₦airaland Forum

GERALD710:
Last I checked, 67% of Kenyans are Bantu.So are 70% of Ugandans.
Chad is not considered to be part of Central Africa(from our point of view, it is in the West)
Last I checked ,the Azande ,a Bantu community are the third largest ethnic group in South Sudan
Most of Cameroon is Bantu, well over 80%
Somalia, which is in the Horn has Somali Bantus, as well as Swahilis and the Bajuni population which overlaps into Kenya
Pygmys form no more than 2% in any of the nations in Central Africa namely the Congo,Rwanda and the DRC, 98 TO 99%of the population is Bantu .In fact, the Congo (DRC)has only around 500,000 pygmys out of a population of well over 50 million. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congo_Pygmies
Rwandan Pygmys are 1% of the population, known as the Twa.
In South Africa, Last I checked, 80% of the population is Black, almost all Bantu. Can you add up the population of 80% of South Africa, 90% of Namibia, All of Angola,All of Zambia,All of Zimbabwe,All of Mozambique, save for the Whites,all of Swaziland and Lesotho,95% of Tanzania,98% of DRC, 70% of Uganda, 67% of Kenya, 98% of the DRC, 99% of the Congo,All of Rwanda and Burundi, All of Gabon,all of Equatorial Guinea save for a few migrants, and over 80% of Cameroon, all from one subgroup.
And btw, last I checked,West Africans are a patchwork of different ethnic subgroups many of whom have little in common and quite often hate each other(Northern and Southern Nigeria for example.Northern and Southern Chad,Northern and Southern Mali etc)While East Central and Southern Africans do have Bantu common roots.
Bantus are recognised as the largest African subgroup on the continent. Whether I go to the Zulus of South Africa or to the Azande of South Sudan,we use the word mtu to mean a person(and apparently the word goat in Zulu and Swahili is the same too.Mbuzi)
Swahili is spoken by 200 million people in East Africa alone!! That is Kenya, Uganda,Rwanda,Burundi,South Sudan and Tanzania. It is the official language of all three nations and has also been adopted by Rwanda,Burundi and South Sudan.Luganda is NOT an official language of Uganda.It never has been.It is indeed widely spoken in Southern and Eastern Uganda but go to the North and West. It is absent.Swahili on the other hand is present in every corner of Uganda.
The 200 million people you mention, do not include the Eastern DRC who also speak Kiswahili(Joseph Kabila feels quite at home in any part of East Africa.It is also why Congolese refugees face little hostility across the region), Malawi, where there are Swahilis,Mozambique, Comoros and Part of Zambia.

Last I checked MPESA is in every country in East Central and Southern Africa except the Horn(Ethiopia due to Government monopoly, Eritrea and Somalia due to turmoil)
Ever heard of Vodacom??(Not Vodafone,Vodacom)
It offers MPESA in all the above nations except CAR and I believe Angola.Whether you go to Mozambique
http://allafrica.com/stories/201305280313.html
Lesotho
http://www.vodacom.co.ls/ls-personal/m-pesa/m-pesa
or the DRC
http://www.nation.co.ke/business/eMoney/Safaricom-MTN-partnership-Africa/1625712-2694198-yc82wo/index.html
MPESA is there.
MPESA is also found in Egypt and Romania
https://www.mobileworldlive.com/money/news-money/vodafone-to-launch-m-pesa-in-egypt-romania-report/
as well as India
https://www.mpesa.in/portal/
And Afghanistan where they use a different name(M-Paisa, generally the same meaning) but the same platform
https://www.roshan.af/en/business/m-paisa/
So MPESA has not just spread across East Africa(BTW,it is available on MTN Uganda and Rwanda as well) but has gone to even India and even Romania.
MPESA is indeed becoming a global force.

Ok
Let me correct some wrong points and misconceptions of yours.

1) Chad has never been part of West Africa, they belong to the Community of Central African states, they never belonged to Ecowas. Dont forget that the Sara people who are the largest ethnic group in Chad are also a major ethnic group in CAR.

