BBC African land grabs debate | International Institute for Environment and Development

BBC African land grabs debate | International Institute for Environment and Development

Black Liberation An Intergenerational Dialogue 02/28 by Black Truth Media | Blog Talk Radio

Black Liberation An Intergenerational Dialogue 02/28 by Black Truth Media | Blog Talk Radio

40 Days and 40 Nights In The Wilderness Lent Culture 02/23 by Black Truth Media | Blog Talk Radio

40 Days and 40 Nights In The Wilderness Lent Culture 02/23 by Black Truth Media | Blog Talk Radio

MLK Speaks Truth to Power

"It becomes more necessary to see the truth as it is if you realise that the only vehicle for change are these people who have lost their personality. The first step therefore is to make the black man come to himself; to pump back life into his empty shell; to infuse him with pride and dignity, to remind him of his complicity in the crime of allowing himself to be misused and therefore letting evil reign supreme in the country of his birth."

Steve Biko

African Spectacles

"My main point here is that if you are the child of God and God is a part of you, the in your imagination God suppose to look like you. And when you accept a picture of the deity assigned to you by another people, you become the spiritual prisoners of that other people."

 
John Henrik Clarke

"Powerful people cannot afford to educate the people that they oppress, because once you are truly educated, you will not ask for power. You will take it. "

John Henrik Clarke

Eeenie Meanie Miney Moe, Don't Forget My Toe

"We do not want to be reminded that it is we, the indigenous people, who are poor and exploited in the land of our birth. These are concepts which the Black Consciousness approach wishes to eradicate from the black man's mind before our society is driven to chaos by irresponsible people from Coca-cola and hamburger cultural backgrounds."

 Steve Biko

"Our own wish and desire is to safeguard the unity, independence and internal security of the Congo inasmuch as We uphold the Charter of the United Nations and have abiding loyalty in the principle of COLLECTIVE SECURITY"

Emperor Haile Selassie I

 

 Give thanks for the spontaneous moments of inspiration when we get to converse with like minds.  That was the occasions a few nights ago on reasoning with a sistren of mine regarding life and Rastafari.  We didn't get into any hardcore discussion of faith or such.  Those conversations, valid and necessary as they are, can go all night and day.  And while good reasoning has no end, it does sometimes leave ones wanting.

King Emmanuel and HIM Haile Selassie 1st

However, such was not the case this particular night.  In fact, on reasoning about the nature of the movement to date, some issues arose that are very serious.  One being the nature, or better the perceived nature, of foreign nations in the livity.  It may be abundantly clear to many outsiders, that in the last decade or so, there has been a steady rise of non-African adherents to the principles and doctrine of Rastafari.  Of major significance is the perception that the call for repatriation, the restoration of peoples to their native lands, to Africa.

This is such a salient point for Rastafari.  For the ascendants of the generations of Africans stolen from their homelands and transported against their will to the America's, returning home is a matter of restoring an identifiable nationhood to a much maligned peoples.  It matters little what faith, culture or particular locale respective peoples are currently residing in.  What matters is the identity of the African who cannot change his or her skin.

So the question to ask then amongst Rastafari: Are we faith or nation?  If we are simply faith, does the call for Africa include foreign nations?  If simply a nation, does the foreign representation count in our numbers?  Is there a way to assuage both poles and still address the central issues?

I won't begin to suggest that I have all the answers.  That was made positively clear to me reasoning with my sistren.  Born and raised outside of continental Africa, many of us in the West, have been raised in liberal, multicultural, heavily diverse communities.  So diverse that you are taught that to separate and consolidate to reaffirm your kinship is akin to being a racist.  That to be deemed recognizable, your once Pan-African organizations, need foreign nations intermixed throughout the very leadership and inner workings to gain more broad acceptance.  No wonder the word from the continent is that the colour of Rastafari seems to be getting lighter and lighter.

Let me not pretend that the teachings and livity that Rastafari know to be true and divinely inspired should not have risen up throughout all nations.  The course the world had been on for far too long, was devoid of the love, the Godly love that Rastafari has been teaching and spreading for nearly a century.  It was ripe, the earth that is, ripe for a message of universal love with clean hands and pure hearts.  Love for all peoples.  Love for the earth.

Still, the Nation of Rastafari rose up in the last century amongst the children of the children who had suffered the brutality and inhumanity of the Trans-Atlantic Slave trade and the oppressive wickedness of the plantation chattel system.  The early tenets addressed the righting of the wrongs: physical mental and spiritual, that devastated the African peoples who had been carried away.  The tenets sought to restore a people to a sound body of uprightness within all aspects of their lives.

