Prior to the attainment of political independence, most African nationalists closed ranks in order to forge a common ideological front aimed at wrestling political independence from their erstwhile colonial overlords. These nationalists were inspired by Pan-Africanism (Afrocentrism) which evolved out of the works of African-American intellectuals in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. With the attainment of independence by Ghana in 1957, Kwame Nkurumah’s Pan-Africanism was embraced across the African continent.
Suffice it to say that by the 1960s when most African countries secured political independence from their respective colonial overlords, the future looked bright for these independent African states. But six years down the line it became increasingly clear that most of those states could not sustain their respective political independence. What happened was that official corruption, nepotism and profligacy, somewhat became statecraft in those independent states. Under the pretext of fighting the aforesaid ills, some power-thirsty military juntas in those states staged military coup d’états that destroyed the pre-existing legal orders in those states. The tragedy of the incursion of the military into politics in Africa is now history.
Perhaps the greatest tragedy in Africa today is that despite gaining political independence from their erstwhile colonial masters, most African countries are yet to be completely emancipated from variants of neo-colonialism: paternalistic imperialism, political imperialism, economic imperialism and cultural imperialism. According to Kwame Nkrumah who coined the word “neo-colonialism”, “the error of neo-colonialism is that the nation which is subject to it is in theory independent and has all the outward trappings of international sovereignty. In reality its economic system and thus its political policy is directed from outside….”
For me, the most pernicious form of imperialism that oftentimes goes undetected in Africa is cultural imperialism. Culture is the life of a people. Therefore the destruction of a people’s cultural heritage is tantamount to destruction of the people. Unfortunately what we are witnessing today in Africa is a profound systematic deconstruction of the cultural heritage upon which the African people lay claim to civilization. Last two weeks I attended an international conference in Accra, Ghana.
https://www.thisdaylive.com/index.php/2019/11/13/pan-africanism-must-not-die/