2) West Africans do not hate each other. Our only differences are political and not racial or ethnic. We never had an ethnic genocide (Hutu-Tutsi) like you Bantus did in Rwanda. You Bantus have killed yourselves more than us.
See the extreme poverty in Central Africa today because of wars. So i wonder where the Bantu brotherhood is. Xenophobic set of humans.
I am a northern Nigerian and i love Southern Nigerians as much as my own people. The only difference between us are political, colonial and religious difference. The fact that we are from different language groups is very inconsequential to us.

90% of Malians are as black as i am. The problem with the light skinned northern minority berbers is that they refused to go to school and integrate with the govt in the south. Black Malians were not the ones who colonized the berbers, the french people were, why don't they take their grievance to France? Those people see themselves more like their counterparts in North Africa and they will continue to be isolated as long as they choose to isolate themselves. (for me, i wish they and their deserts would be given independence to join Algerian deserts).

3) We west Africans love and respect each other so much. Our countries will never think of Warring each other like your Bantu brothers of Congo, Rwanda and Burundi or your East African cousins of Ethiopia, Eriteria, Somalia and South Sudan. Every issue we will have is internal and thank God for a united ECOWAS which helps us speak with one voice as one people.

As for your Mpesa. Ok, can you give an official link showing the population of members it has on the continent and it's total net income? Cos you obviously did not understand what i meant by penetrate. Mpesa is in Ghana for instance but barely 1% of the population know about it or use it.

ZarZar:
Kwaaaaaaa! Do they know our entertainment industry boasts Grammys & an Oscar award?

Jayceon:
the sound quality is horrible,always sounds like someone is jumping up and down a corrugated iron

Muafrika2:
Errm

I hear that that happens. Many of their (3 - 6 hour long) movies are shot within 3 days

I still love them though. The end result is totally hilarious

Up to 8 Nigerians have won Grammys. Almost anybody wins that these days.

Pls, you guys should tell me of what use is an industry that produces 1 or 2 quality movies once in a decade?
An industry that cannot captivate the entire Africa producing movies that relate with the African masses?

Most of those South African movies, (i agree they are of good quality) but they are usually produced once in a decade and they are mostly centred on South African history of Apartheid (which only Black South africans can relate with)
While Nigeria on the other hand mostly produce movies (drama styled) always with intriguing and captivating story lines which relates better with the daily family, communal and social lives of the average African! That is why we still make more sales on the continent! Just like the Telenovelas have dominated most of the world as the preferred drama series.

However, many of our producers have started diversifying and are now producing historical movies like 'Sarafina'. Checkout these Award winning movies 'Black November, 76, Oloibiri'. Other movies like 'Higher a man, The wedding party, 30 days in Atlanta' e.t.c.

You guys should leave the old nollywood movies and check out the New nollywood movies which are now making sales of millions of dollars in weeks after production and are now featuring renowned American artistes and keep on dominating the African movies awards, while South African movie producers are still waiting to gather enough money to produce another Sarafina-like movie in the next 10 years. Pls, the world has gone past your apartheid movies which come once in a decade.

Muafrika2:
You also need to examine the causes of urbanisation and the movement of people from rural to urban areas. Mostly it is in search of employment, directly linked to reduced opportunities in the rural areas.

In Kenya, some rural communities are very empowered, such that they hardly ever leave their homes for cities. I live with the Kalenjin for example. They inhabit the Rift Valley (which has towns like Eldoret). They are also the fourth largest tribal group in Kenya, but you will hardly ever meet them in low income estates in Nairobi.

Kalenjins have very good schools back in the Rift Valley. They are economically empowered with knowledge in dairy production and supply milk companies based all over the Rift Valley. Am in a small town, but there is a milk processing plant just around the corner serving this area. Kalenjins also grow tea and like milk, there are tea factories dotted all over the place. There are many teaching colleges in Kalenjin land, making it the most common profession among the people here.

When Kalenjin runners win millions in athletic championships, they bring back the money to their home and invest in their houses, farms, rental houses, etc. My landlord is one of them. The best people to have as landlords by the way.

I believe Kalenjin empowerment was so effective that our Kikuyus do not enjoy the same kind of privilege.

