Black Women, Wigs, Race, Identity, Brandy & Pan-Africanism

(...)

There was Okeoma (*), who came most often and stayed the longest. He looked younger than the other guests, always wore a pair of shorts, and had bushy hair with a parting at the side that stood higher than Master’s. It looked rough and tangled, unlike Master’s, as if Okeoma did not like to comb it. Okeoma drank Fanta. He read his poetry loud on some evenings, holding a sheaf of papers, and Ugwu would look through the kitchen door to see all the guests watching him, their faces half frozen, as if they did not dare breathe. Afterwards, Master would clap and say, in his loud voice, ‘The voice of our generation!’ and the clapping would go on until Okeoma said sharply, ‘That’s enough!’

And there was Miss Adebayo, who drank brandy like Master and was nothing like Ugwu had expected a university woman to be. His aunty had told him a little about university women. She would know because she worked as a cleaner at the Faculty of Sciences during the day and as a waitress at the staff club in the evenings; sometimes, too, the lecturers paid her to come in and clean their homes. She said university women kept framed photos of their student days in Ibadan and Britain and America on their shelves. For breakfast, they had eggs that were not cooked well, so that the yolk danced around, and they wore bouncy, straight-hair wigs and maxi-dresses that grazed their ankles. She told a story once about a couple at a cocktail party in the staff club who climbed out of a nice Peugeot 404, the man in an elegant cream suit, the woman in a green dress. Everybody turned to watch them, walking hand in hand, and then the wind blew the woman’s wig off her head. She was bald. They used hot combs to straighten their hair, his aunty had said, because they wanted to look like white people, although the combs ended up burning their hair off.

(…)

One Saturday night, Okeoma dropped a glass and Ugwu came in to clean up the shards that lay on the floor. He took his time cleaning. The conversation was clearer from here and it was easier to make out what Professor Ezeka said. It was almost impossible to hear the man from the kitchen.
‘We should have a bigger pan-African response to what is happening in the American South really –‘ Professor Ezeka said.
Master cut him short. ‘You know, pan-Africanism is fundamentally a European notion.’
‘You are digressing,’ Professor Ezeka said, and shook his head in his usual superior manner.
‘Maybe it is a European notion,’ Miss Adebayo said, ‘but in the bigger picture, we are all one race.’
‘What bigger picture?’ Master asked. ‘The bigger picture of the white man! Can’t you see that we are not all alike except to white eyes?’ Master’s voice rose easily, Ugwu had noticed, and by his third glass of brandy, he would start to gesture with his glass, leaning forwards until he was seated on the very edge of his armchair. Late at night, after Master was in bed, Ugwu would sit on the same chair and imagine himself speaking swift English, talking to rapt imaginary guests, using words like decolonize and pan-African, moulding his voice after Master’s, and he would shift and shift until he too was on the edge of the chair.
‘Of course we are all alike, we all have white oppression in common,’ Miss Adebayo said dryly. ‘Pan-Africanism is simply the most sensible response.’
‘Of course, of course, but my point is that the only authentic identity for the African is the tribe,’ Master said. ‘I am Nigerian because a white man created Nigeria and gave me that identity. I am black because the white man constructed black to be different as possible from his white. But I was Igbo before the white man came.’
Professor Ezeka snorted and shook his head, thin legs crossed. ‘But you became aware that you were Igbo because of the white man. The pan-Igbo idea itself came only in the face of white domination. You must see that tribe as it is today is as colonial a product as nation and race.’ Professor Ezeka recrossed his legs.
‘The pan-Igbo idea existed long before the white man!’ Master shouted. ‘Go and ask the elders in your village about your history.’


(*) The character Okeoma is based on the life and poetry of acclaimed Igbo poet Christopher Okigbo.


[Excerpts from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Half of a Yellow Sun]


Related Posts:


A Minha Patria...

Dear Prince William...

Olhares ao Espelho

A Irresponsabilidade do Vazio

Kada Um E' Kumo Kada Kual...

O Novo B.I.



"Other References":

"Os Falsaportes"

(...)

There was Okeoma (*), who came most often and stayed the longest. He looked younger than the other guests, always wore a pair of shorts, and had bushy hair with a parting at the side that stood higher than Master’s. It looked rough and tangled, unlike Master’s, as if Okeoma did not like to comb it. Okeoma drank Fanta. He read his poetry loud on some evenings, holding a sheaf of papers, and Ugwu would look through the kitchen door to see all the guests watching him, their faces half frozen, as if they did not dare breathe. Afterwards, Master would clap and say, in his loud voice, ‘The voice of our generation!’ and the clapping would go on until Okeoma said sharply, ‘That’s enough!’

