THE NEGRO: A race of light.
“Through our scientific genius we made the world a neighborhood and now through our moral and ethical commitment, we must all learn to live together as brothers or will all perish together as fools” --MARTIN LUTHERKING JR.
This write up is more than a call for indemnity to blacks. It is an invitation to all the people of the world to re-examine their roles in the affairs of the continent and rededicate their persons and resources to her growth and development. This is essentially an appeal to blacks both at home and in the Diaspora, to sever our minds from the development of sufficient continental integrity to our erstwhile colonizers to join our movements towards self-sufficiency. On the other hand, blacks are here called to self-improvement, to build capacity for the future. On the other, those who have foisted unequal relations on them are asked to pay their dues. Let us switch on the light rather than continue to curse the darkness. Africa the most blessed of all continents in the world is the roots/origin of all Negroid on earth. As many of you already know, the colonization of Africa by Europeans which lasted for nearly five hundred years consisted primarily of the whole sale exploitation of our natural resources and the removal of both large numbers of human beings and vast amounts of raw materials. This enormous evil was, and continues to be compounded by the fact that the hallmark of this odious enterprise was that its operation required little or no infrastructure. That is why after centuries of suffering, most of Africa was left with what can only be described as a bare skeleton of the apparatus required for economic development and effective administration. However as a result of the balkanization of the continent, the Africa of the European colonial expression persists and the resultant chaos and disorders have equally affected Africans in the Diaspora who as products of European slavery now find it difficult to trace their roots. One of the most enduring legacies of European exploitation of Africa has been the forcible removal of millions of Africans. I am convinced that enslavement of our people deprived the continent of so many of its young people and consequently placed a very low ceiling on our future development potential for many years to come. It is very clear that the future course of African development cannot escape the negative impact of these historical antecedents.
Taking the example of French colonization in Africa, the French who administered their large African possessions as French West Africa and equatorial Africa-2 countries- were the same people who divided them into 17 nations at independence. In my personal reflections I have always thought of the Afro-Americans as the biblical Joseph who was sold into slavery by misguided brothers who professed to be patriots, Joseph was not unduly embittered, he was later to become the rescuer of his people from the poverty and injustices in which they found themselves. The Afro-American commitment of the African cause has proverbial values. That commitment will not be duly realized until they support wholeheartedly and contribute to the development of their brothers and sisters here in Africa. The struggle for the independence of African nations has started by Afro-Americans. I need not go too much into that history but political independence for a fragmented people has exposed them to worse exploitation.
The Afro-American is strategically placed to help Africa develop towards a profitable future. This is a fact which must be recognized by all and sundry. I am sure the dream of the immortal MARTIN LUTHER KING JR which is indeed an African dream will manifest fully and the black man where ever he finds himself will be able to hold his head high. We are bound to succeed, let us share the joy of bearing witness to the process; the seed of which Africa has the fountain and reserves to water and nourish, let us make hay now while the sun is shining today much brighter than ever before on our side. The times are in our favor and by the grace of GOD we will get there.
The American heritage dictionary defines Africa as “THE SECOND LARGEST CONTINENT IN THE EASTERN HERMISPHERE” south of Europe and between the Atlantic and the Indian oceans.” Africa is about 11,500,000 square miles and has a population of more than 500,000,000. This definition is merely geographical. It is not possible to discuss Africa without due references to the Africans in America, the Caribbean and other parts of the world. I should therefore not hesitate to state that while the main focus of my write up will be on the African continent, there will be occasions when my emphasis will be on black people generally.
Africa and its indigenes were always misinterpreted until the latter half of the nineteenth century. The Europeans knew little about the interior of Africa. By then much had been learnt about America, Asia and Australia. Because the Europeans knew little about Africa then, this was why Stanley the British explored the Congo basin, the Stanley falls on this river is called after his name. Most of the inhabitants of Africa are black in complexion and perhaps this was the second reason why the words “DARK CONTINENT” were applied to Africa. One may ask why the inland part of Africa was unknown until about one hundred years ago. Many are of the opinion that this was because the natives of Africa were not friendly towards Europeans. Until then, Arab slave raiders had been enslaving Africans. This made many Negroes look upon all white people as slave dealers. But we must not forget the difficulties in exploring Africa. The Sahara desert, the rapids on rivers and thick forests made traveling very difficult. The damp, heat, mosquitoes and flies caused illness to European explorers at the onset of African nationalism; the primary goal was the attainment of political independence. This objective was self-evident in the now famous statement of the president of Ghana.