My own Luhya people are the opposite. No Agricultural empowerment, not enough land (after colonialists left, our politicians took the land they had stolen from our people for themselves), limited knowledge in agricultural production, no market for our goods, no colleges and no factories - it pays to have a president from your own tribe

That means cities are flooded with my Luhya kinsmen looking for menial jobs. My people flood every town, including the little towns like where I live.

I hope I have demonstrated the powers behind rural to urban migration and population of urban centers at the expense of rural areas.

Ok, great, i think i get the concept. It is good for the countryside of a country to look developed.

I think, Nigeria is heavily urbanised because of our 36 state govts and 774 local govts. Every of our states and local governments have administrative capitals and headquarters where adminsitrative activities take place, leading to creation of more jobs and rapid urbanisation.

So i guess you can see the reason why our markets for entertainment, banking and other industries are very large? People in the cities always tend to appreciate the elements of modern life more creating a greater market.

I believe if your country had adopted a similar state govt system like Nigeria then your country would have been more urbanized (somehow forcefully) because there would be more administrative city centres all over the country.

Kenya can never go into full blown industrialization without urbanisation and some of your sectors like your entertainment, fashion and banking sectors may never achieve their full potentials because these sectors feed more on urbanization.

gallivant:
We were all learning until Nigerians got ignorant. You can't faze Kenya with slums when entire Lagos or Owerri is a slum! Get over yourselves, ask anybody in the world about Naija slum cities.You proudly deceive yourselves.

Are you sure you understand English language very well or you were taught in swahili all your life (hence do not understand English words well)?
Almost all of the people in Lagos and Owerri have access to tarred motorable roads, tap water, toilet facilities, drainages, sanitation and live in appartments with living rooms and bed rooms. How can that be called a slum?
Are you just commenting for commenting sake or do you really have something reasonable to say?

uzzyfire:
dude stop hating, its bad for ur health. do u know how dirty new York is it is infested with rats and bugs. people survive just fine bro(I'm surviving just fine) the thing is, if u are coming to Lagos, u have to know how to hustle and bustle if not u will not survive (that's y its GDP is so high) cos people are constantly working 24/7 nobody seeps in Lagos.

Lagos is not d best place to do vacation in Nigeria , u go to places like abuja, calabar, owerri if u want to enjoy ursef.(although Lagos has one of d best nightlife in Africa ) parties are always going on in Lagos

You have said it. Someone like me for instance i cannot go and live permanently in Lagos. The place is too loud and fast. I can only go for visits, entertainment events, parties and exhibitions. Chikena.

The guy thinks New york is all he sees on TV. He doesn't know that new york has dark areas and some terrible suburbs completely overtaken by gangsters and niggas.

TayserMahiri:
Give Abuja ten more years and it will be as bad as Lagos. You guys cannot teach anyone in Africa about matters to do with population and service provision. The kenyan slum upgrade program coupled with the Counties is an excellent solution to the problem. Moving capital is usually in case of an overpopulated/ unplanned capital like Lagos or when it is not central like Dar Es Salaam.

Slum upgrade of since how many years? When we saw that many Nairobi slum dwellers were selling their newly given appartments and going back to the slums?
Were you guys sleeping when your slum population grew up to 3 million, (50% of the city)?
Abuja can never be like Lagos, because our Federal capital territory will never tolerate the creation of slums. You need to google and see for yourself how many aspiring slums and illegal settlements have been demolished in Abuja over the decades.

Nairobi is not a city planned from the scratch! So how different is it from Lagos? While Lagos on the other hand is building more cities on islands from the scratch!

Eko atlantic city, Lagos smart city and Orange island are being planned from the scratch as you can see. While Victoria island, Lagos island, Lekki and Ikoyi were planned from the scratch. So in a short time from now, about 50% of Lagos would be planned from the scratch and that is how more will keep on springing up until the unplanned parts from the scratch are reduced to 1%.

TayserMahiri:
Please don't compare Lagos with NY. Lagos is a true mess. The best example of disorder in Africa if not the world.

