There's certainly a lot of blame that can be placed on the country's leadership over the past fifty years, but it's not as straightforward as that. For one, th

There's certainly a lot of blame that can be placed on the country's leadership over the past fifty years, but it's not as straightforward as that. For one, there's been huge economic, political, and commercial pressure applied to ensure that the colonial-era extractive industry relationships broadly remain the same and with similarly bad terms for the former colony. Investments are often directed at infrastructure that improves the efficiency of those extractive operations, rather than local beneficiation, intra-African trade, or other local development. France was even more blatant, applying the Françafrique restrictions to its former colonies, such as the requirement that they keep portions of their foreign reserves in the French Treasury, and keep the CFA Franc, in order to get French investment.