And there was Miss Adebayo, who drank brandy like Master and was nothing like Ugwu had expected a university woman to be. His aunty had told him a little about university women. She would know because she worked as a cleaner at the Faculty of Sciences during the day and as a waitress at the staff club in the evenings; sometimes, too, the lecturers paid her to come in and clean their homes. She said university women kept framed photos of their student days in Ibadan and Britain and America on their shelves. For breakfast, they had eggs that were not cooked well, so that the yolk danced around, and they wore bouncy, straight-hair wigs and maxi-dresses that grazed their ankles. She told a story once about a couple at a cocktail party in the staff club who climbed out of a nice Peugeot 404, the man in an elegant cream suit, the woman in a green dress. Everybody turned to watch them, walking hand in hand, and then the wind blew the woman’s wig off her head. She was bald. They used hot combs to straighten their hair, his aunty had said, because they wanted to look like white people, although the combs ended up burning their hair off.

(…)

One Saturday night, Okeoma dropped a glass and Ugwu came in to clean up the shards that lay on the floor. He took his time cleaning. The conversation was clearer from here and it was easier to make out what Professor Ezeka said. It was almost impossible to hear the man from the kitchen.
‘We should have a bigger pan-African response to what is happening in the American South really –‘ Professor Ezeka said.
Master cut him short. ‘You know, pan-Africanism is fundamentally a European notion.’
‘You are digressing,’ Professor Ezeka said, and shook his head in his usual superior manner.
‘Maybe it is a European notion,’ Miss Adebayo said, ‘but in the bigger picture, we are all one race.’
‘What bigger picture?’ Master asked. ‘The bigger picture of the white man! Can’t you see that we are not all alike except to white eyes?’ Master’s voice rose easily, Ugwu had noticed, and by his third glass of brandy, he would start to gesture with his glass, leaning forwards until he was seated on the very edge of his armchair. Late at night, after Master was in bed, Ugwu would sit on the same chair and imagine himself speaking swift English, talking to rapt imaginary guests, using words like decolonize and pan-African, moulding his voice after Master’s, and he would shift and shift until he too was on the edge of the chair.
‘Of course we are all alike, we all have white oppression in common,’ Miss Adebayo said dryly. ‘Pan-Africanism is simply the most sensible response.’
‘Of course, of course, but my point is that the only authentic identity for the African is the tribe,’ Master said. ‘I am Nigerian because a white man created Nigeria and gave me that identity. I am black because the white man constructed black to be different as possible from his white. But I was Igbo before the white man came.’
Professor Ezeka snorted and shook his head, thin legs crossed. ‘But you became aware that you were Igbo because of the white man. The pan-Igbo idea itself came only in the face of white domination. You must see that tribe as it is today is as colonial a product as nation and race.’ Professor Ezeka recrossed his legs.
‘The pan-Igbo idea existed long before the white man!’ Master shouted. ‘Go and ask the elders in your village about your history.’


(*) The character Okeoma is based on the life and poetry of acclaimed Igbo poet Christopher Okigbo.


[Excerpts from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Half of a Yellow Sun]


Related Posts:


A Minha Patria...

Dear Prince William...

Olhares ao Espelho

A Irresponsabilidade do Vazio

Kada Um E' Kumo Kada Kual...

O Novo B.I.



"Other References":

"Os Falsaportes"

Thirst for African Oil

[Details here]

[Details here]

1960-2010: "The Year of Afrika" 50 Years on (XXI)

This Day in 1960:

The evolution of Nigeria from about 1849 until it attained independence in 1960 is largely the story of the transformational impact of the British on the peoples and cultures of the Niger-Benue area. The colonial authorities sought to define, protect and realise their imperial interest in this portion of West Africa in the hundred or so years between 1862 and 1960. The British were in the Niger-Benue area to pursue their interests, which were largely economic and strategic. In the process of seeking to realise those interests, there were many unplanned-for by-products, one of which was the socio-political aggregation which is known today in international law as the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

The first critical step in this uncertain path was taken in 1849 when, as part of an effort to 'sanitise' the Bights of Benin and Biafra, which were notorious for the slave trade, the British created a consulate for the two Bights. From here, one thing led to another for the British, especially to deeper involvement in the political and economic life of the city states of the Bights and to rivalry with the French who also began showing imperial ambitions in the area.