Well, Los Angeles may be cleaner, finer, classier and more exotic than New york with terrible gangsters and drug pushers, but still New york remains the financial capital and power of USA. That is what Lagos is to Africa. The entertainment and financial capital of Africa.

TayserMahiri:
I think yours is even more embarrassing where 2/3 (two thirds) of the Lagos population lives in slums. Taking the city alone, that is some 10 million people crammed in the steamy lagoons of Lagos. . That is of course in an oil rich NIgeria. And that was back 2006, and of course now its even worse with the problems you guys have been under for the past decade, probably around 15,000,000 slum dwellers now because the city population grows at 8 % per annum. It was anticipated that by 2015 Lagos would be the third largest city in the world but it has less infrastructure than any of the world’s other largest cities. So, man, stop comparing your filthy city with Brazil, China etc. Its a filthy place.
You may have to visit other cities outside nigeria to see why everyone wonders how the people of Lagos survive.
In fact, its known as the Megacity of Slums. Sometimes I think the nigerian government deliberately hides data from nigerians to fool them of their sad reality.

http://www.irinnews.org/news/2006/09/05/lagos-mega-city-slums

Do you know the millions of people who live in slums in Mumbai and Delhi in India? What about Rio de janeiro in Brazil (the world most renowned slum)? Even Sao Paulo has slums!
It would absolutely be crazy for me to compare Nigeria with developing countries like China. But even a country like Brazil who have been independent for almost 200 years, yet Rio de janeiro has more slum dwellers than Lagos which is two times it's population.

India and Brazil may never get rid of poverty and their slums because in both countries, a large segment of their population is seen and treated as inferior 2nd class citizens. In Brazil, most of the black and mixed race people are highly economically disadvantaged and discriminated while in India, it is the caste system. People of the lowest caste will always live in slums and scheduled villages because it is even forbidden for the people of higher castes to see or come in contact with them. Both countries suffer a form of racism which is somehow supported by their govt and elites.

This is unlike Nigeria where we all see ourselves as equal citizens and development is even. So we dont have people who are condemned to slums and villages their entire lives.

Pls don't embarrass yourself next time, the whole world knows Mumbai and Rio de janeiro for gigantic slums! What about Karachi and Dhaka in Pakistan and Bangladesh? and all these countries gained independence before Nigeria.

China and Malaysia are the only large developing nations with large cities without slums together with excellent world class infrastructure.

Go and watch that award winning Indian movie (Slumdog millionaire) and see what a real slum is about. India even has a worldwide award winning movie about their slums in Mumbai (their largest city). (kai, Indian poverty is really worst than African poverty, just that India enjoys political stability which prevents widespread starvation and famine which comes through wars as we see in Africa).

However, if you want to dare me to this statement (i am ready, let the pictures and facts start rolling in)!

TayserMahiri:
I think yours is even more embarrassing where 2/3 (two thirds) of the Lagos population lives in slums. Taking the city alone, that is some 10 million people crammed in the steamy lagoons of Lagos. . That is of course in an oil rich NIgeria. And that was back in 2006, and of course now its even worse with the problems you guys have been under for the past decade, probably around 15,000,000 slum dwellers now because the city population grows at 8 % per annum. It was anticipated that by 2015 Lagos would be the third largest city in the world but it has less infrastructure than any of the world’s other largest cities. So, man, stop comparing your filthy city with Brazil, China etc. Its a filthy place.
You may have to visit other cities outside nigeria to see why everyone wonders how the people of Lagos survive.
In fact, its known as the Megacity of Slums. Sometimes I think the nigerian government deliberately hides data from nigerians to fool them of their sad reality.

http://www.irinnews.org/news/2006/09/05/lagos-mega-city-slums

If Lagos is such a slum, can you pls tell me why Nairobi still keeps on topping the list of slums in Africa and worldwide? why not Lagos?
The only slum in Lagos is Makoko (which picture is in that link). Apart from Makoko, we don't have another real slum in Lagos. And Makoko itself has been largely demolished, while the other areas like Agege, Mushin and Ajegunle which are quite close to being slums (but are not slums) have been facing serious infrastructural development and integration. If you want pictures with links can give them to you.