It is not lost on Rastafari, that the "livity" would be seen as a right cause for other "nations".  Salvation, while always personal, is very sweet and hard to keep from other persons.   It even seems somewhat fitting that the children of the former colonial and imperial powers have seen the vileness and errors in their father's ways and have turned to the very people their fathers brutalized for guidance, forgiveness and redemption.  But that does not necessitate that these same children look to Africa as their future and final homeland.  

We had previously been separated into distinct regions and habitats for many reasons.  One could probably give the arguments of culture, language, spiritual philosophy.  Even physiology could be used as an argument for the regional separation.  Yet, the current phase shift of human interaction has pushed or pulled us into these cosmopolitan societies that feed many needs.  Still, while the kinship on a spiritual or principle level has been attained in the Diaspora, who are we to say that those on the continent want a remnant from every nation?

There is however a place within the functioning of the movement for the myriad nations that are presently involved.  That place is in agitating to their respective peoples for the full restoration of rights and full restoration of Nationhood for the ascendants of the African Holocaust.  The world, and I have made this argument and appeal previously, will not begin to repair herself until that breach is repaired.  While the world can seemingly manage effectively without such repair, it is akin to baking bread without a rising agent.  You will likely be able to eat what is produced, but it won't be a proper bread.

Okay, so I've just now equated repatriation to baking bread.  That has got to be a literary first.  Getting back to the point of foreign nations, they are expressly useful in this current dispensation and must be called upon for their usefulness.  There are many issues in the land that have arisen from not only the external African Holocaust but also the internal one of colonialism and imperialism.  Even today, foreign intervention is creating much havoc.  The call for help is not a call for interloping but rather, as stated before, a call to urge their own peoples to make things right.  It is a call to minister to life with justice.

This does not preclude the African people themselves from doing any of the heavy lifting themselves.  We must do a majority of the work.  Firstly, and I give thanks to Empress Marina Blake of the Ethiopian African Black International Congress (EABIC) for taking a first step in this regards, we must begin to see each other as family.  And forgive but never forget any of the injuries that have occurred over these many years.  We must beyond the point of distant cousinhood and remind ourselves that we are brothers and sisters, sons and daughters to one another.

Because as I see it, there is no hope for the African in this world outside of Africa.  Opportunity through the occurrence of debt is no hope.  It is slavery in another form.  By another name.  That is all the West has to offer African peoples.  And while many will never see that reality so plainly, many many of us do.  And many of us have been and are now looking forward to that day when the African continent and Her peoples are fully restored.  We in the Diaspora are willing and able to do what is necessary to facilitate that progress.  We only need to come home to show such.  Bring us home family.  Bring us home.

As naive as these meditations may come across to some, one thing stands above all: "God is love, so let us love."

Follow me on Twitter @JahKwasiAbahu

 

 

A Letter To The Continent Feat. Hon. Empress Marina Blake 02/21 by Black Truth Media | Blog Talk Radio

A Letter To The Continent Feat. Hon. Empress Marina Blake 02/21 by Black Truth Media | Blog Talk Radio

Message To The African Diaspora

"If God lives in you, then you have the obligation to walk the earth as a God .  Everything that touches your life must be an instrument of your liberation, or you must throw it into the trash can of history."

Dr. John Henrik Clarke


"The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed."
 

Steve Biko: Speech in Cape Town, 1971

I received the following letter in my inbox several days ago and wanted to share it with my family.  It was already shared with many ones and ones throughout the African Diaspora and it has received a great deal of attention and congratulatory praises from many.   I had already been writing a brief piece myself when it reached my desk, in regards something very similar but the author hit the mark much stronger than I.

The letter, 14 pages long and I understand that it was whittled down from over 20 pages, is a history lesson of sorts, inasmuch as it is an introduction, or further introduction for Diasporan Africans both continentally and abroad.  There are too many salient points for me to address in these few lines, so I attach here for your viewing and edification.  It is rather long but it well worth the read.  Feel free to comment and help the conversation continue.  The only way we are ever going to get to the point that we are truly family once more, is through open honest communication.

"God is love, so let us love."

Follow me on Twitter @JahKwasiAbahu

I have been expresing this very sentiment...

Has the African hour arrived?

