From Guest Declan above:

"Much of the trouble that has started in post-colonial independent countries arises from divisions in the societies there which were fomented and exploited by the colonial power in order to help 'rule' the 'natives'. Someof these divisions were artificially created by the colonial powers."

This when applied to former African colonies is an extremely niaive view and implies that all was sweetness and light prior to the arrival of the Europeans.

Historically, Ethiopia apart, there were no countries in the modern sense, only nation-tribes. At any given time what land was theirs, was what land they could control.

Examples of the more successful tribes were: Zulu, Ashanti, Matabele, Masai, Ndebele. They ruled areas by subjugation of lesser neighbouring tribes. Along come the Europeans and when the predominating tribes found themselves in conflict they lost. Generally, when this happened the lesser tribes found the "new kids on the block" did not drive off their cattle, did not slaughter their menfolk, did not carry away or destroy their crops, did not abduct their women and children - They were a damn sight more benign than their previous conquerors.

Once the areas were divided into countries by the colonial powers, no consideration at all was paid to the ethnic make up. This was not something that was done deliberately to screw the place up in years to come, it was done for purposes of administration and commerce.

When the colonial powers set up their colonies, they needed "locals" to assist them. The people required, generally were found from among the lesser tribes, not from the former ruling tribes. When independence came along, the descendents of those people were the obvious choice to rule and administer the newly independent state.

Colonial power leaves, new administration is set up. Now former dominant tribe, says "Bugger this" we're not being ruled by the ......(whatever the tribal name is of the lesser tribe) - "We're going to take back what was ours". The sectarian divisions were there before the colonial powers came along, the colonial powers did not create them.

Now some examples:

South Africa:
If what I have said above is completely untrue can anybody explain the rift that occured between Chief Bhuteleze(Zulu) and the ANC (Representing the lesser tribes - Housa's, Hottentots,etc)

Rhodesia/Zimbabwe:
Ian Smith declared UDI - Britain imposed sanctions, Robert Mugabe(Mashona) and Joshua Nkomo (Matebele) head for the hills and conduct a guerilla war against the Smith regime. Lancaster House peace agreement and Robert Mugabe becomes President of the new state of Zimbabwe. His first programme is to send his North Korean trained 5th brigade into Matebeleland to ethnically cleanse the area before they do it to him. Anybody heard of what became of Joshua Nkomo? This was a case of the former subserviant tribe destroying the former dominant tribe.

Rwanda: enough said.

DougR's comment:

"Maybe colonialism wasn't so bad after all. There were far fewer killings in those days, weren't there? "

May not be as tongue in cheek as you think. Post WWII how many droughts, famines and natural disasters have there been in Africa? What have they resulted in? Now as these are "natural" catastrophies they must have occured during the colonial era - they definitely did but were far less severe in result because the colonial power had a vested interest in looking after the place. Now-a-days basically the IMF and World Banks don't give a toss, they just want their loans repaid - a balance sheet has no compassion.

To Bill Kennedy: The British Empire was not the only one around at that time - you also had a Dutch Empire, Spanish, French, Begian, German, Portugese. The British one was the one that basically kept the peace (for damn near 100 years) - because that was what was good for business. And by the by, the 'Great' that appears before Britain comes from the description of a geological feature, not from any desire on the part of the inhabitants to inflate the political nature, or status, of the place. Another interesting exercise for you would be to establish just how few colonies Britain actually had, how few places Britain actually conquered, the number of places Britain got involved with through trade, where, when challenged by another of the European powers, the indigenous people fought alongside the British (In Canada the Indian nations fought with the British forces against the French and later against the Americans - Same happened in India against the French).