Towards demythologisation of African history

Witten by Bobson Gbinije - Warri, Delta State Nigeria

Asocial critic

History is witness of the times, the torch of truth, the life of memory, the teacher of life and the messenger of antiquity

CICERO (106-43BC) De oratore.

IN his magnum opus and literary tour de force entitled Heauton Timoroumentos the philosopher and essayist Publius Terentius Afer said: "Humo sum ; humani nihil ame alienum puto" ( I am a man; and nothing human is foreign to me). It is this drive to ensure that nothing human is foreign to man that gave birth to history. History is an authentic chronicle and a verifiable documentation of ancient and modern events.

The matrix of history is buttressed and consolidated by inputs from oral tradition of folklores, preserved by memories and recounted to the existing generation to document for posterity. The elements of written, divinatory and numerological submissions, etc, also contribute as resource archives from which historians, historiographers and archaeologists can get factual information. Before the art of writing was introduced, man, from the Paleolithic through the Mesolithic to the Neolithic ages used primitive means to document events.

Fundamental and remarkably eventful occurrences in history like the Nile Valley Civilization, the Cretan Civilization, the Sumerian Civilization, the rise of Babylon, Assyria, Chaldea, Phonecia, Persia, the Roman Empire, the early history of Greece and Christianity were documented in history. But the art of writing and documentation did not arrive in Africa until the 16th century, when European historians, from a European perspective, had already documented most of Africa's history.

Although the king of the ancient Mali Empire, Mansa Kankan Musa (1307-1337 A.D) set up the Sankore University in Timbuktu in 1310 A.D, it was a university for the propagation of Islamic studies (Arabic education), as against what was prevalent, the Western education and the art of writing. This exposed Africa's early history to the whims and caprices of history dabblers, sentimentality, historical prejudices, myths, tribal jingoism, misplaced patriotism, falsehoods, judgmental fallacies, arrant controversies and apocryphal submissions, making African history and anthology of incongruities.

For Nigerian traders in Ghana, it's still no respite in sight

AJAYI OLUWAPELUMI in Ghana writes about the frustration of the affected Nigerians.

Nigerian traders in Ghana have been under pressure to move out by the local authorities at the instance of their Ghanaian counterparts. 

The year 2014 has no doubt being  one of turbulence and instability for Nigerian traders in 10 regions of Ghana, as the Ghana Ministry of Trade and Industry threatened to implement the Ghana Investment Promotion Centre (GIPC) Act, 2013 (Act 865) which prohibits foreign traders from trading in its 48 markets across the country.

Nigeria and other ECOWAS member countries are recognised by Ghana constitution as foreign.

In June this year, it was reported that thousands of members of Ghana Union of Traders Association (GUTA), both in the capital city of Accra and Ashanti region of Kumasi, turned up the pressure being mounted on the foreign traders, mostly Nigerians by locking up their shops.

The situation was, however, checked through the intervention of Ghana police, which saw the foreign traders return to their shops without hindrance.

However respite for the traders seemed short-lived as the ministry that has the power to eject the traders, in September, issued a 30-day ultimatum for all foreign traders to quit the local markets or else face eviction and be prosecuted in a court that will be set up to prosecute foreign retail traders.

The evil of Nollywood

Written by Biodun Ogungbo - Nigeria

One story

Dr. Biodun Ogungbo

There is a story/video reported on the Internet. The title of the video, “Flying bird turns into old woman in Oshodi,” doesn’t appear to explain the disturbing scene, but its description and a local news article combine to create an unusual narrative.

In the film, an angry mob and a policewoman can just be made out, gathered in a circle on the dusty ground. As the camera finds its focus, the grim reality becomes clear. In the middle of the circle sits a woman, almost naked, her body bloodied and burnt.

Eyewitnesses quoted by a newspaper said a black bird had been flying in the sky over Oshodi, in Lagos, before striking an electrical cable, falling to the earth and transforming into a woman. The same eyewitnesses said she confessed to being a witch.

Banke Idowu was one of those who filmed the woman. She told BBC Trending that as she arrived, she was told about the metamorphosis by others in the crowd. She herself believes the explanation of witchcraft. “I’ve never seen it in real life, but I’ve heard about it and seen it in films. So when they said it happened, I believed it.”