Wednesday, 15 February 2012 00:00

Lovemore Ranga Mataire The recent African Union summit in Ethiopia must be lauded for tackling pertinent problems afflicting the continent particularly those that threaten the security and the autonomous management of our resources. It is now clear to every conscientious African that last year's political developments in northern Africa have laid bare the need for Africans to forge a solid united voice strong enough to influence the course of world events particularly those that concern the survival of Africans. The unprecedented capture and murder of Osama Bin Laden, Col Muammar Gaddafi, the capture and sending to the Hague of Laurent Gbagbo and political upheavals that persist in North Africa and the Middle East have reignited a new impetus for real unity among Africans. It is sad to note that the African voice in all this was and still is either silent or totally obliterated by a systematic Western propaganda still steeped in its medieval historical baggage nonsense. President Mugabe, who is the only undisputed genuine revolutionary left on the continent, alluded to this silence at the recent African Union summit in Ethiopia. "We said absolutely nothing. Even if we could not raise a force, at least we could have protested. How did we fail to say even ‘no' to killings that included civilians in the NATO bombings?" lamented President Mugabe. It is sickening that as Africans, we continue being reduced to mere bystanders as foreigners remove and install their puppet regimes in our backyards, taking us back to the dark days when bombs and guns replaced diplomacy as the stuff of high politics. In my view, the challenge facing Africa today is to reverse the mental genocide inflicted upon the African during the horrendous years of slavery and colonialism. It is the lack of self-pride and dignity that has given birth to a disjointed and fragmented African voice strong enough to offer an alternative to counter the one way flow of information that has somehow resulted in the glorification of NATO even among Africans. It is now common place in bars and commuter omnibus to hear people jokingly threatening to unleash NATO on each other to settle personal disputes. The continued self-alienation that has become characteristic of many of the so-called born-frees who find it irrelevant and an unnecessary baggage to define and embrace themselves as Africans before being anything has become a constant nagging pain on the conscience of most conscientious Africans. It is even worse when a whole Prime Minister, in a vain attempt to present himself as morally upright, describes and situates himself as a social democrat before being an African. How does someone in Tsholotsho, Tamandai or Kamutsenzere understand what a social democrat is? How do you translate it to vernacular? Any fool can easily reason that such labels are alien and mean very little to the social, political and cultural dynamics prevailing in our African context. It is this kind of self-definition that clearly projects Mr Tsvangirai as not just alien to our experience as Africans but also poses serious questions about his attachment to Africa and the African struggle for fair treatment and justice on the global scale. Why does it seem like a lifetime pastime for some among us to collaborate in every act that aids the continued humiliation of Africa and its inhabitants? While Baffour Ankomah (New African magazine editor) called for Africans to come up with their own secret societies strong enough to influence the course of world events, most pan-Africanists are of the view that the most critical project at the present epoch is the one that seeks to gather inspiration reference from our rich historical and cultural experience. It is this inspirational reference that will once again restore our dignity as a proud race which has contributed immensely to world civilisation. But for any unity project to succeed Africans need to first re-affirm themselves first as Africans and seek to deconstruct most historical myths that present race as nothing but zombies. Inspirational reference is needed so as to make Africans have something they will refer to as their own scientific and historical heritage, instead of being mere robots that gullibly consume anything produced by other people. Thus in a paper titled, "Reclaiming and Reaffirming African Heritage," Paulo Wangoola, a Ugandan writer and philosopher writes: "Since Africa was the cradle of mankind, and the home of the earliest civilisations, and since Africa led the world in philosophy, science and technology, she was destined to lead the world once more, though in vastly different circumstances." Wangoola's assertions are not hallucination but are rooted in the firm belief and understanding that Africans can no longer forge ahead without inspirational reference, which once led the world in all fields of human excellence. If Europe had its Newtons, Fruads, Socrates and Darwins then where are African godfathers of inventions? It is a lie that has metamorphosised into the truth that Africans never invented anything. If the earliest man was found in Africa it therefore logically and naturally follows that Africans were the first architects of earliest civilisation. Where are those African philosophers and scientists who were the architects of the Egyptian civilisation including modern agriculture? The dilemma that Africa faces today is its identity as a continent without a tangible history and in the words of the late South African Black Consciousness Movement leader, Steve Bantu Biko, "A people without a positive history is like a car without an engine." It cannot move. It is through a corrected version of our African history that Africans can obtain the inspirational reference needed to instill confidence in harnessing our creative prowess and amassing the much needed vigour in re-asserting, re-constructing and resurrecting the rich African cultural heritage that was distorted, stolen and plundered