(Issue Tuesday 28, June 2016)
I
often find myself in a dilemma as to where to begin when I write about and
refer to events in our contemporary world. However, given that editors are
often constrained by space and the fact that I am writing for in this instance
an audience of a highly literate elite on the pages of a newspaper, I will
assume that they have a good working knowledge about Africa. I will further
assume that they can skim through the surface of the text and ignore the issues
omitted even though they can be critical to the debate on Africa’s way forward
in the present century. Do pardon the omissions! They will be retrieved as the
debate progresses and interrogated in order to ascertain their merit or
otherwise in the discourse.
In
spite of the above, you will appreciate that I am caught in between a rock and
a hard place trying to condense such important matters of life, living, our
stories and of our destiny within a few pages while at the same time, trying to
chronicle the full import of seventy years of the past, present and probable
future events. The ghost in my machine
tells me that things must be fully contextualized while reality presents me
with its own fait-accompli- brevity. I will accept reluctantly the practical reality
that besets me with tremendous humility!
In
this article, I will begin by heeding Big brother Chinua Achebe’s advice on
where to begin, ‘what we need to do is
look back and try and find out where we went wrong, where the rain began to
beat us. Here then is an adequate revolution for me to espouse, to help my
society regain belief in itself and put away the years of denigration and self
abasement’.
The
past three months in The Gambia have been interesting for me and I want to
begin by sharing some impressions and some thoughts with you as curtain
raisers. I believe each one of them has some affinity or some bearing on,
(however remote), with the debate I am hoping this paper might generate in
relation to the African narrative we need to re-appraise.
I
can then go on to delve on the more substantive issues that appertain to the
several visions of Pan Africanism and Africa liberation. I will argue in the
conclusions of this paper that, there is a new scramble for Africa and our
liberation is still a pipe dream unless, we screw up the courage to change
course. Finally on a more positive note, I will advance the notion of
‘delinking from international finance capital (imperialism in other words), as
an alternative to the existing status quo. Delinking is not a new phenomenon!
However owing to the precipice Africa has been landed on, and without hope for
rescue, gives new and alternative thinking the impetus to review some other
ideas we have overlooked and hardly taken notice of. It is to this that I proffer one possible
approach that could be added to our quiver of means in our quest for freeing
ourselves from the stranglehold of imperialism. A part of this approach did
work on a small scale before our economies and politics were subsumed and
consigned irrevocably to an appendage status. I am convinced that it is
possible to apply and adapt it in larger settings. It is thus time for
review.
In
February, this year 2016, a video documentary was released on the life and
times of Edward Francis Small, Gambia’s patron saint and founding father of
Gambian nationalism, the trade unionist, the anti-colonial struggler, the
educator, the freedom fighter, the pioneer par excellence of journalism and the
list is long. His pride of place in our contemporary history has never been
accorded to him until recently. Even there, more beseening accolades are due to
him. After the release of the video, many people approached and confided in me
and said, they have never known about this luminary but more so that Gambians
of those times had the gumption to challenge and debate with the colonial
authorities with such; frankness, openness, in such wide and varied ways and
more astonishingly, considering the level of education and the limited tools of
analysis that were available to them at the time.
I
had also attended the Roots home-coming festival’s symposium on Africa’s past,
present and future in relation to her future politics and economics. After the
sixties, with the exception of a few robust and sincere scholars, the debate on
Africa was first put on the back-burner by emerging leaders and their stalwarts
for their own class interest. Later on it became confined to the dusty
tombstones of times past. Interestingly enough, the Pan African agenda was
finally picked up and salvaged from neglect and atrophy by the same petit
bourgeois radical intellectuals. Oddly enough, these rarefied individual
nationalists, often castigated and dubbed as mavericks ‘harboring foreign
ideologies’ continue to sing a lonely swan song without an audience to listen
or applaud them. Now, they are few and
far between. For the masses, nothing has changed and nothing has visited them
to give them a little glimmer of hope to ease their burden even though, they
bear the brunt of the ravaging and rampaging consequences of neo-colonialism,
poverty, disease, debt servitude,
superstition, immisiration and hopelessness.
Some
pretty interesting ideas emerged out of the symposium. Especially noteworthy
was Juka Jaabang’s paper that suggested that Africa should begin to look
inwardly and open discussions with fellow sister-states. I agreed with her but
did not get the chance of articulating fully my vision of the future for Africa
beyond expressing my favour for the phenomenon of unhinging our economies from
the global finance capital. However,
owing to the limitations of such fora, none of the issues raised were dealt
with beyond the depth of our skins. Will
there be other such assemblies that are all inclusive and engaging so that
civil society throughout Africa can reclaim their voices and choices. This way,
among other things, these budding ideas could be addressed exhaustively and
tangible plans of action evolving out of them or will it be business as usual?
The
African youth gathering in The Gambia is another case in point. Could it be
reified as a youth-led initiative to fire the imagination of their elders or is
it a part of Africa beginning to come off age at last by initiating baby-steps
towards a genuine intergenerational dialogue with herself, her family of fifty
four states and her own trajectory? Time
will tell!