The result, in time, was that the British converted the coastal consulate and its immediate hinterland into the Oil Rivers Protectorate in 1885, which, in 1893, transformed into the Niger Coast Protectorate. The apparently irreversible logic of this development led to deeper and closer involvement in the administration of the peoples and societies of this segment of Nigeria which, by the middle of the twentieth century, came to be known as Eastern Nigeria.

The second step, along the same path, was taken about 1862 when the British annexed the Lagos Lagoon area and its immediate environs and converted same into a crown colony. According to the British, they did this in order to be better able to abolish the slave trade which used that area as export point. According to Nigerian historians, on the other hand, they did so to be better able to protect their interest in the vital trade route that ran from Lagos, through Ikorodu, lbadan and similar communities, to the Niger waterway in the north and beyond into Hausaland. Be that as it may, by 1897, British influence and power had overflowed the frontiers of Lagos and affected all of Yorubaland which was subsequently attached to Lagos as a Protectorate. The political and administrative unit which came to be known as Western Nigeria in the 1950s came as the end of this second step.

The third and final step in this uncharted path came in 1888. The British administered political 'baptism' on Grenye Goldie's National African Company which had successfully squeezed out rivals, British and non-British, from the trade in the lower Niger, following a trade war of almost unprecedented ferocity. As a result of the 'baptism', Goldie's company became the Royal Niger Company, chartered and limited. It also acquired political and administrative powers over a narrow belt of territory on both sides of the river from the sea to Lokoj'a, as well as over the vast area which, in the 20th century, came to be known as Northern Nigeria.

Between 1951 and 1954, two important constitutional conferences were held in London and Lagos between Nigerian political leaders and the British government. These resulted in a new 1954 Federal Constitution whose main features were: the separation of Lagos, the nation's capital, from the Western Region; the establishment of a Federal Government for Nigeria comprising three regions, namely, North, West and East with a Governor- General at the centre and three Regional Governors; the introduction of an exclusive Federal Legislative List as well as a Concurrent List of responsibilities for both the Federal and Regional Governments, thus resulting in a strong central government and weak regions; regionalisation of the Judiciary and of the public service through the establishment of Regional Public Service Commissions, in addition to the Federal one.

From the point of view of the evolution of the Nigerian state, the most significant thing about the 1954 Constitution, which remained in force until Independence in 1960, was that the Lugardian principle of centralisation was replaced by the formula of decentralisation as a matter of policy in the administration of the Nigerian state. Another significant aspect of that Constitution, which was to cast a long shadow on the development of independent Nigeria, was that the federation it established was unique since one region, the North, was larger than the other two regions, East and West, combined. Thus, at Independence in 1960, the main features of the Nigerian state that had evolved since 1900 were: weak constitutional and institutional basis for development politics; an unbalanced federation; regionalism which engendered mutual jealously and fear; and regionally-based political constituencies.

Indeed, the Nigerian colonial state was perceived by Nigerians, especially the emerging political elite, as an illegitimate foreign system operated according to unfamiliar rules and norms which could not function to promote a sense of common national identity among the diverse ethnic groups or even the three Regions that then made up the country. These legacies of colonialism have remained the bedrock of the many problems of nation building in Nigeria since 1960.

[Partly sourced from here]

This Day in 2010:

At least eight people have been killed in explosions in Nigeria's capital, Abuja, marring celebrations to mark 50 years since independence from the UK. Police have confirmed that two blasts outside the justice ministry were caused by car bombs.
Earlier, the militant group Mend (Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta) had threatened to target the festivities.

Nigeria is a major oil producer, yet most of the population live in poverty.
The bombs went off not far from Eagle Square, where the Nigerian elite had gathered for the official celebrations, but no-one was hurt. President Goodluck Jonathan, who was inspecting a guard of honour at the time, called it a "wicked act of desperation by criminals and murderers". Mend, a militant group in the oil-rich south, issued a threat on Friday morning saying it intended to bomb the event. In the message, the group which is demanding a fairer distribution of the country's oil revenues, said there was "nothing worth celebrating after 50 years of failure".

[here]

Nigeria at 50: what is there to celebrate?

Nigerian blogger Adeola Aderounmu says the country’s democracy is in a shambles and the N17bn for the independence celebrations is money ill-spent.