Dr Kwame Nkrumah suggested that we should “seek first the political kingdom and all else will be added unto.” I would now like to suggest to you that we will not be smug when we question this approach with wisdom of more than 30 years hindsight. It was, I would insist perfectly normal and equally predictable that a people–any–people– would first attack whose aspect of an oppressive system that was perfectly felt. The very personal pain and humiliation of racial segregation, the calculated denial of status and consequents of self- esteem, the usually insulting and often brutal rejection of reasonable aspiration of our people and their disenfranchisement more or less directed the course of our struggle resulting in the singular pursuit of political independence and civil rights and the assumption that economic progress will follow automatically. With the benefit of hindsight, we should have been more aware of the superficiality of political power which leaves the economy in the hands of old masters. This is not to imply that our predecessors in the struggle failed or erred nearly as some may now believe they simply attacked the most visible and immediate cause of misery which to them was certainly more real than perceived. Even with all the problems of foreign denomination that we now face and with all the imperfections of the political and economic systems that resulted from the initial stages of our struggles. I am proud of the fact that there are now more than 50 countries on the African continent that have all the tools in place for the attainment of true independence which in today’s means economic self – determination.
In America most of the legal and overt forms of dehumanization of our brothers and sisters are no longer prevalent. To be certain we have many miles to go but haven from our knees means, at the very least that we can see what is before us and get started. We now know that African people are not helpless, we have both the intelligence and the stamina derived in part from having survived the brutality of slavery and colonization. I therefore have sufficient faith to believe that if we join our hearts and our hands and become one world we cannot only climb the mountain before us but that can also fertilize and enrich the valleys for our prosperity. Today many of Africa and the Diaspora are sliding into chaos not because we are lazy but because practically everything is structured against us. In Ethiopia, Sudan, Mozambique, Ivory coast, Sierra Leone and our people are stretched mercilessly on the rack of civil war and internal insurrection, most of which are fuelled from outside Africa. Africa has an internal debt of about $300 billion which exhausts an already deprived population struggling against a past of forced depopulation and dehumanization by slavery, exploitation by colonialism made worse by the adverse terms of international trade mastermind by the western industrialized nations. Natural disasters such as floods and drought have led to famine and disease. All these have worsened illiteracy, malnutrition and preventable diseases among our innocent young and vulnerable people who are our embodiment of hope for the future.
The majority of Africans gave their support to the decisions made by various governments in the last two decades to nationalized land and most of the natural resources from land. That support particularly from the informed members of the public in various counties was based on the belief at that time that such national ownership of land would increase public attention on the crucial issue of the environment. That hope unfortunately has being dashed as it becomes clearer day by day what the intention was. In actual fact to make money from the land seized from various families by force of law with little or no intention to make any improvement other than the minimum required to facilitate allocation of land at exorbitant prices, to the lucky few who would hold them as tenants of the state on terms that can be varied by the state without any consultation with the tenants every 3 or 5 years. I am asking to look into the effect of the present policies with regard to the land on the very serious push of African/Black countries for massive foreign investment from abroad in competition with Asian countries most of abroad have not introduced legislation on land similar to those of many African countries. In other words how realistic is it for us to expect people to sink millions of their hard earned money into land they do not really own and the tenancy condition of which can be altered to their detriment at will. Especially when hustles do not confront them in other countries competing with African countries for their investment.
As scholars of African studies in the United States, some of you participated in policy formulation in several African countries and are still doing so. Can you honestly expect massive private American investment in countries where land is not part of the things under the direct control of such American companies in the same way those companies are used to when they invest in the US, AUSTRALIA and most of the LATIN AMERICA. The proposed amendments to the indigenization decrees in various African countries are intended to throw Africa wide open to private foreign investments from overseas. I ask to consider how successful the amendments would be without dealing with the basic issue of land ownership. The experience of the speaker is that it is possible for an eminent African in his own country to pay up one million US dollars at 1984 rate of exchange, without securing an inch of land in 4 years and without getting any explanation from the state government to account for the delay. How many foreigners can endure that and why should they be expected to anyway?