There is no way our govt can hide slums from us because we dont have them. If we had slums like Nairobi, we would have been attracting foreign NGOs and humanitarian aids like Nairobi, but they are not in Lagos.

Pls i dare you to show me the slums in Nigeria, bring out their pictures and let's check their development if they are qualified to be called slums, then we ascertain their population.
In a developing country's Urban area of 21 million people and not even up to 200,000 people live in slums (less than 1% of the population). Pls that is progress!

While in a Nairobi of 6 million, 3 million (50%) live in slums, not just ordinary but world renowned slums!

Slum dwelling is not a Nigerian culture and this is something you must know! Nigerians are quite proud people, instead of us to live in a slum, all in the name of living in Lagos, we rather remain in our villages or go to smaller cities and towns which are everywhere in the country.
For instance, i have never lived in Lagos or Abuja my entire life, i have only visited for few days. I have only lived in Warri, Benin and Jos (mostly my entire life). And these 3 cities i live in have over a million people each. There is so much wealth in these cities and majority of the people are middle class citizens. We have access to almost everything people in Lagos have (apart from entertainment industry). So why should i ever think of going to stay in Lagos?

We have too many clean, calm, cheap, affordable, peaceful and prosperous cities in Nigeria for us to go and be living in slums in Lagos! Nigeria is unlike Kenya where everything in centred in Nairobi and everyone who wants to live in a city in Kenya must go there.

uzzyfire:
but all d credit and money still goes to nollywood. ghana does not have an industry, they are all incorporated in nollywood

Yes, i think we are still somehow together with them.
If not for the stupid colonial divide between we West africans where many of us are french speaking and other English speaking. We would have had a united region and entertainment industry.

TayserMahiri:
Of course not all villagers stay in the villages, many in kenyas poorer areas move to the cities in search of better lives. More than Half of kenya is arid or semi arid and people from such areas will move to the cities. Not to mention the sheer number of illegal and legal refugees from all over east africa who come with nothing and end up in the slums.

I think Kenya can copy from Nigeria.
I thank God for Babangida who relocated Nigeria's capital from Lagos to Abuja and made Lagos a state govt of it's own.
This somehow shifted the migration from Lagos a bit. Abuja of less than 25 years now has about 5 million people in it's metropolitan area. Imagine what it would be in a decade time. Lagos is no longer receiving all the attention. Before Abuja's creation, Lagos was growing uncontrollably (creating many slums). Even without capitalship it is still exploding, let alone if the capital was still there. Thank God Lagos state govt is meeting up.

Lagos state is the 4th largest economy in Africa after Nigeria, SA and Egypt and it's per capital income is far higher than SA and Egypt. It is going well ahead to meet the likes of China, Russia and Brazil. I hope the whole Nigeria goes along with it.

(Sorry i'm digressing). I was just trying to see how the large slum population of Nairobi can be reduced. It's too much and embarassing. How can 3 million people be living in slums in an urban area (Nairobi) of 6 million? That's half the population?

TayserMahiri:
Did you get my point or you just responded. You guys have nollywood for nigeria but each country in east africa has their own. unless, they merge, they would not be as big as nigerias nollywood for the huge population.

There was a time Ghanian movies were dominating Nigerian market because their productions started beating ours in quality. This is why till date our movies feature lots of their actors (although this is drastically reducing cos we have regained our stance). However both countries (NG and Ghana) do joint productions for both markets and Ghana obviously benefits more as a smaller country.

I think if Kenyan movies are better they will obviously dominate EA market, just as Nigerian movies are dominating the continent and not just Nigerian market.
Your actors and producers can also feature each other (or don't you guys do this?). Nigeria and GH have been doing this for over a decade.
That is the point am trying to make.

uzzyfire:
I really don't know y Nigeria gets all d attention in africa ,without even trying. anything Nigerian grabs d attention of Africa
.just look at dis bbnaija that was just concluded. it caught d attention of d whole Africa and its supposed to be a Nigerian thing , they shud have just called it bbafrica cos I really didn't see d difference between d both . and big brother made a truck load of money from Nigeria

This is the advantage of having a large country. We have the greatest continental influence.
This is why we must really work hard to make Nigeria work as a united nation. Those fighting for Nigeria's break-up don't know what we will loose if we divide.

