I think colonialism is both the reason and the excuse.

It is the reason because you cannot pretend countries were handed functioning institutions at independence. But it becomes an excuse when every conversation ends there.

At some point every government has to answer for what happened after 1960. If roads are not built, if power doesn’t work, if corruption is normal, how many decades do we get to blame London, Paris, or Brussels?

The uncomfortable truth is that some African leaders have done more damage to their own countries than the colonizers ever did.