One of the most important problems for the future is the cumulative effect of past abuses of our environments. We hear today of the rising temperature of our urban areas. This is taking place because we do not set aside large areas of the city as parks, we do not plant trees around our houses and along our highways. When it is realized that a white oak tree of average size passes as 150 gallons of water from the soil into the atmosphere on a summer day, we can best appreciate why it is difficult to have rain where trees are not planted. The situation in rural Africa is as bad as in the urban; land clearing for agricultural purpose is generally not carefully done. This results in the removal of its top soil which drastically reduce soil fertility with predictable effects on food productivity. In our search for wood fuel, trees are cut down, the best remedy for desert encroachment and drought stricken situations is to imitate tree planting as governments in Nigeria and several nations in the Sahel areas now do. The provision of adequate supply of water has been a problem even where rainfall has been heavy. This is because as soon as the rain falls it runs off. The process whereby river courses are also sources where sands require for construction work are extracted has not helped the situation. The river courses become widen as a result of sand extraction, there by exposing the river water to exclusive evaporation. The banks of the rivers become flooded during the rainy season, leading to loss of life and property, and the excess water runs off into the lagoons. Use of river beds for supply of sand for construction work should be discouraged, dredging of river courses into the canals in order to retain their water and make the rivers navigable will increase sources of water both for drawing and irrigation.
Planting of trees along the banks of all our rivers should be enforced right from now. While some parts of the African continent suffer from desert encroachment, others suffer from soil erosion. Such areas include most of the former eastern Nigeria. It is a known fact that forest land which has not been encroached upon does not suffer from erosion. However, as soon as man interferes with nature by felling trees or recklessly cultivating the soil, forces of erosion are set in motion on the abused land. In the case of Nigeria with which I am familiar, the promised soil map of every state has not surfaced in ten years. Mean while all evidence of abuse of land has continued unabated so serious is the condition of the American environment and its implications for our future, that the adoption of the American conservation pledge by Africa today may help to stem the degradation with all it implies for the future of the African environment.
I GIVE MY PLEDGE AS AN AFRICAN TO SAVE AND FAITHFULLY TO
DEFEND FROM THE WASTE NATIONAL RESOURCES OF MY CONTINENT
ITS SOIL AND MINERALS, ITS FOREST, WATERS AND WILD LIFE.
As a summary, my position is that the African condition, as it is today is bleak and pitiful. The trend could be worse in the pursuit of irrelevances. The part to Africa’s greatness: stability and progress rest in her ability to unite in other to benefit mutually from her numerous resources. The only viable answer to the African predicament is the Pan-African imperative to unite or perish. No amount of loan, aid, or any other form of external assistance to individual countries in Africa will in my honest opinion, seriously affect the well-being and medium to long term prosperity of all Africans. Only Africans/ blacks can at the end the day help themselves. To formulate the true educational system needed for our children, to enable them to take their rightful place among their peers from the rest of the world. The world will not wait for Africa in the next century and beyond, the world has never waited for anybody.
Throughout history, men and women have fought and died for such freedom, for the first time in history we have the opportunity to obtain noble values with wars or massacres, without defining them with the blood and tears of victims. It is your responsibility as well as a responsibility of a united humanity to create through massive investments, conditions which will prevent the finest of our youngsters from developing into predatory animals in search of prey. Instead of calling Africa the “DARK CONTINENT”, why not help us turn on the light, a light that will be seen in triumph all over the world!
The Negro race is a race of unique characteristics, a race of power, a race of culture, a race of knowledge and wisdom finally; we are a race of light. No matter what any country, organization, cult or race might do to suppress us, we will always triumph. So, why then do blacks who are at the top neglect their origin? Like I said earlier, the immediate challenge to blacks everywhere who care about their origin is to aid us as directly as possible, a new African initiative is urgently needed to draw attention to the role of AFRICAN-AMERICANS in the task of re-building the colonially designed as artificial conglomerates of nation states of Africa into the realistic federal union of Republic of states of Africa to which every Black person on earth can claim a right of citizenship. I am proudly impressed by the American spirit, not the dream but the reality of all races coming and living together as one people and one nation indivisible, working purposefully to lead the whole world. If PERESTROIKA changed the face of Eastern Europe, “THE NEGRO: A race of light” will change the destiny of Africa.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Olajide Ojeniyi is a Creative Writer, Think Tank and a Tech Innovator. He is an Advisory Board member at The Black Policy Institute, United Kingdom. He is a Creative Intelligentsia who has been collaborating with likeminded individuals to take on social-economic problems around Africa. He can be reached at BIGJYDO@GMAIL.COM
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