Africa despite her enormous population is largely a consuming continent. Therefore any policy that is aimed at weaning the populace from the unbecoming consuming appetite will reduce unnecessary capital flight from the continent. The manufacturing sector needs to be rejigged and revived from deep slumber and squalor to usher in a prosperous chapter of self-sufficiency.

There are so much able bodied Africans without any outlet to release their ubiquitous energy. Job creation will work wonders. A person who goes to work to ply his trade or services can only come home tired, thus having no more energy to commit crime or foment mischief. This way a glorious circle of job creation, wealth generation and crime eradication can be attained with the high quality of life and improved living conditions that come with that.

No denying that problems abound all over Africa and we must devise creative ways to solve our problems But I remain ever suspicious of using direct labour approach as a model for rural and urban development. For example, try to fix and tar a road using direct labour and you will discover the effort will be mired in substandard and uneven performance controversies. Workers will be under paid, motivation will be low and the overall delivery will be lackluster because of the obsession to keep cost down.

Malaria is still wrecking havoc all over Africa but eradicating malaria via killing off all mosquitoes will portend disastrous and devastating consequences to mankind. Granted that the Malaria parasite is ferried around by female anopheles mosquitoes but should we kill off all mosquitoes for the acts of a negligible minority? Many people fail to realize that Mosquitoes, like all other life forms, are part of a complex food web. Many fishes feed on mosquito larvae, which are aquatic, and plenty of birds and spiders and other insects feed on the adults. Dragonflies and damselflies love mosquitoes. Frogs eat adult mosquitoes, tadpoles eat the larvae.

The harm caused by the female anopheles mosquito pales into insignificance when juxtaposed with the tremendous benefits that come from all the mosquito species. In the same token, kill off all the bees or even reduce their population and the world will go hungry because there will be nobody to do the cross pollination for crops or produce honey for dietary and medicinal purposes. No matter what anyone feels about the mosquito, kindly note that they also deserve to live and that on this earth, we are all inter-connected.