The African Union’s high representative on infrastructure, Raila Odinga has said that the current coronavirus pandemic is like the ‘World War III’.
The former Kenyan Prime Minister said the only difference between this “war” the previous ones is that the current pandemic is being fought without bombs.
Odinga told the SABC news that the pandemic is “a third world war without the bombs”.
“Even in the Second World War we did not have the extent of casualties that we have witnessed within a short period of time.”
Odinga said “The effects are going to be far reaching to the continent,” as he warned Africa would have to revise its strategies to win the battle.
He said “African countries will wake up to this reality that nobody is going to help them because everybody has been affected. Europe is on its knees, the US is crying, even China is crying.
“About 85% of Africa’s trade is with the external world and most of it is commodities which we are exporting. We now need to look internally into intra-Africa trade”.
African solutions
Last month Odinga said “Africa is the richest continent on earth with regard to raw materials. The paradox is that it is also the poorest in terms of the living conditions of its people.
The post Covid-19 era creates opportunities for job creation in manufacturing, service sector including ICT, food production and infrastructure development.”
He continued to say on twitter that “Instead of exporting iron ore, copper ore, bauxite, we must export steel products, copper cables, bars, sheets and aluminium.”
“Even gold, diamonds and crude oil should never leave Africa as raw materials for industries in other continents. Africa has a historic opportunity, born out of a historic tragedy, to put an end to our tradition of importing everything and producing nothing,” he concluded.
Africa is the richest continent on earth with regard to raw materials. The paradox is that it is also the poorest in terms of the living conditions of its people. 1/4
— Raila Odinga (@RailaOdinga) April 26, 2020
Africa has so far recorded 48,022 Covid-19 cases with 1,878 deaths and 16,019 recoveries as at May 6, 2020.
COVID-19: African countries lift restrictions despite WHO caution
Source: Africafeeds.com
