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| AFRICAN CULTURE |
Despite all that has been said about Africa either in mockery or consolation; condemnation or commendation, I have no regret ever being an African. I celebrate my continent - The GREAT AFRICA. I enjoyed the treasures in our culture and heritage, from the language to the traditions to every aspect of our indigenous ways of life. You can't find such treasures elsewhere in the world.
AFRICA IN TIME PAST
Indeed, Africa has been a great Continent; a great People blessed with Great potentials. We have one of the richest cultures in the world.Before the advent of colonialism, Africa has been. We've always survived on our own. For instance
1 - Indigenous Government: Before the advent of colonialism, we've had successful indigenous leadership structures. We've always had governmental systems and structures of our own manned and run by our own people. We've had different kinds of monarchical systems of government.
Moreso, we've not only successfully led ourselves, our leadership has in time past influenced the whole world. In case you forget, Egypt, a notable North African country was once a world power. Many nations of the world once looked up to them for sociopolitical and economic leadership.
2- Education: Against what obtains today, Africa once had a successful educational system. Of course, you know that the oldest university, The University of Cairo is in Egypt - North Africa established in 970AD.
Before we were introduced into modern educational ideologies, we've had ways of educating ourselves - to pass knowledge and skills from generation to generation. We had our own ways of documentation. If you go through archives of archaeological discoveries, you will understand better.
Before the white men came with the western civilization, African civilization has been.
3- Technology: Before the coming of the colonial masters, technology has been invoking in Africa. One could say that the coming of the white men enhanced and facilitated technological breakthroughs and advancements. But in another thought, we could have still improved on our own if the white men had not come. If we could invent those crude and primitive methods on our own technology-wise without being taught by the white men, we could have still had more refined technological innovations and advancement on our own. This is not to despise the input and impact of the white men in attaining greater technological heights. But we need to, however, remind ourselves how we've lived and survived by ourselves. We need to appreciate how we broke through in so many spheres like:
i- Civil Engineering: Africa has indeed come a long way in terms of civil engineering. There have been magnificent structures all built by our own people. Africa started building with refined bricks thousands of years ago.
Apart from buildings of even several storeys, there has been the construction of bridges across great water bodies all over Africa even if they didn't look like the modern ones we have now. And like I said before, even if the Whites has not come, we could have still improved on those same primitive bridges.
I have personally walked across great water bodies where I grew up. These were built by our own people.
Moreso, there have been pulley systems employed in construction work and even in fetching water from wells and other water bodies.
ii - Transport: Before the coming of the whites, land and water transports have been in operation. This includes the use of animal aided transport systems either by riding on animals or movable trucks pulled by animals.
Water transport systems have equally been invoking especially paddled canoes amongst others. I remember using something that is not even as modern as a canoe to cross a river on our way to farm years back. The structure was simply an assemblage of many lights -weighted straight woods(Okō úhōvwe - as it is called in my place of birth, Okpara Inland, Delta State, Nigeria) arranged side by side and tied together to form a flatbed on which you sit to paddle. This was not a white man's innovation. It was native to us in my place of birth.
iii - Lightning systems: before the advent of modern electricity, there have been light in Africa. The Benin kingdom in Nigeria for example, has been said to be using streetlights generated by wicks dipped into containers of combustible oils and this is very widespread in Africa. I personally witnessed the use of this type of lighting system where I grew up. Even though it had so many drawbacks, it still served its purpose.
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4 : Economy: The economic meltdown that plagued the world some few years ago is not the first to happen. There was an account in the bible of a 7-year economic recession that broke out in Egypt. But Egypt through the prisoner, Joseph that later became the Prime Minister was able to salvage the status quo. Many other countries that were affected were depending on Egypt the then World Power for sustenance.
Against what obtains today in world economic rating, Africa was once very great economically.
In terms of commerce, Africa has had different media of exchange of goods and services. It started by trade by barter, giving out slaves in exchange for goods and services received, giving out female children in marriage to those from whom parents received a number of goods or services. Thereafter, commercial activities in Africa progressed to the use of cowries as currency before the introduction of modern currencies
5 - Medicine: Africa has one of the richest traditional medicine in the world, at least I am a living witness. It was really a great excitement during my final year degree project in my undergraduate days as a Pharmacy student at the Delta State University, Abraka Nigeria. I discovered Africa had had traditional remedies for the majority of the diseases plaguing humanity especially amongst us here in Africa.
There are some cases that seem to be better approached using African traditional medicine than the orthodox medicine. For example, orthopaedic problems like fractures. I met several traditional medicine practitioners with evidence of quick and full recovery from fractures. I even witnessed several cases of fractures and bone dislocations being referred from hospitals to those African traditional practitioners and they would always deliver.