Nigeria is 50 years old on 1 October 2010. This time in our history does not call for any celebrations. Nigeria used to be the giant and pride of Africa, but that was back in the day. Today, Nigeria’s economy and politics portray sad pictures. The educational system is so bad that Nigerian students are now trooping to Ghana for tutorship. Those who have looted, stole and destroyed the country have sent their children and family members abroad for education and comfort. Nigerians who have genuinely attained economic self-sufficiency also tend to prefer to obtain an education abroad.

It is not only the educational system in Nigeria that has suffered. Almost every aspect of our lives in Nigeria has suffered tremendous setback in such a way that the overall quality of life for the ordinary Nigerian is below an acceptable level for a human. In the Niger Delta, where most of Nigeria's revenues are generated, life is far from being a beauty to behold. National and international conspiracies have transformed the rich oil fields into killing fields and a valley of death and despair.

[here]

This Day in 1960:

The evolution of Nigeria from about 1849 until it attained independence in 1960 is largely the story of the transformational impact of the British on the peoples and cultures of the Niger-Benue area. The colonial authorities sought to define, protect and realise their imperial interest in this portion of West Africa in the hundred or so years between 1862 and 1960. The British were in the Niger-Benue area to pursue their interests, which were largely economic and strategic. In the process of seeking to realise those interests, there were many unplanned-for by-products, one of which was the socio-political aggregation which is known today in international law as the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

The first critical step in this uncertain path was taken in 1849 when, as part of an effort to 'sanitise' the Bights of Benin and Biafra, which were notorious for the slave trade, the British created a consulate for the two Bights. From here, one thing led to another for the British, especially to deeper involvement in the political and economic life of the city states of the Bights and to rivalry with the French who also began showing imperial ambitions in the area.

The result, in time, was that the British converted the coastal consulate and its immediate hinterland into the Oil Rivers Protectorate in 1885, which, in 1893, transformed into the Niger Coast Protectorate. The apparently irreversible logic of this development led to deeper and closer involvement in the administration of the peoples and societies of this segment of Nigeria which, by the middle of the twentieth century, came to be known as Eastern Nigeria.

The second step, along the same path, was taken about 1862 when the British annexed the Lagos Lagoon area and its immediate environs and converted same into a crown colony. According to the British, they did this in order to be better able to abolish the slave trade which used that area as export point. According to Nigerian historians, on the other hand, they did so to be better able to protect their interest in the vital trade route that ran from Lagos, through Ikorodu, lbadan and similar communities, to the Niger waterway in the north and beyond into Hausaland. Be that as it may, by 1897, British influence and power had overflowed the frontiers of Lagos and affected all of Yorubaland which was subsequently attached to Lagos as a Protectorate. The political and administrative unit which came to be known as Western Nigeria in the 1950s came as the end of this second step.

The third and final step in this uncharted path came in 1888. The British administered political 'baptism' on Grenye Goldie's National African Company which had successfully squeezed out rivals, British and non-British, from the trade in the lower Niger, following a trade war of almost unprecedented ferocity. As a result of the 'baptism', Goldie's company became the Royal Niger Company, chartered and limited. It also acquired political and administrative powers over a narrow belt of territory on both sides of the river from the sea to Lokoj'a, as well as over the vast area which, in the 20th century, came to be known as Northern Nigeria.

Between 1951 and 1954, two important constitutional conferences were held in London and Lagos between Nigerian political leaders and the British government. These resulted in a new 1954 Federal Constitution whose main features were: the separation of Lagos, the nation's capital, from the Western Region; the establishment of a Federal Government for Nigeria comprising three regions, namely, North, West and East with a Governor- General at the centre and three Regional Governors; the introduction of an exclusive Federal Legislative List as well as a Concurrent List of responsibilities for both the Federal and Regional Governments, thus resulting in a strong central government and weak regions; regionalisation of the Judiciary and of the public service through the establishment of Regional Public Service Commissions, in addition to the Federal one.

From the point of view of the evolution of the Nigerian state, the most significant thing about the 1954 Constitution, which remained in force until Independence in 1960, was that the Lugardian principle of centralisation was replaced by the formula of decentralisation as a matter of policy in the administration of the Nigerian state. Another significant aspect of that Constitution, which was to cast a long shadow on the development of independent Nigeria, was that the federation it established was unique since one region, the North, was larger than the other two regions, East and West, combined. Thus, at Independence in 1960, the main features of the Nigerian state that had evolved since 1900 were: weak constitutional and institutional basis for development politics; an unbalanced federation; regionalism which engendered mutual jealously and fear; and regionally-based political constituencies.

