What about The Kongo Free State and Sarawak?

[King]

How can Victoria emulate nations that came about more or less solely due to personal initiative?

It won't

 

[King]

I might be wrong, but my understanding is that in that case the government sees none of the profit from the colony, even though it effectively still foots the bill, which is a major money sink. Not that there was a lot of profit in Africa anyways.

you'll probaly find that africa has veyr few bureaucrat POPs meaning that you have to pay for soliders to defend these colonies, pay the salaries of the bureaucrats and get sod all tax out of them.

 

[King]

I've got better things to do with my time than discuss various atrocities