We have all encountered these characters in the village. They are retired teachers or government clerks, or failed small business people. From their meagre retirement benefits or earnings from the small shambas their wives cultivate, they manage to get by – just.

Their attire is a poor imitation of the English gentleman, a weather-beaten chequered jacket worn over an open-necked shirt that is beginning to fray at the collar. On their wrist there is a huge watch, which they will position with an ostentatious flick of the wrist in order to check the time.

In the outside pocket of their jacket, is a folded copy of the day’s newspaper, which they let people borrow with a somewhat scandalised expression on their faces, as if to say: You know, buying a paper is a mark of a civilised gentleman.

They seem to know and be known by everyone. They are talkative, and converse easily on many subjects. Their speech is peppered with English words, even when they are talking to people who don’t know the language. And they always have a personal anecdote to illustrate a point. They have plenty of time on their hands, and so you will find them at various village functions, but especially at those functions where there is some kind of feast.

Here, you will find them giving instructions on how the goat should be slaughtered or directing other aspects of the occasion. These village gentlemen think themselves important and respected, indispensable to the smooth running of an occasion.

But what they do not know is that people, especially the rich, at whose goat-eating functions our village Englishmen appoint themselves chief custodians of process and order, only tolerate, not respect them. Behind their backs, the rich ridicule them, sometimes making fun of their mannerisms and pretensions.

African leaders at the G7

That is the image that occurred to me when I watched African leaders at the G7 meeting in Italy. They wore self-satisfied grins on their faces as they lined up to shake hands with the mighty.

The rich, with diplomatic politesse, smiled at their African colleagues, so as to make them feel equal and important. The Africans squeezed awkwardly to fit into the picture frame or to be in the front row during group photo-ops.

In one photo with the Africans, Donald Trump shows a thumbs up-sign. Would he be so playful in a photo with other G7 leaders? The expression on Trump’s face is more of a smirk than a smile. Watching, I was sure that, just as they pride themselves on their countries being “better” than other impoverished neighbours, African leaders who managed an advantageous position in the photo-ops would think themselves better than their poor fellows relegated to the back row.

The African leaders chatted with the mighty about God-knows-what. Maybe about the recent famine, or the latest ethnic war, or the 50 per cent unemployment rates in their countries... I imagined the rich leaders listening with a mixture of concern and contempt, saying perhaps: Oh, very sad, we must do something about it.

And this “commitment” will be the headlines in the papers when the Africans return home, with the self -delusional narrative: We went to the G7 and slew the dragon and brought the benefits back to our people!

The extreme incongruity of Africans at the G7 meeting raises the question: Why do African leaders love to travel so much to America and Europe? Remember the Zambian president who died while on a trip abroad, having insisted on travelling when he was gravely ill?

At one point, Robert Mugabe had the dubious distinction of being the most travelled president in the world. The official spin is that these travels bring back benefits.

But not a single developed country achieved that status as a result of foreign travel by its president. On the contrary, leaders whose countries have made spectacular gains in short periods of time hardly went on foreign trips.

Mao Zedong, who founded modern China, hardly ever went abroad. Deng Xiao-Ping, who modernised China, rarely travelled abroad. Lee Kwan Yew of Singapore also preferred to stay at home to work maniacally to overcome the massive problems of underdevelopment.

African presidents attend meetings such as the G7 and, just like our village gentlemen, bask in delusions of grandeur. But, surely, no one can respect leaders whose citizens die of hunger or whose countries remain stuck in poverty because of looting by the same leaders. The rich at those meetings tolerate them in public, but ridicule them in private.

Tee Ngugi is a Nairobi-based political and social commentator. E-mail: [email protected]