Indeed, the Nigerian colonial state was perceived by Nigerians, especially the emerging political elite, as an illegitimate foreign system operated according to unfamiliar rules and norms which could not function to promote a sense of common national identity among the diverse ethnic groups or even the three Regions that then made up the country. These legacies of colonialism have remained the bedrock of the many problems of nation building in Nigeria since 1960.

[Partly sourced from here]

This Day in 2010:

At least eight people have been killed in explosions in Nigeria's capital, Abuja, marring celebrations to mark 50 years since independence from the UK. Police have confirmed that two blasts outside the justice ministry were caused by car bombs.
Earlier, the militant group Mend (Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta) had threatened to target the festivities.

Nigeria is a major oil producer, yet most of the population live in poverty.
The bombs went off not far from Eagle Square, where the Nigerian elite had gathered for the official celebrations, but no-one was hurt. President Goodluck Jonathan, who was inspecting a guard of honour at the time, called it a "wicked act of desperation by criminals and murderers". Mend, a militant group in the oil-rich south, issued a threat on Friday morning saying it intended to bomb the event. In the message, the group which is demanding a fairer distribution of the country's oil revenues, said there was "nothing worth celebrating after 50 years of failure".

[here]

Nigeria at 50: what is there to celebrate?

Nigerian blogger Adeola Aderounmu says the country’s democracy is in a shambles and the N17bn for the independence celebrations is money ill-spent.

Nigeria is 50 years old on 1 October 2010. This time in our history does not call for any celebrations. Nigeria used to be the giant and pride of Africa, but that was back in the day. Today, Nigeria’s economy and politics portray sad pictures. The educational system is so bad that Nigerian students are now trooping to Ghana for tutorship. Those who have looted, stole and destroyed the country have sent their children and family members abroad for education and comfort. Nigerians who have genuinely attained economic self-sufficiency also tend to prefer to obtain an education abroad.

It is not only the educational system in Nigeria that has suffered. Almost every aspect of our lives in Nigeria has suffered tremendous setback in such a way that the overall quality of life for the ordinary Nigerian is below an acceptable level for a human. In the Niger Delta, where most of Nigeria's revenues are generated, life is far from being a beauty to behold. National and international conspiracies have transformed the rich oil fields into killing fields and a valley of death and despair.

[here]

Promoting Democratic Management of Africa’s Oil Wealth

Lessons from Angola, São Tomé e Príncipe, and Nigeria


This meeting disseminated lessons from “Promoting Democratic Management of Africa’s Oil Wealth” - a regional project that addressed oil revenue transparency and accountability in several countries in sub-Saharan Africa.
The project’s goal was to inform international public debate on the extractives industry – primarily oil revenue management in Africa and to help citizens gain an understanding of the amount and use of oil revenues so that they can hold their own governments accountable. The meeting aimed to increase regional understanding of challenges in oil revenue management and transparency.

[...]

Padre Belmiro Chissengueti described the work that his organisation, the Episcopal Commission for Justice and Peace (CEJP) was undertaking in Angola, particularly its role in building the capacity of civil society as part of an Economic Justice Programme through research into oil, diamonds, public expenses, information sharing and networking. More research needs to be undertaken by Angolans themselves rather than by foreigners. Collaboration with Partnership Africa Canada and the International Budget Partnership were instrumental in this. CEJP’s work on transparency echoed that of previous speakers, finding that there had been some improvement in transparency of the oil sector and more openess by oil companies. However he pointed out that in Luanda the space for debate is far greater than in most of the rest of the country. The main reccomendations were that access and desaggregation of data needed to improve, and that there are changes to the legal framework required to promote the fuller disclosure of information.

[Full Summary Report Here]

Lessons from Angola, São Tomé e Príncipe, and Nigeria


This meeting disseminated lessons from “Promoting Democratic Management of Africa’s Oil Wealth” - a regional project that addressed oil revenue transparency and accountability in several countries in sub-Saharan Africa.
The project’s goal was to inform international public debate on the extractives industry – primarily oil revenue management in Africa and to help citizens gain an understanding of the amount and use of oil revenues so that they can hold their own governments accountable. The meeting aimed to increase regional understanding of challenges in oil revenue management and transparency.

[...]

