George Ayittey famous quotes

03-28-2025

The solutions to Africa's problems lie in Africa, not in Live Aid concerts.
-- George Ayittey

#Lying #Problem #Aids
If NATO goes in and solves the crisis in Darfur, when the next one comes along Africa's leaders will just sit back.
-- George Ayittey

#Leader #Next #Crisis
The richest persons in Africa are heads of state, governors and ministers. So every 'educated' African who wants to be rich - and there is nothing wrong with wanting to be rich - heads straight into government or politics.
-- George Ayittey

#Government #Want #Rich
African history is filled with experiences of people shooting their way to power and then splintering into factions, like in Somalia and Liberia.
-- George Ayittey

#People #Shooting #Way
Africa has more dictators per capita than any other continent.
-- George Ayittey

#Dictator #Continents
Africa's salvation doesn't lie in begging and begging for more aid, and as an African, I find it very, very humiliating.
-- George Ayittey

#Lying #Aids #Salvation
Getting rid of the dictator is only a first step in establishing a free society. The dictatorship must also be disassembled.
-- George Ayittey

#Firsts #Steps #Dictator
Hippos kill more people in Africa annually than any other wild animal.
-- George Ayittey

#Animal #People #Hippo
Look at the history of peace accords in Africa. They have a terrible record. They are shredded even before the ink on them is dry.
-- George Ayittey

#Ink #Looks #Records
In the West, the basic economic and social unit is the individual; in Africa, it is the extended family or the collective.
-- George Ayittey

#West #Economic #Individual
In a banana republic, one might slip on a banana peel but things do work - now and then for the people, albeit inefficiently and unreliably.
-- George Ayittey

#People #Republic #Might
You have to separate the humanitarian impulse from the record of aid itself. We all want to help. Many people would say that it's the moral impulse of the rich to help the poor, but the record of aid has been terrible.
-- George Ayittey

#People #Want #Records
Personally, I regard myself as an intellectual 'rebel,' kicking against the 'old colonialism-imperialism paradigm' which has landed Africa in a conundrum.
-- George Ayittey

#Intellectual #Colonialism #Rebel
Dictators cause the world's worst problems: all the collapsed states, and all the devastated economies. All the vapid cases of corruption, grand theft, and naked plunder of the treasury are caused by dictators, leaving in their wake trails of wanton destruction, horrendous carnage and human debris.
-- George Ayittey

#Leaving #World #Causes
Africa is poor because she is not free.
-- George Ayittey

#Poor
The only good dictator is a dead one.
-- George Ayittey

#Dictator
Radio is the death and life of Africa.
-- George Ayittey

#Life And Death #Radio
The election of Senator Barack Obama brought jubilation across Africa, where millions celebrated him as 'one of their own.'
-- George Ayittey

#Jubilation #Election #Barack
There was free trade in Africa. There was free enterprise in Africa before the colonialists came.
-- George Ayittey

#Enterprise #Trade #Free Trade
Traditionally, Africans hate governments. They hate tyranny.
-- George Ayittey

#Hate #Government #Tyranny
What Africa needs to do is to grow, to grow out of debt.
-- George Ayittey

#Needs #Debt #Grows
Western-style multi-party democracy is possible but not suitable for Africa.
-- George Ayittey

#Party #Style #Democracy
Virtually all of Africa's civil wars were started by politically marginalized or excluded groups.
-- George Ayittey

#War #Civil War #Groups
When Uganda got debt relief in 1999, the first item President Museveni bought was a presidential jacket for himself.
-- George Ayittey

#Uganda #Presidential #Firsts
Back in the 1960s Africa not only fed itself, it also exported food. Not anymore.
-- George Ayittey

#Motivation #Inspiration #Feds

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