Africa works in mysterious ways. Here's how it happens:
Have hammer, have saw, have nails
Relative asks to use hammer, you absolutely must give them the hammer or you will never receive anything from them in the future
Relative asks to use saw
Relative asks to use nails
Now you have nothing
They're never returned
Relative has nothing you want to borrow
He probably sold it all for a few loafs of bread
This is actually normal in Africa. In most villages you don't really own anything. Anyone you know can borrow anything. And you'll probably never get it back. You could give an African every tool they need to be the handyman of the entire village, and within a few weeks, all of the tools would be gone, forever. It's because of this that there is almost no entrepreneurship in African villages. If someone has made a life for themselves and is prospering, that just means they haven't shared all of their stuff with everyone.
Allegory: At my elementary school kids were told to not bring any candy to school unless they could bring enough to give some to everyone, otherwise the kids that didn't get any would feel left out and get upset. So even though having candy would be cool, and sharing it with your friends would be cool, having to share it with the entire class created an onerous penalty that discouraged kids from ever even bothering. That's basically how African villages work and why no one even bothers to have nice things.