during the nightmare years of slavery and colonialism. It is through that process that truth is affirmed and falsehood discarded. By discarding falsehoods, Africans would ultimately inherit a new perspective and start relating to themselves and others differently. What Africa needs according to Thabo Mbeki (former President of South Africa) is a re-birth from the horrendous existence under slavery and colonialism. But for the re-birth to take place we need to subvert the mental genocide inflicted upon the African mind during colonial conquest and rule by uprooting historical lies which brainwashed and indoctrinated Africans into thinking that Africa is incapable of progressing without the generosity of the West. It is not surprising that even after the demise of colonialism; some among us still believe that if it wasn't for the Europeans we will still be hanging from one tree to another. It is unfortunate that this mentality seems to be rooted even in some of the continent's intellectuals who should be leading the continent into resurrection. Instead, most of the continent's intellectuals live an arduous life of self-denial of the African in themselves. It is partly because of the skewed colonial education that demonised the African way of doing things that has shaped their way of thinking. The colonial education denigrated everything African. The black colour became a cursed colour. African knowledge gained over centuries suddenly became obsolete. African religion became pagan. In a nutshell the African ways of doing things became NO WAYS. The brutal existence under colonialism maimed the African mind. It deprived the African any sense of pride. Dehumanisation of the African occurred everywhere - in mines, on farms, and all other workplaces. But with now an independent Africa, all hope can not be lost. Before we establish what Ankomah called secret societies, we must first put the African legacy in its proper perspective with special emphasis on debunking historical myths and lies about us and reinforcing the following facts; Africa is the cradle of mankind and home of earliest civilisation, Africa is the home of the earliest and first literate people, Africa developed the concept of body and soul, Africa developed languages of sophisticated discourse and access to complex idea in philosophy, science, technology, literature and diplomacy. Africa was the first to master astronomy, medicine and engineering, Africa does not tolerate but celebrates diversity, Africa developed a social welfare system, health for all, food for all, support for widows and orphans through the egalitarian set-up. In the final analysis, Africa, the Arabic world and all progressive forces of the world must at all cost unite in preventing America from exercising its unfettered interventionist power. It is one thing to oppose African leaders, and their leadership. But it is another to condone their replacement with puppet regimes, whose stay in power can only be guaranteed by the inevitable use of violence, ultimately. Africa and all other progressive forces must proffer sober and humane answers to world problems through international dialogue and diplomacy. The era of bombs and guns must remain in the dustbins of history. The challenge confronting the African continent today is that of unity. Unless Africans both living on the continent and in the Diaspora begin to see themselves like the former South African President Thabo Mbeki, as an African first, the unity of all Africans may remain a mirage. We can not allow our different languages; practices and even religions stand in the way of constructing a consciousness of universality. In the words of Kwesi Kwa Prah, "Indians speak different languages, practice different religions, but these have not prevented them from overcoming their specific attributes and proclaiming an Indian national identity." Mbeki suggests that we acquire universality as Africans through our history of resistance and shared experiences under slavery, colonialism and imperialism and neo-colonialism. If we remain fragmented and rugged in our thinking, we will remain politically porous for powerful nations to obtrusively interfere and dictate how we will govern ourselves. Africa can not progress materially without properly developed conscious minds because all our endeavours would be doomed as petty and peripheral. It is my contention that a shared idea of an African as universality beyond all cosmetic differences must as a matter of survival be agreed upon and embraced. The challenge is upon every African to move towards a genuine common humanity, based on dignity and self-respect of others and ourselves. Such an achievement could finally result in an expression of self-confidence and self-consciousness.

BOBO DREADS ON JAMAICAN RADIO 1985 ( Bobo Dread Radio Show.mp3 - Hulk Share - Music Distribution Platform

BOBO DREADS ON JAMAICAN RADIO 1985

As the New Year Rolls On

"A river that chooses to continue running and flowing perpetually, must learn to carve even the most dense stone in order to grow. For if growth is not the desired end game, the only result must be the stench of stagnation and death. So too for Man. Growth is inevitable."

Kwasi Abahu

 

From Out The Mouths Of Babes

"To develop oneself, one has to develop one's own initiative and perseverance --- a man has to strive in order to grow "

H.I.M Haile Selassie I

"Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great ones make you feel that you too, can become great."

Mark Twain 

Just the other day my usual meditations were interrupted by a startling remark by a very close friend.  It was revealed to me that my almost quarter century trod in Rastafari was by all observations a complete waste of time and of my energies.  While I truly applaud their forthrightness, it disturbed me that the sacrifices and uncompromising fortitude against adversity, big and small, goes largely unnoticed or worse unrecognized as qualities that were once held in such high esteem.