Padre Belmiro Chissengueti described the work that his organisation, the Episcopal Commission for Justice and Peace (CEJP) was undertaking in Angola, particularly its role in building the capacity of civil society as part of an Economic Justice Programme through research into oil, diamonds, public expenses, information sharing and networking. More research needs to be undertaken by Angolans themselves rather than by foreigners. Collaboration with Partnership Africa Canada and the International Budget Partnership were instrumental in this. CEJP’s work on transparency echoed that of previous speakers, finding that there had been some improvement in transparency of the oil sector and more openess by oil companies. However he pointed out that in Luanda the space for debate is far greater than in most of the rest of the country. The main reccomendations were that access and desaggregation of data needed to improve, and that there are changes to the legal framework required to promote the fuller disclosure of information.

[Full Summary Report Here]

JOS, NIGERIA: ANOTHER SENSELESS TRAGEDY

[Background and details here and here]

[Background and details here and here]

CHIMAMANDA NGOZI ADICHIE: FIRST AFRICAN ORANGE PRIZE WINNER

The winner of the Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction 2007, one of the most prestigious literary awards in the UK, was just announced: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Nigerian, born in 1977, for her second novel “Half of a Yellow Sun” (Fourth Estate). The 29 year old became the first African and the youngest ever winner of this prize. She won over a shortlist of finalists from five countries, including American Pulitzer winner Anne Tyler, Indian Booker Prize winner Kiran Desai, Chinese Xiaolu Guo and the British Jane Harris and Rachel Cusk.

During the awards ceremony in London, at the ballroom of the newly refurbished Royal Festival Hall, the 2007 Chair of Judges, Muriel Gray, presented the author with the GBP30,000 prize and the 'Bessie', a limited edition bronze figurine, having said: "The judges and I were hugely impressed by the power, ambition and skill of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's novel. It's astonishing, not just in the skillful subject matter, but in the brilliance of its accessibility. This is a moving and important book by an incredibly exciting author."

“Half of a Yellow Sun”, set in the 1960s during the Nigeria-Biafra war, is described as a novel about Africa, about moral responsibility, the end of colonialism, ethnic allegiances, class and race and about how love can complicate all these things. Chimamanda’s first novel, Purple Hibiscus, was shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction in 2004 and the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize, longlisted for the Man Booker Prize and won the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award for debut fiction.

In her first interview to the BBC after receiving the prize, Chimamanda expressed her obvious joy for this achievement, saying that she wasn't particularly proud for being the youngest, but for being the first African to win the prize. Asked about her views on the understanding of Africa by the main protagonists of G-8 meetings (currently taking place in Germany), from Bush to Bono, in relation to the subject of her book, she said "I don't see the problem as one of how much Africa is understood, but how Africa is approached... not as a hopeless continent with people only waiting for aid and things to be done for them."

The Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction was set up in 1996 to celebrate and promote fiction written by women throughout the world to the widest range of readers possible. The prize is awarded to the best novel of the year written in English by a woman. Previous winners of this prize are Zadie Smith for On Beauty (2006), Lionel Shriver for We Need to Talk About Kevin (2005), Andrea Levy for Small Island (2004), Valerie Martin for Property (2003), Ann Patchett for Bel Canto (2002), Kate Grenville for The Idea of Perfection (2001), Linda Grant for When I Lived in Modern Times (2000), Suzanne Berne for A Crime in the Neighbourhood (1999), Carol Shields for Larry's Party (1998), Anne Michaels for Fugitive Pieces (1997), and Helen Dunmore for A Spell of Winter (1996).

ADENDA: Meanwhile, Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe won the Man International Booker Prize Award 2007. (Read more about it here)

(Pictures by Getty Images/AFP and Orange)

The winner of the Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction 2007, one of the most prestigious literary awards in the UK, was just announced: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Nigerian, born in 1977, for her second novel “Half of a Yellow Sun” (Fourth Estate). The 29 year old became the first African and the youngest ever winner of this prize. She won over a shortlist of finalists from five countries, including American Pulitzer winner Anne Tyler, Indian Booker Prize winner Kiran Desai, Chinese Xiaolu Guo and the British Jane Harris and Rachel Cusk.

During the awards ceremony in London, at the ballroom of the newly refurbished Royal Festival Hall, the 2007 Chair of Judges, Muriel Gray, presented the author with the GBP30,000 prize and the 'Bessie', a limited edition bronze figurine, having said: "The judges and I were hugely impressed by the power, ambition and skill of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's novel. It's astonishing, not just in the skillful subject matter, but in the brilliance of its accessibility. This is a moving and important book by an incredibly exciting author."

