By Takura Zhangazha*
It’s a hard ask, sometimes, trying to refer to a revolutionary
Africa in contemporary times. Even more-so, when it comes to our annual 25 May Africa
Day commemorations. The latter’s ebbing historical
meaning to subsequent generations of Africans who still view the North as
better than home remains a sore point. Including the sad tales of those who would
sooner risk life and limb crossing the temperamental Mediterranean sea only to
meet watery deaths in the vain quest for acceptance and integration in fortress
and increasingly intolerant Europe.
If one adds to this the tragic circumstances that continue
to unfold in various parts of the continent such as in Libya, Nigeria and South
Sudan , to mention a few, one would be forgiven for thinking that Africa is
functioning as of old and is in fact, as given by colonial narrative, in ‘regular
need of saving from itself’.
Narratives in affirmation of the latter point have been with
us, particularly since the tragic Rwandan genocide. Counter-narratives have
also regularly emerged that seek to place the African as being capable of solving
his/her problems without undue interference let alone assistance. Hence there was reference, which gets muted
with each passing year, the one time popular ‘African Renaissance’
African Union backed project.
In both, there resides the past. Either by way of colonialist attitude
toward the continent, and the idealistic one of the revolutionary intent exhibited
by those who were at the heart of the anti-colonial struggles to liberate the
continent.
Outside of these two narratives has emerged another which is
basically a pretense at looking at the ‘hard facts’ of Africa’s
backwardness. It claims, among other
things, that Africa is merely refusing to accept its ‘backwardness’ and must
stop assuming the world owes it anything. Even if on the basis of the historical
injustice that was colonialism.
It is an argument that has been a sensation on the internet
and also in the African Diaspora mainly because it is argued from the citadels of
the West and also because it resonates with the biased argument that Africa
needs to follow development models as determined by Western epistemology in
order to get out of its seemingly never-ending poverty/ crises. Where it accepts such knowledge and
implements its dictat, then it will rise in the manner that is partisanly preferred by
global publications such as the Economist.
In all of these arguments, the intention appears to be to de-link the African continent
from its revolutionary history and struggle against t imperialism and
colonialism. Given the broader
undemocratic tendencies of most post colonial African governments as well as
the bifurcation of the then Organisation of African Unity (OAU) by the vicissitudes
of the Cold War, the intentions of such an argument are easier to achieve. In fact, the end results of it have become
more self evident than what many a Pan-Africanist would prefer.
From the ineptitude o the African Union in dealing with
continental crises or the under-performance of African members of the United
Nations Security Council through to the general lack of a clear African success
story in narratives deemed African, there appears to be little to be optimistic
about.
This however does not take away the fact that there is an undying umbilical cord with revolutionary Africa and contemporary Africa. For Africans, the continent cannot be imagined in the 'now' without reference to its revolutionary past. The principles and intentions of those that first sought to link all of us together have not had reason to be changed, regardless of the fact that in most cases the same have been betrayed by current and former political leaders.
The problems faced by Africa may be numerous and in most
cases not of its own making. Indeed we
may be complicit, either via our recalcitrant political leadership or our
easily prone disposition to external goods and services ‘markets’, but there are always
remedies to a crisis.
The first such remedy requires that we, as Africans, embrace
fully, the historical trajectory that has been the African continent. We cannot nitpick our past. Instead we must
understand it in its fullness in order to better tackle contemporary and future
challenges.
This would entail seeking more to define our African being
on our own terms and beyond the geographical or the age-old, ‘native other’. Admittedly this does not solve our myriad of problems,
but having a clearer mind of being goes a long way in assisting us to get our
desired democratic results.
In the same vein, we cannot resist technology as it visits
us, either via the internet or increased mobility and cheaper goods and
services as they arrive at our borders.
What we must however do is to be able to harness these technologies and
new knowledge systems to our context in our best democratic and public
interest. So for example, information communications
technologies (ICTs) cannot merely be
applied on the continent in mimicry to their application in their places of
origin. Our lifestyles may be poorer,
but that does not make them any less important within their own context or
universal human rights values.
Or where we are asked to apply neo-liberal economic policies
in return for direct aid or foreign investment approval, we must take into
account our local contexts and not just our electoral cycles. Our policies must reflect posterity and not ‘hand
to mouth’ cyclical frenzies. Moreover,
we must continually understand that the task of acting for posterity no longer relates only to those that
were in the liberation struggles. But more to those that have been referred to as 'born free'. They too must take up the mantle of continuing the revolutionary intentions of the struggles against colonialism and imperialism, even without having to hold a gun. They must learn the significance of their own their
values despite having to navigate a much more connected world or even latter day African dictatorships. As would have been said by the Guinea Bissau and Cape-Verdean revolutionary, Amilcar Cabral, we must return to the historical path of determining a democratic future for our societies.
We need to speak more to ourselves than to the rest of the
world. Our socio-economic and political values need not always find approval elsewhere
than on our very own continent. From our football, music, through to our
political and economic development models, we need to reaffirm that being
African transcends mere identity or geographical placement. Instead, it exudes values and principles that
are passed from one generation to the next in the pursuit of continuing democratic
progress. All for posterity.
*Takura Zhangazha writes here in his personal capacity
(takura-zhangazha.blogspot.com)
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