Thank you for your incisive and illuminating article on Canadian companies in DRC- .

With the recent news explosion of women and children becoming refugees in DRC in the Eastern region of DRC, I had to ask myself why is the BBC and other media making such a noise about the issue. The British Government then started speaking about possibly sending its troops into the country to help restore law and order.

Now I read your article on the subject about Canadian Mining companies and you have confirmed my views that the problem of DRC and Africa in general is not about exploitation by imperialists and mining companies, our problem is a problem with ourselves and lack of testicular fortitude.

When will we become men and women and stand up in the world and truly take care of ourselves without recourse to external persons, bodies and companies to do for us, that which we have the means and ability to do for ourselves.

Unless we acquire the know-how and begin to apply knowledge to develop our own natural and human resources and then sever the umbilical cord with the West and the East we will remain as slaves to others thereby reaping the destruction of our countries as clearly explained in your article.

We let in these mining companies. Have we no sense? Have we not learnt that the imperialist in Britain is the same as the one in Canada, Australia, Europe and America? When have they ever sought to do us any good without the motivation of getting as much as they can without recourse to morals or any mores?

In truth, we actually deserve what we get in Africa, for going to bed with our ‘open enemies’ whose sole desire is to eliminate us from the Continent of Africa and have her as a play ground. So your article on the modus operandi of Canadian companies is confirmation of what’s been done to Africa since the late 14th Century when the first colonizers began their expeditions into Africa and began setting up ‘Trading Posts’ to exploit and decimate Africa. The difference today is that then, they came in with force and a bible in the other hand, but today we let them in with economic liberalisation policies, political handshakes, Foreign Capital Investments, AID (s) and unpaid IMF, World Bank loans that result in strategic assets being sold off.