TayserMahiri:
Let me say Nigerias Nollywood benefits a lot from nigerias large population in terms of revenues hence an ability to expand. Beyond that, it is not much to talk about.

But you guys in East Africa are very much alike in culture and language. Your movie producers should be able to cover the entire East African market (which can equal Nigerian market), or won't Tanzanians and Ugandans watch Kenyan movies? If no, then why do they watch ours?

Do you know that about 1/3 of Nigeria do not even watch nollywood movies? Many northern Nigerians watch only Hausa movies (Kannywood).

TayserMahiri:
Most likely why the station is unpopular for not resonating with the masses.

Does this change the condition of the Kenyan villages i see regularly?

Why do you guys also have a large slum population if you claim that your people love to stay away from the cities in the comfort of their villages?

uzzyfire:
I don't think it can, at least not now. america has been building Hollywood for over 100 yrs . although nollywood is moving at high speed, d quality of movies they do nowadays is on point and their storylines has really improved.
u can watch this movie "the wedding party" to confirm wat I'm talking abt

It can in the next decade if our economy advances well into being a high middle income economy and if we have stricter govt policies against piracy.
Many Nigerian producers actually have what it takes to produce a Hollywood quality movie, just that they are not sure of making their due profit after spending so much on production.
Many Nigerians still don't have access to the cinemas and many pirates are still on the loose. Take for instance, the producer of THE WEDDING PARTY movie lost hundreds of millions of Naira to piracy on that movie. Until things like this are curtailed. Many producers may not be willing to go too far.

TayserMahiri:
Village life in kenya is way better than it is in nigeria. Kenya is largely an agricultural economy. Which makes a lot of people farmers, and coffee and tea and flowers are the main crops alongside other food crops. Of course we will have to urbanize more to be industrialized. So far, our urban population is enough for the country's industries, and our farmers don't need to add to it.

You have no proof of this. Like i said, the Kenyan villages i see on K24 are condraticting to your hype.

TayserMahiri:
I had no idea K24 is in Nigeria

TayserMahiri:
Or are you all guys just another bunch of nigerians in kenya

LoL. It is on DStv.

uzzyfire:
[color=#000099][/color]u watch K24 . no offense but that's one d worsts station iv ever tuned into

I just tune in once in a while to see about East Africa for few minutes.

uzzyfire:
yeah , owerri is beautiful but sadly it is very underrated ,unlike Lagos that is overhyped and overcrowded. although Lagos is like d biggest and d most central city in africa (I min there's nobody u will not see in Lagos).

Well i think the SE needs to market it's cities like Enugu and Owerri in order to attract investments or settlers from all over. If not for NYSC, many would never have known places like Enugu and owerri in the east.

uzzyfire:
and wen it comes to entertainment, I don't tink naija has any rival in Africa (not even S.A) we outshine everybody in dat aspect

Of course, none, and it keeps growing in Nigeria. Very soon, we would get to the level of Hollywood. LoL

TayserMahiri:
I know you like big numbers. However, many people who live in the rural areas don't tend to move to the cities because of the quality of life in the villages. For your information, kenyan highlands are among the most developed and farmed rural areas in Africa, and majority of the kenyan population live here. It is very hard to convince coffee farmers, or tea farmers, or flower farmers in the Great Rift Valley or Central Highlands to go to the cities when they have a good source of income already in the already serene villages. If you take a visit to some of the rural areas in kenya you would not want to back to the cities. And they all have reliable electricity supply. Below are a few examples of rural areas that I don't think anyone would want to leave for the hustles of city life.

U dont deceive me, do u? You and i know that majority of the villages in no damn black african country can be all like this. This scenery cannot measure up to 5% of what the average Kenyan village looks like. There is a Kenyan news station i seldom watch (K24 i think) and i see what Kenyan villages look like.
75% rural population is still too much for a nation that wants to be industrialized or have powerful financial city centres to compete with others.