It
will be remiss of me as a social scientist if I do not mention the U D P
opposition’s marches for electoral reform.
Many
such events like the demand for constitutional reforms had occurred in the past
especially during the build-up towards our independence. The general strikes of
1929 and 1961 are examples to go by among umpteen strikes by the stevedores,
students, teachers, even night-soil workers and so on. All of them were
resolved through dialogue. In my humble opinion, these are small touchstone
events that I figure are nudging reminders that could be adduced as evidence to
all for the need to initiate and promote dialogue both at the intra and the
extra political levels. I must not miss
the economic dialogue as well, for it is economics that determine society,
culture and politics only define it! I stress this more so because our battle
cries in the sixties for independence did not include an economic and social
agenda as to who will eventually expropriate, own and control the means of
production and the surplus created by the people?
It
is to this pertinent question of where Africa is heading that I proffer some
modest thoughts a small contribution to the debate. To some, what I present
below may be unsettling. To others, I hope it will find resonance in
their hearts and finally, if it ruffles any feathers to the extent that it
provokes some opposing thoughts or even spurs them to action, then I will have
accomplished my objective. I crave that the level and quality of the debate be
continually raised and maintained.
It
is often argued and I belt along to say that I subscribe to the view that, one
of the best things to have happen to The Gambia is the establishment of a
university. This is the citadel of hope; the loci of research, learning and the
bastion for excellence, the seat of independent, critical thinking and the hub
for our future development.
I have met and spoken with a good number of
the students, graduates and lecturers of this fledgling institution. There are
obvious problems of a teething nature but I cannot but say that with time and
with conscious effort, these issues can be addressed in enabling and innovative
ways so that so many of us who are leaving and languishing in the greener
pastures in the elsewheres of others can have reason to want to stay in our own
grazing lands. One thing is clear among the youth; there is hunger for
knowledge, a thirst to change their material circumstances and doubts as to how
to satiate these expressed needs without resorting to desperate actions? The
infamous mass hijra known otherwise as the ‘back way’ by the youth cannot be
swept under the carpet as a nonentity. What are the causes; Consequences and
long term effect on our demography and future development?
Perhaps
this might be a trigger to ginger-up the atmosphere so that we can begin to see
some interesting and seasoned discussions on the plight of Africa from the
university lecturers and students. Above all from the diasporians, politicians
and civil society, all of whom could input in the discussion-the more, the
merrier! A quick gentle reminder is necessary here as what is hindering our
development is beyond partisan politics and personages. The concerns of Africa
are larger than the sum of all of us put together. It will be good to have
politicians of all colours and hew to join in.
I
hasten to add that scores to settle, slagging matches or vendettas are least
called for so, do let us engage fruitfully, maturely, let us allow others to
show us our blind spots! Let us transcend our egos and see the value of
engagement for what it is.
Africanist scholars have posed the same question about the future of Africa differently in a more declamatory and exploratory manner -‘Whither Africa-‘which way Africa all point to the same phenomenon?
1945
was a great watershed in the history of the African liberation movement. It was
a period of great excitement and hope for all Africans, diasporians included.
It
is seventy one years ago when Gambia’s
very own Ibrahima Garba Jahumpa and other Pan Africanists such as; Nkrumah, Kenyatta, George Padmore,
Awolowo, Ras Makonnon, Amy Ashford Garvey,
William E. B. du Bois and Wallace-Johnson heeded to the cries of Ujamaa,
Uhuru, Harambee We want bread and butter. The answer to these urgent demands by
the masses jolted these fine sages to Chorlton town hall in Manchester, England
under the banner ‘African liberation’ now!
These
sons of Africa stood together on the same platform on common ground and
exchanged viewpoints about the future of Africa. They designed and shared and maintain this
common vision for Africa. That vision was for Africa to come together, unified
and strong, an Africa sans frontier. Pan-Africanism, for them was a trope for
an unreduced and an unbroken totality and completeness. It advocated
comradeship, unity in diversity, a people who shared a common destiny, above
all, for Africans all over the world to free themselves from the trammels of
colonialism and the fetters of necessity.
Africa needed to find her own way in the modern world. She needed to
grow strong and develop her industries. This is a challenge that the delegates
left with to address with their masses back home.
At
the end of World War II there were only three independent African countries,
but by the mid 1960s the vast majority was independent.
These
were hopeful times especially for those who Fanon refers to as the ‘wretched of
the earth! Most of the African colonies had attained ‘flag’ independence, a
euphemism for constitutional independence. Britain and France quickly read the
writing on the wall and ceded independence to their colonies (in most cases,
with a struggle for emancipation).
Portugal still held on to her Colonies. The peoples of Guinea Bissau,
Angola, Mozambique embarked on a bitter and afflictive Armed Struggle.
The
emerging so-called independent African Countries had several bequests. Salient
among which were: an Anthem, a flag,
a Constitution raked-up from Marlboro House or Paris, the borders, the
Mace, the white paper, Mr. speaker sir,
the front and back benches and an education system that had no bearing on the economic base of the countries.
