only the quality of life of their people that will impress the world!

The current self-righteous leaders of that young American are no better. Their greed has led them into a war that has destroyed the country of a people with a civilisation dating back thousands of years - a war which has now sent them straight back into the Dark Ages.

And obscenely, the greedy merchants of death, who are behind those running the US today, particularly that arrogant extreme right-winger, Vice President Dick Cheney, have started a whole new industry driven by the unfathomable greed of some of today's neo-conservative business elite - that feeds off the misery of the victims of American aggression.

Today, the shareholders of those evil privately-owned American military industrial complex entities, are prospering mightily, from the blood and tears of the victims of unjust and illegal wars overseas.

And the employees of these privately-owned war machines, are killing Iraqis like flies, with impunity - simply because the cronies and lackeys of their bosses in Washington, have out-sourced a brutal war to them: without public tender, and worth billions of dollars in US taxpayers' money, to fight an illegal war in Iraq.

Yet, it would take only a fraction of the vast sums going to these new thriving business models, the so-called defence contractors now operating as a law unto themselves in sovereign Iraq, to wipe out poverty in many places on planet earth.

The American people themselves are amongst the most generous people in the world, and many of them would rather the huge amounts of money the US is expending on the crime against humanity that the war in Iraq represents, which is enriching the new rich of America (the likes of the notorious "defence contractor" Erik Prince, founder and owner of Blackwater Corporation), was spent on funding scores of village projects, which could wipe out poverty in much of rural Africa and elsewhere in the developing world, by providing some of the infrastructure that Ned bemoans a lack of in the many Uriva villages across Africa.

What decent man, Roldolphe, will not shed a tear for such outrages? You represent the unsung heroes of Africa, Rodolphe.

And our wwww.nabuur.com is indeed a veritable means of bringing good human beings together to help each other.

Those who give off their time and energy (and money sometimes!) to help those in need, living many thousands of miles away, from behind their computer screens, also benefit as much from our online  community as those they help in villages around the developing world.

That is the way God has made humankind - we need to help each other in order to be happy and fulfilled!

God bless you, Rodolphe - and please find those little children Ned mentioned in his latest posting: and tell them they have an African friend in me, and that they must make an effort to learn to read and to write: so that they too, can help others tomorrow, as you, Roldolphe, are helping the very nice people of Uriva village, today.

I salute you - and the many others like you across our dear home continent, Mother Africa!p. Bravo!

Best wishes,

Kofi.