The things I have learned from reading, documentaries, and school make it seem like European Colonialism is the primary reason Africa is in the terrible state it is in right now. I wanted to question the accuracy of how much European Colonialism truly negatively impacted Africa.
Not to discourage discussion here, but there is a a lot of related reading on African development in the FAQ.
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/africa
This question in particular might be of interest to you. /u/khosikulu goes into some detail into how colonialism was the final step in a series of imperialistic European policies alongside a lot of other issues within the continent.
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/111vj8/what_caused_africa_to_be_so_poor_and_corrupt/
It is important to note that the European effect on Africa was not limited to the formal period of Colonization in the 19th and 20th centuries. Most of the continent was subjected to less than a century of direct control. But the European impact was much larger than that. From the initial contacts with the Portuguese in the 1400s and 1500s, Sub-Saharan Africa was sorely abused by Europeans. Some Africans were certainly complicit in the slave trade, but blaming Africans in general for that makes about as much sense as blaming Mexican victims of Narco-terrorism for the drug trade.
Through the 1500s, 1600s and 1700s this slave trade became progressively more and more debilitating. Entire coastal civilizations were built around the industry. Yes the British did eventually ban the trade in the 19th century. They should be given credit for that, but they were also the main beneficiaries of that horrific trade for two centuries, so they don't get a pass. When the slave trade stopped (to the degree that it did), Africa only had a few decades breather before the missionaries and the soldiers started to pour in, subjecting almost the entire continent.
The idea that Britain's imperial oversight was somehow benign, which I've see elsewhere in this thread, is a bit hard to credit. Was it better than Belgium? Certainly. Regardless it was still a bunch of white people coming in to disrupt and discard whatever indigenous organization was left after 300 years of slave trade. Anybody trying to tell you that the British were benign colonial masters should read up on the Kenyan independence struggle.
Is Europe entirely to blame for the current state of Africa? No, not entirely. Most countries have been independent for a few decades, and kleptocratic politicians should not be able to get away with just blaming Europe. Nonetheless, European slave trade and colonialism bear a lot of responsibility for Africa's current state.