GERALD710:
MPESA is well known in East Central Africa because it is in operation here.From Vodafone MPESA in South Africa to Vodaxom MPESA everywhere else.
West Afric is FAAAAR much smaller than East Central and Southern Africa, which btw is largely one entity with common cultural roots as the largest subgroup here is Bantu and Batus are everywhere except the Horn of Africa and Sudan.
Oh and a large percentage of us speak Swahili, From South Sudan to Malawi, Kenya to DRC, it is the language of trade, regardless of what tribe you are.

Bantus are not more than West Africans, it is impossible. The entire horn Africa is not Bantu, almost half of Kenya and Uganda is not Bantu. South Sudan is not. The entire Chad, parts of Cameroon and CAR are not Bantu. What about if we remove the pygmy populations from Congo and Gabon and also remove the whites, coloureds and Asians from South Africa and Namibia? Can the remainder beat the 350-400 million people of West Africa?

The entire numb of swahili speakers is still not more than 200 million. Luganda beats swahili as a lingua franca is half of Uganda. Lingala beats swahili as lingua franca is Kinshasa. Pls i know my continent. Swahili still has a long way to go to dominate the entire east Africa before going further to take over Horn and Central Africa. Only a stabilized and powerful united EAC can achieve this.

As for mpesa, they have not penetrated most of the countries you are talking of.

TayserMahiri:
They are wealthy nonetheless. That it is disgusting is meaningless. Its not like they get a Nobel for being listed as rich, they are wealthy whether it is disgusting or not. And its not just in Africa, some world leaders of strong nations such as Silvio Berlusconi of Italy are among the richest in their nations not to mention the Arabic emirs are unimaginably filthy rich and now we have Trump who literally runs his own empire.

Corrupt politicians flaunting their wealth in the faces of the masses and even being acknowledged by the masses shows a high level of insensitivity, recklesness and unnacountability in the system. It shows that they owe no one an explanation how they appropriate the country's funds.
I dont know about corruption in Europe, but i dont think it is an issue over there as in Africa. As for the arab nations, most of them are monarchial.

GERALD710:
In East Africa, Bantus usually have a mix of something else.
Example.The Kikuyu Community is Bantu and by genetics, on average around 70% of the genepool is similar to all other bantu groups, yet because the community absorbed the Athi(A south Cushitic group) the Gumba(a Khoisan group)and Maasai(The Maasai clan civil wars in the mid 1800s saw many maasai leave for the Kikuyu lands.Today, Kikuyus of Nyeri and Kiambu often have a Maasai ancestor).A few also have Arab ancestry(due to Arabs trading there ) and European ancestry(mostly around areas that had large scale European settlements and missionary towns).
In Tanzania, almost every ethnic group traded with the Arabs.In fact Tanzania had Arab-Swahili towns in its interior like Kigoma, unlike Kenya where this phenomenon is restricted to the Coast.Thus light skinned members of Bantu communities are not uncommon.Also like the Bantus of Kenya, many have South Cushitic blood

Ok, great, i see. Are u kikuyu?

We west Africans are not Bantu, but we still have some tribes who have many light skinned people. So i wonder who we mixed with.

TayserMahiri:
The population is around half a million.

Ok, great.

I however think that Kenya needs more urbanization.
I found out that apart from Nairobi and Mombasa, no other Kenyan urban area has up to a million people, while only Nakuru has about 500k-1m people and the rest are just below 500k.
In Nigeria, there are about 15 cities/Urban areas with over a million people and over 30 cities with 500k-1m people. I won't even count those within 100-500k range cos i dont consider those ones cities but towns and they can be up to 100 in Nigeria.

If we add up all the Kenyan cities/towns above 100k people, they will not be more than 12 million people. This means that only about 25% of Kenyans live in Urban areas while a whooping 75% live in rural areas. Can you enlighten me on this?

TayserMahiri:
Exactly my sentiment. I have never understood why the other members cannot just move on and leave Tanzania sorting out their fears.

That's because they really want the beautiful women of TZ to be part of their country. lol (joking).