“Half of a Yellow Sun”, set in the 1960s during the Nigeria-Biafra war, is described as a novel about Africa, about moral responsibility, the end of colonialism, ethnic allegiances, class and race and about how love can complicate all these things. Chimamanda’s first novel, Purple Hibiscus, was shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction in 2004 and the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize, longlisted for the Man Booker Prize and won the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award for debut fiction.

In her first interview to the BBC after receiving the prize, Chimamanda expressed her obvious joy for this achievement, saying that she wasn't particularly proud for being the youngest, but for being the first African to win the prize. Asked about her views on the understanding of Africa by the main protagonists of G-8 meetings (currently taking place in Germany), from Bush to Bono, in relation to the subject of her book, she said "I don't see the problem as one of how much Africa is understood, but how Africa is approached... not as a hopeless continent with people only waiting for aid and things to be done for them."

The Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction was set up in 1996 to celebrate and promote fiction written by women throughout the world to the widest range of readers possible. The prize is awarded to the best novel of the year written in English by a woman. Previous winners of this prize are Zadie Smith for On Beauty (2006), Lionel Shriver for We Need to Talk About Kevin (2005), Andrea Levy for Small Island (2004), Valerie Martin for Property (2003), Ann Patchett for Bel Canto (2002), Kate Grenville for The Idea of Perfection (2001), Linda Grant for When I Lived in Modern Times (2000), Suzanne Berne for A Crime in the Neighbourhood (1999), Carol Shields for Larry's Party (1998), Anne Michaels for Fugitive Pieces (1997), and Helen Dunmore for A Spell of Winter (1996).

ADENDA: Meanwhile, Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe won the Man International Booker Prize Award 2007. (Read more about it here)

(Pictures by Getty Images/AFP and Orange)

WHAT'S IN A NAME - II

I guess certain things are to be expected in the 'blogosphere', as in normal life, but perhaps it won't go amiss to repeat:

"It is not what you call me, but what I answer to, that matters most"

African Proverb

(in "Capitalist Nigger - The Road to Success", by Chika Onyeani)

Picture: Kongo Mask

I guess certain things are to be expected in the 'blogosphere', as in normal life, but perhaps it won't go amiss to repeat:

"It is not what you call me, but what I answer to, that matters most"

African Proverb

(in "Capitalist Nigger - The Road to Success", by Chika Onyeani)

Picture: Kongo Mask

ANGOLA, PETROLEO E ECONOMIA POS-CONFLITO: QUE FAZER?

Prometi aqui ha tempos publicar aqui o artigo "Angola, Petroleo e Economia Pos-Conflito: Que Fazer", que escrevi em meados do ano passado e que foi inicialmente publicado no Semanario Angolense, tendo posteriormente sido reproduzido na revista Figuras e Negocios e re-publicado, numa nova versao, na Antologia de 2007 do Conselho Noruegues para Africa.
Um recente comentario, bastante bem elaborado devo dizer, de um visitante Anonimo deste blog sugeriu-me que talvez seja esta a altura mais oportuna para cumprir o prometido. O comentario, inicialmente feito aqui, e' o que se segue:


"Anonymous said...

Bato, Koluki: Obrigada pelos comentarios positivos.

E estimulante trocar este tipo de ideais, ver a vossa motivacao, os bonitos exemplos dados. No fundo quem sabe o desejo de mudanca esteja tambem a flor da pele de pessoas com que nao contamos. Os do poder?!

Como disse a mudanca para melhor e trabalho de todos e manter as coisas melhoradas sera tambem trabalho de todos, e sera um trabalho permanente.

Mudanca da Noite para o Dia. Como consegui-la?
Existe um individuo em Angola com o poder para fazer o seguinte:

1) Contractar um grupo de conselheiros e elaborar e executar um plano de desenvolvimento economico para a capital e as provincias. Incluindo construcao de hospitais, escolas, universidades, centros tecnicos e de investigacao, habitacoes, criar um sistema de financiamento e treino para pequenos investidores Angolanos, construcao e manutencao de museus, centros de recriacao, construcao de estradas e de auto-estradas, criar centros agro-pecuarios, construcao e manutencao de barragens para abastecimento electrico etc, etc.

