Africa: In Search of a New Image

A prominent feature of colonised people is the washing away of their important identities in the course of time. Even their selfbelief.

Identity has much more to do with the intangible attributes of a people than with only their facial or personality peculiarities. Identity cuts deeper into the root and essence of a people.

By colonisation, I mean, the advent of “Whiteman’s” rule over its subject people, especially in Africa, to which the British may have set out with all the brilliant intentions of “bringing civilization” to a “dimmed, darkened people”.

Identity or the people’s selfimage, almost always suffers a collateral damage whenever a people are colonised.

The dominant image of contemporary Africa seems to be the one of poverty, a consequence of complicated social and political experiences inspired by incompetence of the managers of the continent. Perhaps, alongside another silent but no less a big factor; western conspiracy and manipulations.

Something profound must take place within Africa’s psychology, not only to restore its fledgling image, but for it to be able to exert an authentic influence on the world. China and India is proof that a colonised people can equally succeed.

Almost half a century after their independence from Japanese and British colonisers, China and India, would against all forms of controls and subtleties, rise from the lurch of a broken state, to both forge strong and dynamic cultural and economic identities, bringing to rest long-held stereotypes, about third world countries not being able to initiate and sustain meaningful development imperatives.

India is already an industrial economy, coasting neck to neck with other established western economies. China with its twin miracle state has gone past most advanced countries, well reckoned as the second largest economy in the world.

These success stories both engender profound respect for the image of these nations, and should serve as revolutionary models for peer nations of Africa.

The myth must be laid to rest which holds that for success to be real and authentic, it must be couched in the mould of western traditions.

Singapore’s leap from being a tiny desolate patch of British estate into a first-rate world within four decades serves a good example. In his book, From third world to first, Lee Kuan Yew, the prime minister of Singapore writes: “Our climb from a per capita GDP of US$400 in 1959 to more than US$12,200 in 1990, and US$22,000 in 1999 took place at a time of immense political changes in the world.”

A contrasting but saddening economic descent instead took place in Africa. Martin Meredith, in his book, “The state of Africa”, he observed: “By the end of the 1980’s, after a decade of structural adjustment, little had changed for the better. Africa was slipping into its own bleak category. Per capita income in Black Africa, with a population of 450million, was lower than it had been in 1960. Growth per capita during the 1980s contracted by an annual rate of 2.2 per cent. External debt tripled, reaching $169billion”.

There is no doubt that one of the perils of colonialism is the bitter historical residue it leaves on the psyche of its victims, the cultural and image burden it dumps on their collective psychology.

But, enough of the colonial ranting. Africa like the mythic phoenix must be reborn, it must course through the fog of its historical distortions to prop a fresh start, a powerful break from the normal course. Such revolutionary march must come at a price.Africa would fundamentally need lots of inspired courage and sense of superior creative enterprise to wean itself from the strings of western dictations and influence.

The image and identity Africa bears is better interpreted within the hearts of Europe and other places where Africans scurry for daily bread.

First, how are Africans perceived? How a people are perceived gives an idea of the identity or image of the continent to which they regard as home. This ultimately begets the treatment they receive.

Africans are first of all, abjectly needy people. A people who live in shanties, afflicted by the world worst epidemics, whose governments are either not working or badly broken. Africans are those who must survive, even when it means living off hand-outs from the western world. They are mauled and hurled like beasts in Europe and elsewhere, they do the dirty jobs.