The advent of modern medical scientific methodologies only served to standardise the traditional recipes we already have.
Several of the other tradomedical practitioners I met during my survey on traditional medicines all over Ethiope West Local Government Area of Delta State, Nigeria also have proven claims of bullet extraction using traditional medicines without surgical procedures as it is usually done in modern medical practice. I even witnessed a case of spinal cord injuries being handled by one of the traditional medicine practitioners I met during my research. Without exaggeration, I found out that most of the diseases presently ravaging humanity have traditional remedies in Africa.
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AFRICA NOW
Indeed, Africa has come a long way over time. A lot has changed. A lot has gone under the bridge.Looking back at the testimonies of some Africans in various spheres both past and present, one would expect that Africa would have been greater than what we are now if we had really built on past victories. If we had tasked our brains further, if we had better maximized our treasures and resourcefulness, we would have been greater than this. If we had acknowledged and celebrated our cultures better, we would have advanced further than this. If we had fought with a more united front, we would have won greater victories. Oh, Africa!
Have we failed?
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| Together we can make it. |
It will be very unrealistic to say that Africa is a fallen people. We are only staggering and struggling to find our feet and we can become great again and again.
More recently, if you really follow the trend in various spheres you will understand that we are picking up gradually only that our best is not enough yet.
Indeed there are a lot of strange and evil winds that have blown in parts and whole of Africa and these have ruptured the structures of African strengths in various ways. Let's take time to look at some of them.
1- Slave trade: So many factors led to the proliferation of slave trade in Africa. This would be X - rayed in another article. But permit me to say here that the slave trade really impacted the destiny of the man of colour with so many hurts.
True, no one can make you a slave until he makes you feel less than who you are and accept less than what u worth.
The white taskmasters must have understudied the African setting to discover the degrading mental capacities of the people as well as their timidity and in exposure. They capitalised on this to play it smart on us-Africans.
Some of the white merchandise penetrated the land through our traditional leaders and the indigenous elites who they offer some "white colas" they had not seen before aside other attractive promises. This way, the slave merchandise penetrated the land and took away our people as slaves.
If you really understand the life of a slave, you will attest to the fact that slaves don't have a choice. They are dictated to. They act on orders, commands and decrees. Their rights and freedom are limited if not eliminated.
They are conditioned not to think freely as humans that they are. They don't express themselves. Their opinions do not count. It is either they do their masters will, or do their will and face the repercussion.
Slaves are often used and not built. They use their strength for the good of their masters whether they like it or not. They are subjected to torture and all sorts of inhuman treatments and they are left with no opportunity to seek redress.
With these set of experiences, their potentials are either deadened, unexplored or exploited by their taskmasters. They are used as tools and treated like pieces of equipment. As a result, they become mentally and otherwise incapacitated. Having been compared to live like a lesser human, their sense of dignity, creativity and innovation is being made dormant if not deadened.
Indeed, the slave trade was widespread in Africa and it transcended decades and even centuries. So many people were displaced and translocated.
Many of our people that were sold out never came back and those that came back came in bad fate.
The experience of the slave trade took away the sense of dignity, integrity and nobility of many Africans and replaced them with what we can now call the "slave mentality"
Their natural instincts for creativity, productivity and excellence were tempered with aside cultural and religious mutations. And today, look at where we are.
Funny enough, despite the backwardness in our systems, the majority are not still driven for a change. You see people being tossed here and there by the tempestuous wind of ailing political and socio-economic systems. Many are yet to acknowledge the need for a change not to talk of sacrificially birthing the change.
there are times you will see some self-acclaimed advocates in some sectors in our various systems. They could sound so real, sincere and with genuine intentions of fighting for the common good of the land but deep within them are ulterior motives - some selfish interests they want to achieve in the long run. And of course, nature has its own way of exposing these hidden agenda sooner or later. But be that as it may, we can still testify of some great souls who charted new and better courses in various spheres in Africa and the world at large.
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2- Colonialism: as if buying our people away as slaves were not enough, the white men finally came to take over the leadership of our own land. They gradually displaced our indigenous leadership apparatus and replaced them with their special envoys all employed to exploit the African treasures.
Although, colonialism brought so many blessings but not without causing some damages. It exposed us to modern civilization but at the same time, it mortgaged the treasures in our culture and tradition.
They infused into us, if not imposed on us their language, tradition, culture and their way of life. Even though we still have a stock of our culture and tradition, but not with much relevance as it were.
Our mode of dressing and diet have been badly affected. The western styles of dressing are now being widely celebrated than our indigenous ones. In some settings, the western dressing is regarded as the official dressing code.