The African scholar Ali Mazrui has argued cogently that ‘Missionary education
has had a special role in Africa...the Gospel was not a manual of technology.
Missionaries
instructed us into the three R’s; writing, reading and arithmetic’. The fourth
R was religion and this was their hidden agenda. Furthermore, the system of
education has had devastating and enduring effects on our values and mind-sets.
Western education placed a high premium on elitism, the acquisition of literary
skills at the expense of technological skills. The result was a total
technological arrest and a deep seated psychological precipitate that continues
to dog and distort our self-image, our self-perception and a perception of
ourselves in relation to others. Do you all remember that even in our drama, we
said things, especially through the voices of female actresses that ‘I will
never marry a man who washes his hands after work’ (duma sey ak wacca raxasu;
Kii kapinta rek la, Xay yow, kii di masong)! I need not belabour this point but
you can see in such a simple slice of life, we have been taught to deride and
debase ourselves in such manifold ways that depict psyches that are held
captive and are in continual crises.
Mazrui
continues; ‘We learnt to wear western, dance western, drill western, and speak
western.
What
we did not learn was to achieve western in this temporal world’.
Lest
I forget, among our other bequests are
no economic independence agenda for total emancipation but they were gracious
enough to teach us their democracy and how to rule ourselves and remain loyal
and servile producers of primary products for their industries. They also
failed to bequeath to us the knowledge that democracy died the day after it was
born! , at independence, we had
inherited countries whose irrational boundaries were pegged on extraction and
predation and a neo-colonial state apparatus that Ngugy very fittingly calls
‘the negation of Africa’s progress and development’.
That
very same state apparatus was revered and cherished dearly by the new
leadership of Africa. This is not surprising as they were all moulded in the
crucible of colonialism with all its ramifications. Looking back, nothing good could have really
come out of a system whose rule is inimical to the interests of the newly
independent states. The consequences of these are what are now felt today and
known as Neo-Colonialism - a state which was not geared to the development of
the people, but one which coerced and condemned them into accepting an
appendage and servile status.
Now
that the whole of Africa including the sit-tight white-ruled Azania, Namibia,
Zimbabwe were in the fold of new imperialism and would never let go off them.
Countries like Libya and Ghana took the lead in supporting the struggle and
gave them assistance to free themselves. In fact the whole of Africa agreed
that apartheid and white minority rule were moral evils. Consequently, they all
rallied around them to support these countries even if some of the assistance
were mere token gestures. They fought
against white domination and established black majority rule. This was what Ian
Smith of Rhodesia could not contemplate ‘in a thousand years’. The armed
struggle coerced both Smith and the apartheid regime in Azania to accept black
majority rule.
Lumumba
was brutally murdered and with him went the aspirations of the people of the
Congo. But this was in the early sixties! Half a century later, we have the
same situation or even worse. Thousands have been killed in the fratricidal
struggle for the control of valuable commodities, resulting in new terms being
coined today, such as “resource wars,” “conflict diamonds” ‘ethnic cleansing
and so on. Remember the tragedy in Sierra Leone, Rwanda, Burundi, Liberia,
Algeria, Egypt, now Libya etc?
It gave imperialism the chance to dig its
heels into the rich mineral resources of these countries. Nkrumah of Ghana the
(beacon of light for Africa at the time),
was overthrown thanks to the British, American, German, Israeli Agents
and his own inherited colonial super-structure. . He was lured to Hanoi to mediate
between the Americans and the Vietnamese. He never made it to Hanoi because the
coup happened while he was in China. This Hanoi mission was very much
encouraged. To lure him on this mission, the Americans even promised to stop
the bombing of Hanoi to make sure that his plane arrived safely. The coup took
place just 48 hours after he left. The British Prime Minister, Harold Wilson,
was in favour of Nkrumah being assassinated at Accra airport before he left for
Hanoi, just to make sure. The Americans were against it. They thought it would act
against them to make a martyr of him. They thought it would be sufficient to
get him out of the country and that they would never hear from him again. From
the point of view of Nkrumah’s foemen, Wilson was wrong because several
attempts were made on Nkrumah’s life and the overthrow of his government in
Ghana -previously all of which failed dismally. Yes! Nkrumah was left to
languish in a sad exile, away from his family and friends and away from the
country and continent he loved.
The
story repeats itself throughout the African continent. In independent Africa
there have been well over eighty coups. The Western technology of destruction
still decimates Africa with all her aspirations. At the high-noon of the
independence of Azania, imperialism insisted that this great African country
must first of all be disarmed because they cannot trust Africans with a nuclear
bomb. Azania they disarmed indeed. The
next on their agenda was Libya. Briefly, Gaddafi may invoke conflicting
judgments upon all of us. However, in spite of this, which country in Africa
had better social welfare provisions than Libya? Which country in Africa showed
solidarity and sympathy to the liberation of Africa more than Libya? Which
leader in Africa refused to have others plunder her country’s resources?
Which
country in Africa allowed other Africans to come and make a decent living
within her borders?
