Africa is for Africans – all of us

If you ask Google which is the first country to gain independence in Africa, the answer it will give you is Ghana, on March 6, 1957. The thing with Google is that it is never wrong. It is also never correct. Google does not give answers, the Google search engine, through its algorithm, tells you which ‘answer’ is probably the most correct — not the answer.  

Google will tell you that Sudan received its independence from Britain on 1 January 1956, more than a year before Ghana did. You will find some pseudo-intellectual explanation, that Sudan was under the joint administration of Egypt and Britain, but Google conveniently forget that Egypt itself was under British colonial rule.

Why do academic scholars, and basically everyone, not count Sudan’s independence from colonialism as the first African country to gain independence?

Maybe because our understanding of what is African is no different to a European or an Indian or a Chinese person — narrow and exclusive. 

African and Black should be one. Because no single colour knows oppression better than Black. Steve Biko deliberately referred to the colour Black as political. Biko was not being rhetorical or playing to the gallery.

Africa, though, is not the continent of victimhood. We should not celebrate our massacres, because there won’t be enough days in the year for that. But equally, we cannot continue to celebrate our oppression on the basis of who is oppressed more. It is this thinking that allows xenophobia on our continent.

So what does it mean to be African? Or should we really ask if there is a difference between Black and African? 

In South Africa, in the days of our struggle we used the oppressors’ perspective of differentiating between the disenfranchised. We acknowledged that the oppressive whites did not want any of us except how we could serve them. So we called all the disenfranchised, Black, because wherever a white person could go, none of us could.

However, the whites also distinguished between us, by calling some Coloureds, others Indians, and those from various tribes black. We fought against this ignominy of apartheid, but accepted our oppression was not the same and coined the phrase, “Black in general, and African in particular”.

This phrase originated in South Africa. If this phrase was known on the continent in 1956, today we would be celebrating Sudan being the first African country to gain independence from colonialism.

It is not by accident that the African continental body was named the Organisation of African Unity. The European Union does not mention unity — European countries have been at war many times. In Asia, there is the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.  The Americas have the Organisation of American States. None include unity, except for Africa.

Why?

Because we do not have a problem with white people or those who do not care about Africa or Black people, we have a problem with each other. Africa may be the largest continent on Earth, but we act like there’s not enough space for anyone except those called African.

Many may be irritated by the ANC and their allegiance to non-racialism. However, non-racialism remains the most amazing and radical principle to be developed. It incorporates suppression based on colour or complexion, while factoring in both class and gender oppression.  

Thabo Mbeki’s famous speech, “I Am An African”, helps us to acknowledge that Africa is not composed only of those whom Europeans found here, but time has passed, people have travelled, and the people who pledge allegiance to this continent have also changed.    

I recall an African peer review mechanism heads of state and government meeting in the 2000s in Algeria.  

The host, Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, in his opening address, said (I paraphrase because of memory and translation): “President Abdoulaye Wade, in my culture you are a barbarian. But you are not a barbarian, you are my friend. So I reject my Arab culture when it regards you as a barbarian. But, I am reminded on this continent when I say that I am African, that I am not, I am Arab. So can I be Arab and still be African? I give up that part of my Arabness so I am African, but can I still be Arab and be African?” 

Non-racialism factors in the material conditions that have oppressed people based on their colour and culture. So, yes there’s only one race, the human race, but human beings with power normalised a system of oppression and prejudice where those with darker skin were made to believe they were inferior and those of fairer complexion were automatically superior.  

The radical nature of non-racialism is that it does not truck on hate or envy. It believes in the innate goodness of all human beings. It embraces difference, so that we all are a part of something, so that we reject the divisions imposed on us by those who require anger to remain in charge.

Donovan E Williams is a social commentator.

The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Mail & Guardian.