At a time, it seems we couldn't help ourselves to achieve maximum greatness as a people. This made it easy for the colonial masters to find their feet amongst us.
After the colonial masters took over for years, the brave ones among us led us to fight for independence with the conviction that we are now capable to lead ourselves. And years after most African countries gained independence, we are yet to find our feet. Which way my people?
What's the source of this confusion amongst us? Is it the slave masters, colonial masters that confused us to the extent of still being confused decades after we took over the leadership of our own land from them, or we are the ones confusing ourselves? Who did this to us, Africa? What's really wrong with the man of colour that's too difficult to be corrected?
Look at our leaders who promised us a better life than what the colonial masters promised and offered us. They are busy enriching themselves, pilling up mountains of wealth both home and abroad all stolen from the fountains of treasures in our own land. They are busily overfeeding themselves with what's too big for their body system to digest while the common man goes to bed every day on empty stomach.
With the way these supposed leaders are handling the affairs of the land, one may be tempted to prefer colonial governments to these deficient, incompetent and insensitive government who are only driven by, and for their bellies.
However, some part of Africa is getting it right more appreciably but we need to do more because we have all it takes to do so.
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THE FUTURE OF AFRICA
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| Taking out destinies in our hands |
The ailing and failing systems poses so much threat to the future of Africa. If you have access to immigration statistics ratios, you will understand the extent to which our people take the risk of travelling long hours by air or sea in search of greener pastures abroad. This is not to even to mention the countless number of people dying daily of hunger, lack of good medicare and poor living environment.
This is indicative of the fact that our land is not green enough for our dreams to thrive. Because of our established systems not being productive enough, many dreams have gone down the drain. Many visions have been shattered by the stormy wind of hardship that we are persistently faced with. Our sense of creativity and crave for excellence is gradually being eroded. The common man is being left to battle the wind of poverty. Even to put food on the table is a battle for the majority. And how much would you really expect from a man who is struggling to make both ends meet in contributing to nation building? But the question is, WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE? How long shall we continue like this?
We need to sit down and ask ourselves some questions. We need to spend some time on self-interrogation, self-appraisal and self-reinvention in order to gain freedom from this ravaging self-enslavement.
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THE WAY FORWARD
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| A time to think |
1- Mental Remodelling: Greatness is not a state, but a mindset that becomes a lifestyle.
Greatness and mediocrity are both products of the Mind.
Until we think greatness and live greatness every day, we cannot become it.
The greatest limitation of mankind is that of the mind. We are where we are today where our mind has placed us and we cannot overcome mediocrity in reality until we overcome it in our mind. We cannot progress as a people until we have progressed in our thinking.
We must think the future we desire to live it. We must place a premium on building the nation above building fat bank accounts home and abroad from looted funds.
Our language must change from 'I' to 'WE'.
It is our land, our people, our future!
We need to improve on our nature to improve the state of our nation.
Wait a minute, why divert funds meant for the common good of the land to private pockets?
Why stand for or against the idea because of selfish interests?
Why bend the rule because of what you want to gain?
My people, this is poverty of the mind which is the most ravenous of all poverties.
Most times, I begin to wonder why our people wander abroad in search of what we have in our homeland.
Why are we hiding these treasures from ourselves?
This is self-deception and self-enslavement.
Our people even go as far as stocking wealth abroad when there are scarcity and poverty here. I don't even know what and how they think. They loot our wealth and take them abroad to boost another man's economy while our economy here is crying for help.
You see our so-called leaders going on medical trips abroad and the monies they spend on all these trips could go a long way in building stronger healthcare systems here. But the question they fail to ask themselves is if you could take advantage of government funds you have access to by virtue of your office to seek medical assistance abroad and you are well, what about the common man? Even if you are in good health and the people you claim to lead are in ill health, don't you think you are sicker upstairs?
Imagine the wild widespread insecurity in the land, yet, a larger percentage of the available and best security agents are attached to these so-called leaders leaving the common man vulnerable. Oh, Africa!
I wonder how they feel enjoying the basic amenities they couldn't provide for their people. They enjoy imported goods and services at the expense of patronizing indigenous products.
We have to realise that consuming more than what you produce places you at the mercy of the producer. You will keep spending all and what you have in buying and be left with little or nothing for real developmental projects.
Africa really needs to wake up. Other nations of the world are waxing stronger and stronger every day and we are still struggling to find our feet.
We need to think well to live well.
2- Effective leadership structures: Several African nations after independence adopted the pattern and structure of the government of their colonial masters but the western system of government we adopted seem not to have produced positive results for us as it produced for them. The possible explanation I can give to this is as follows
i - Leadership incompetence: Excellence is a product of mastery, expertise and diligence The success or failure of a people start from her leadership.
