You know, I find myself asking “why?” a lot with anything related to foreigners going to Africa. I was just in Lagos, doing some research (which I talk about, among other things, in the links below), and I couldn’t help but wonder about each foreigner I saw there. People don’t really travel there out of curiosity. It is mostly for business. And it is hard not to wonder if their motives have the “good” of Nigeria at heart. And perhaps they shouldn’t necessarily?

Anyway, I am blogging about Nigeria to add to the collective pool of information about this country that is largely unknown to the outside world, but strangely important given how much oil it contributes to the rest of the world, and to hopefully promote awareness of what could help Nigerians who are struggling to have true independence and justice.

Interestingly, you tagged Rebekah Heacock–I am working with her on this project. Thought she is researching Uganda, not Nigeria. But same project.

Anyway, I also blog about Nigeria because it fascinates me. It has almost every development issue imaginable, and is a wildly complex place. Oil and a resource curse, religious conflict, corruption, population explosion, health issues, environmental degradation, bad governance, foreign exploitation, militia rule, former military rule, and people filled with spirit and an enterprising nature. I simply can’t get it off my mind.

http://themorningsidepost.com/2009/01/nigeria-blog-entry-1-slave-to-the-traffic-jam/

http://themorningsidepost.com/2009/01/nigeria-blog-electric-power-to-the-people/

–Ben

I think it is also an important one in revealing the motivations of those of us who blog about Africa. Our concerns are different, but I think that each of us is contributing immensely to an understanding of the continent. Even when we write the “silly stuff!”

And, yes, there are times I think that the preoccupations of some of my fellow-bloggers are rather silly, but then I look at it this way:

By concentrating on the “lighter” stuff, these bloggers show the world that this continent has much more going for it than mud huts and so on.

Your Global Voices Project does stunning work presenting this African Quilt to the world public and I thank you for such obvious passion.

Keep on blogging!

I too am not from Africa but I share your fascination. I did a lot of work-related traveling there in the 1990s, in the French-speaking countries. Here is a post I put on my blog that points up the difficulties of using modern business theory in a country (Ghana, in this case) that still needs to satisfy the basic requirements.
http://johngaynardcreativity.blogspot.com/2009/01/application-of-problem-solving-methods.html
Best wishes, John
P.S. I have got the feed from your site so I will be looking in regularly.