Another story

A friend was at a discussion forum where a taxi driver claimed in broad daylight that he hit a cat on the road and after the impact, the dead cat turned into a dead woman. The police were called, they bought the taxi driver's story and took the corpse away. He got away with manslaughter! Sadly, many on the forum also believed his story.

Marked for life? Are your tribal marks attractive or repulsive?

Written by CHIOMA GABRIEL - Nigeria

As incredible as it may seem, many people find tribal marks repulsive.

The first time Akinwunmi travelled to the United kingdom several years ago, he recalled how a little white girl approached him where he was seated at the airport and studied his face. Akinwunmi had four long horizontal lines deeply etched on his two cheeks.

The girl was aged about six. Akinwunmi was initially embarrassed at the way the girl stared at him. Her parents were seated a few yards away and not knowing how to send her away, he decided to engage her in a conversation.

Then, the girl came clean to ask about the marks on his face and he told her he fought and killed a lion. Impressed, she ran back to her parents shouting on top of her voice that she wanted her doll and a biro. She was shouting that she had just met a brave man who had killed a lion.

The little girl drew the attention of many who shifted their gaze to Akinwunmi's direction and wondered at him. Some of the men even nodded in admiration at his bravery and the little white girl returned, holding her doll and a biro. She lovingly caressed Akinwunmi's face and the marks on his face before giving him her doll for his autograph.

Now visibly embarrassed, Akinwunmi held her hand and told her he didn't fight or kill a lion but that the marks on his face were tribal marks he got as a child. On hearing that, the little girl shifted away and screamed in horror, shouting that he was a savage. Her scream attracted airport officials who came to her rescue and found her pointing at Akinwunmi's tribal marks as the face of a savage.

That was over thirty years ago.

Now, Akinwunmi is 57 years and happily married. He has five kids. None of whom has tribal marks.

" I cannot subject my children to the embarrassment I suffered over the marks I have on my face. Even in my school days in Nigeria, they called me all sorts of names because of the severe tribal marks my grand parents put on my face. As a young man, I remained a virgin for a long time because the kind of ladies I wanted to date rejected me due to the marks on my face. The greatest thing that happened to me was getting educated and qualifying to be a doctor otherwise it would have been disastrous for me.

Converting illicit funds to transform Africa

Written by Carlos Lopes

Lopes is Executive Secretary, Economic Commission for Africa.

HOW can Africa move away from aid to trade? What should it do to attract more private equity and how can it convert the illicit financial flows to funds for domestic resource mobilization, climate change and conflict resolution - these are pertinent issues which affect the long term development of the African economies.

Financing developmental efforts in Africa has proved difficult in the past. Overreliance on overseas development assistance (ODA) was seen as the solution. Now we know better. Lessons learned from the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) have prompted a fresh wave of thinking. Africa needs a transformative developmental framework. However, a structural transformation agenda will require an adequate, predictable, sustainable and integrated financing mechanism geared towards financing developmental goals. Also, the continent must embark on reforms to capture currently unexplored or poorly managed resources. This includes curtailing illicit financial flows and rather transforming those funds into a powerful tool for enhancing domestic resource mobilization, as a way of furthering the continent's development.

According to recent studies, from 1970 to 2008, Africa lost $854 billion to $1.8 trillion in illicit financial flows. The latest progress report of the High-level Panel on Illicit Financial Flows, where I deputize for President Mbeki, revealed that the annual average was between $50 billion and $148 billion a year (ECA, 2013). Commercial money such as tax evasion and trade and services mispricing through multinational companies, constitute the largest component followed by proceeds from criminal activities and public sector corruption. This loss undermines revenue generation and reduces the benefits from economic activities, particularly in the extractive sector.

Nigerians in America: How (NOT) to raise our children

Written by Abiodun Ladepo

Ladepo, a resident of Los Angeles, California, USA.

Email: oluyole2@yahoo.com

It begins with the language spoken in the home. It is often the case that parents who share the same Nigerian language speak English to their children at home even when the children are just babies and toddlers. This is a waste of the child's wide repertoire for learning new things, including new languages. 

Various psychologists and socio-linguists opine that every child is imbued with an innate ability to acquire a language. What parents need to do is place that child in close proximity to the language and the child would pick it up effortlessly. Parents unwittingly underestimate the child's capacity to learn the parents' native language, internalise it as perfectly as the parents do and use it as appropriately as the parents do. By not speaking their native language to their children, parents deny their children the three theories of language acquisition: Imitation, reinforcement and active construction of grammar.