No nation grows beyond her level of leadership capacity. The nation will always be as strong on weak as her leadership.
If the western people from whom we borrowed these systems and structures of leadership are doing very well with it, then why is it not working for us?
It is probably because we don't have the competence to make it work. It is possible our people are yet to develop the capacity and skills to operate and drive these systems effectively.
I begin to wonder at times the calibre of people that saddle our leadership in the various spheres. People without proven leadership competence being at the helm of affairs will produce nothing but mediocrity.
In life, you cannot give what you don't have. Not until we position only competent hands to run the affairs of the land, the land will remain fallow and the treasures underutilized. We have to say "NO" to sentiment and allow only the right people who really have what it takes to take us to higher glories.
No more pocket politics!
No more politics of 'self'!
We must be able to place things where they belong irrespective of what and who is involved.
ii- Poor followership: True, incompetence cannot survive in the presence of competence. It takes vis-a-vis poor followership to produce poor leadership.
All the 'Misfits' sitting on our leadership thrones who are constituting nuisance everywhere. How did they get there? How else if not to take advantage of the masses who seem not to know they're left from their right.
the nation will always be disadvantaged when the leaders are not leading well and the people are not following well.
Good followership requires being very supportive of the leadership on board, but not without placing them under good checks.
In fact, it has to start from the point of choosing the leaders at all levels.
We must be ready to offer constructive and prompt criticism to the leadership when they are deviating from the essence they are meant to serve in office.
The people must be sensitive enough to know when things are going wrong and be brave and proactive enough to address those issues using the appropriate channels.
Policies that do not mean well for the common good of the people and for the future of the land should be firmly opposed and resisted.
On the other hand, the people should be ready to embrace any change that would take the land to greater heights no matter how sacrificial it might be.
iii - Uncustomized leadership structure: The white men that originated these structures of government that we adapted, fabricated them to suit their setting there both in terms of geography, economy, culture, tradition and religion. So, we that are borrowing or rather adapting these systems should ensure they are adjusted to fit into our own settings here and satisfy the needs of the land in all ramifications.
The constitutions both the ones adapted from them and those drafted here should represent every interest of the people to the widest spectrum.
Most of these western states that colonized Africa are not as multi-ethnic as some African countries like Nigeria for example where there are over 700 ethnic groups all covered by one governmental entity. This is why you see that the political systems and operations most times is divided along ethnic and religious lines.
If you look at the systems in Africa critically, you will notice a lot of incompatibilities between the various needs of the people - both geographical, religious, economic, sociopolitical and cultural, and the systems, structures and operations of the government invoke in the land.
So, there is a dire need for a review of systems and structures of government if we must progress.
iv - Capacity building: Indeed, strong people make a strong nation. No nation can be stronger than how strong her people are.
Capacity, however, is not achieved or wished, it is consciously built.
You know that the educational systems in Africa are nothing to write home about. Most of the educational curricula are outdated and even poorly implemented.
If we must progress as a people, we must fortify our educational apparatus both former academia and informal facilities of training.
We must encourage skill acquisition and development.
We must make talent hunt and development a major project.
All hands must be on deck to improve our indigenous products and at the same time have more taste for locally made goods and services rather than depending on the importation of what we can produce locally. Remember, a consumer nation can never be self-sufficient economically.
v - Harnessing our cultural resourcefulness: Indeed, Africa is highly culturally resourceful. There are a lot of treasures in our culture that we can maximize both economically and socially to wax stronger as people.
To achieve this, we must price our culture above the culture we borrowed from the white men that colonized us. We must be proud of the uniqueness of our culture both from our dressing, language, diet and our general way of life instead of throwing away our culture with a preference for the white man's culture. This is the only way we can be happy and fulfilled as a people.
vi - Harnessing our ecological resourcefulness: Indeed, God has really blessed Africa with a good ecosystem. When you look at the natural scene, Africa has so much valuable natural resources for tourism and entertainment and these can better be maximized to progress further.
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CONCLUSION
From time immemorial, Africa has produced heroes in various spheres and we can continue to do so if we realise we have all it takes.
Africa can be great again and again.
We can change the narrative. We can rise to prove our critics and haters wrong. But we have to take our destiny into our own hands and fight for it.
If we don't fight for our destiny as a people, we remain defeated.
To restore the glory of Africa, you have a role to play and so do I.
Let's join hands to prove to the outside world that we are better and bigger than what they think of us.
long live Africa the Great!
Long live my people!
I believe so much in Africa!
My dream is to see Africa become great and in greater glories.
The Giant in us must wake up to the demands of time and the time is NOW!
#IRepAfrica
#proudlyafrican
#ilovemycolor
#emmanueleyafimoni
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