Are Burundi and Ethiopia going to be part?

Kenya, Uganda n Rwanda together should be about 90 million people right?

TayserMahiri:
Ohh, so nigeria politicians are not corrupt? Good to know. You need to follow their trails and you will learn they are probably wealthier. All the lists you saw are based on people's personal judgement. Black kenyans in particular hate to reveal their net worth, for whatever reason. What I can tell you is that in Kenya, the talk on domination revolves around the kikuyus whom people find to be too dominating. In all secotrs. One sector where Indians have done really well is the Manufacturing sector and retail sector. Yet even in the retail sector, you will find that top supermarket chains in kenya are dominated by the kikuyus. You should understand that i am touching on a very thorny issue in kenya during electioneering period, i don't want to go too deep.
Whichever way you look at it, Indians are good in business but do not dominate Kenya, kikuyus do that, which is one of the reasons why the Counties were created to reduce that dominance.

Truly there is corruption everywhere. Just that in Nigeria, our corrupt politicians somehow hide their wealth and do not reveal them as such. This is why you hardly see Nigerian politicians being ranked among our richest. Let alone their families together.
It is very disgusting seeing political families claiming and accepted to be the richest people in a country. Things like this only happen in Black Africa, the likes of Isabel dos Santos. People who turn a whole nation to their private estate.

TayserMahiri:
Good news. I actually think you only need to fight the terrorists for great tidings to come. Is it that the northern states support Boko Haram or where do the fighters hide? Let me confess I have never made my way around the idea of such a group operating so freely in a big country like nigeria, where they even have territory they control.

I have explained this in a comment before. Tried to find it but couldn't.
Of course, initially, Boko haram never started out as a terrorist group. It started as an islamic movement group which was obviously hijacked and sponsored by foreign elements to become what they are.
North-east Nigeria is geographically very much a large, vast, hilly and difficult terrain which extends into Cameroon and Chad. These terrorists took advantage of this. They also infiltrated cities and villages and recruited members. They also operate with some great form of diabolical powers indoctrinating and recruiting masses.

Nigerian army is controlled from Abuja and most of the soldiers posted to the North-east were not even familiar with the terrain and had to take a longer time to understand it.

TayserMahiri:
With the new counties, it has become very rewarding to invest in places outside nairobi. A gas station would do very well in a place like nakuru, my hometown, with very good infrastructure. I have seen many people recently putting up businesses here and the costs of doing business are very low compared to bigger cities like nairobi and mombasa. If you ever want to do it in kenya without too much straining, think of the counties.


Nakuru

The city looks very green. It's just like Nigeria's Calabar & Uyo cities. What is the population?

TayserMahiri:
Lol, beauty in in the eyes of the beholder. Tanzanians are almost exclusively Bantu, and if you did your History and Geography well, you might have learnt that Bantus are generally light skinned, which is probably what you find attractive.
Maybe our leaders might have to appeal to them, but nothing can change. Think of it like the competition between USA and USSR, now Russia. None of the two will ever accept that the other has a better system of governance and economy. It just will never happen.

Hmm, i never heard that Bantus are predominantly light skinned. I can't really believe that. What abt the other Bantus spread all over Africa?

TayserMahiri:
The richest people in kenya list is not dominated by whites and indians, it is dominated by kikuyu peoples. I don't know about S.A but the fact that they never chased white people obviously means that the wealthy whites will dominate. In Kenya, very few white people remained (they were too scared of kenyatta and Mau Mau fighters) and Indians, who indigenous kenyans never felt the need to chase because they joined kenyas fight for independence. Many indians nonetheless left but many remained too and worse still is that when Idi Amin chased Indians from Uganda, they came to kenya. Other Indians came too from S.A sometimes later. Here is a list of kenyas richest people

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Kenyan_entrepreneurs

Ok. Just that i once saw another list and the first 3 richest were Indians. The list on wiki is not based on their net income, i guess if it is arranged based on net income, the Indians would probably top the list.
I can also see some politic families in the list, i smell corruption. Check out the top 10 Nigerian billionaires and i doubt you will see a single politician.