Also, by speaking our adulterated, impure American English to the children, parents unwittingly impede or, in fact, destroy the children's ability to learn American English in its purest form. Most of us who arrived in the US after 12 years of age or after puberty (according to socio-linguists) have forever lost the capacity to learn American English like a native speaker. We come from Nigeria with our breathy alphabets, twisted consonants, misplaced stresses, wrong diction, abbreviated vocabulary, and we unknowingly impose these habits on our children. Our imperfect American English is what we expose our children to, and through the three theories of language acquisition mentioned above, our children acquire our poor English. We do not recognise the fact just as our parents did not sit us down to teach us our native Nigerian languages, that our children would naturally and effortlessly learn from their friends at the nursery, higher schools and playgrounds.

It then goes on into subordinating or completely surrendering our entire mores to the American environment in which we live. Our children wake up and walk past us in the house without rendering the greeting of the day. Forget about girls kneeling down and boys prostrating. The children outright do not even utter the greeting of the day before asking us for whatever they want! A Nigerian man walked into his house with his friend in tow. He found his two teenage boys playing video games in the living room. Rather than greet their father and the guest, the children unplugged their video player and relocated into their room. When the father went to them and chastised them for not having the decency to greet his friend, the boys told him the guest was the father's, not theirs! They didn't think they had the obligation to greet their parents' friends. Some, in fact, call their parents' friends by their first names! Forget "Uncle" or "Auntie."

Ghana's Elmina Castle

Elmina existed as a town before this, and was a tribal capital. The name comes from the Arabic el mina meaning the harbour.

Elmina or St Georges Castle, is the oldest European building in Ghana.

It was the first European slave-trading post in all of sub-saharan Africa. Located on the western coast of present-day Ghana, it was originally built to protect the gold trade. It was a much smaller rectangular fortress than the castle we see today, which today covers around 10 times the area of the first one.

The Portuguese first arrived in 1471 to buy gold. Elmina castle was built in 1482 by Portuguese traders as the castle of St George. Within five years, a number of traders were based there and Elmina was given city status by the king of Portugal. It was the centre of Portuguese operations for over 150 years.

In August 1837, the nearby St Jago hill was taken by the Dutch, who then pounded the castle with canons. The resulting Portuguese surrender ended Portuguese influence in West Africa.

Shortly after its capture, by the Dutch, it was expanded and in 1665, a second fort on St Jago hill was built, so no one could repeat the attack they had made upon the castle.

Organisation of African Unity. As it was in the begining..

Organization of African Unity

The Organization of African Unity (OAU) or Organisation de l'Unité Africaine (OUA) was established on May 25, 1963. It was disbanded July 9, 2002 by its last chairperson, South African Thabo Mbeki and replaced by the African Union.
Its intended purpose was to promote the unity and solidarity of the African States and act as a collective voice for the continent. This was important to secure Africa's long-term economic and political future. Years of colonialism had weakened it in both respects.
The OAU was also dedicated to the eradication of colonialism, as there was still a number of states that hadn't yet won their independence. South Africa and Angola were two such countries. A Liberation Committee was established to aid independence movements and look after the interests of already-liberated states. The OAU also aimed to stay neutral in terms of global politics, which would prevent them from being controlled once more by outside forces -- an especial danger with the Cold War.
The OAU had other aims, too, though:
• Ensure that all Africans enjoyed human rights.
• Raise the living standards of all Africans.
• Settle arguments and disputes between members -- not through fighting but rather peaceful, diplomatic negotiation.
Soon after achieving independence, a number of African states expressed a growing desire for more unity within the continent. Not everyone was agreed on how this unity should be achieved. Two opinionated groups emerged in this respect:
• The Casablanca bloc, led by Nkrumah of Ghana, wanted a federation of all African countries. Aside from Ghana, it comprised also Algeria, Guinea, Morocco, Egypt Mali and Libya.
• The Monrovian bloc, led by Senghor of Senegal, felt that unity should be achieved gradually, through economic cooperation. It did not support the idea of a political federation. Its other members were Nigeria, Liberia, Ethiopia and most of the French-speaking nations.

General Amin's Predictions... (Video)