2) Estabelecer tabelas salariais que permitam aos Angolanos viverem dos seus salarios com dignidade (incluindo todos desde o varredor de rua ao primeiro ministro).

3) Dar preferencia a profissionais e aos trabalhadores Angolanos e em areas em que nao tivermos peritos, procura-los no mercado internacional pagando apenas o necessario/o que o mercado oferece (ate certo ponto o pagamento de balurdios a certos co-operantes estrangeiros preferencialmente aos de raca branca e reflexo de um certo complexo de inferioridade que muitos lideres ainda possuem), treinarmos e incentivarmos Angolanos para obterem conhecimentos nas areas em que carecermos de peritos.

4) Criar e executar um plano para o regresso de Angolanos no exterior em condicoes de dignidade.

5) Promover progamas de educacao social com os objectivos de nos ajudar a superar o trauma do colonialismo, esclarecer a importancia da estabilidade familiar, combate ao alcolismo, prostituicao, sida, etc, etc.Acredito que Angola possua recursos naturais e humanos suficientes para terminar com o ciclo vicioso e comecar o ciclo virtuoso! E existe uma pessoa com poder de iniciar um processo desta natureza tudo o que necessitaria como caracteristicas pessoais seriam a. vontade, b. visao, c. lideranca. Se essa pessoa acordasse um dia com a vontade para o fazer (so precisa de contratar as pessoas certas e de as despedir se depois de lhes ter posto a disposicao os recursos necessarios e ter dado um periodo de tempo razoavel, os resultados nao fossem atingidos).

E claro que a reconstrucao de Angola ira levar anos, mas a beleza a qual eu chamo mudanca DA NOITE PARA O DIA esta exactamente no processo, em si. Koluki, imagine so se voce acordasse amanha e recebesse um convite para fazer parte da equipa de conselheiros economicos. E claro, o trabalho nao seria concluido num dia. Mas a mudanca ocurreria no momento em que comecasse a trabalhar com um objectivo de ajudar a criar uma Nacao digna!

Imaginem acordar pela manha e ouvir na radio em Luanda que o ministerio da construcao com a participacao ira implementar um plano de construcao de habitacoes na areas perifericas de Luanda em que cada familia que enlistasse como aprendizes de pedreiros por um ano cinco jovens por exemplo, tivesse o direito de comprar uma casa a precos acessiveis/com financiamento subsidiado se necessario. Nao so os jovens estariam ocupados a aprender algo de util mas tambem de forma pratica a ajudar a resolver problemas de habitacao.

Imagine comerciais televisivos feitos com as misses Angola de varias idades a anunciarem como e bom e saudavel ser bonita e como pode ser humilhante destruidor do amor proprio servir de objecto sexual(especialmente de homens velhos e feios!). Mostrar comerciais com varios homens com aparencias de elite a morrer de sida. Algo de bem chocante com a dor o estigma, sofrimento que o sida produz. E no final perguntar e isso que voce quer para si?Programas televisivos com estorias de preferencia reais de familias felizes demonstrando como os valores morais lhes ajudam a manter essa felicidade.

Por a Bato como membro do grupo de planeamento dos programas ocupacionais para os jovens.

Acredito, sim que Angola podera mudar Da NOITE PARA O DIA, mas infelizmente nao com o lider que temos a. nao tem a vontade, b. nao tem a visao, c. nao tem a capacidade de lideranca necessaria, para tal!

Tenham um bom dia."

Proponho entao aos meus queridos amigos e amigas que por aqui passam, todos os dias ou so' de vez em quando, que considerem estas propostas em conjunto com o artigo em anexo e digam de sua justica o que acham poderiam ser as melhores, ou apenas possiveis, solucoes para os prubulemas que estamos cum eles...

Os meus agradecimentos antecipados pelos vossos comentarios.

Prometi aqui ha tempos publicar aqui o artigo "Angola, Petroleo e Economia Pos-Conflito: Que Fazer", que escrevi em meados do ano passado e que foi inicialmente publicado no Semanario Angolense, tendo posteriormente sido reproduzido na revista Figuras e Negocios e re-publicado, numa nova versao, na Antologia de 2007 do Conselho Noruegues para Africa.
Um recente comentario, bastante bem elaborado devo dizer, de um visitante Anonimo deste blog sugeriu-me que talvez seja esta a altura mais oportuna para cumprir o prometido. O comentario, inicialmente feito aqui, e' o que se segue:


"Anonymous said...

Bato, Koluki: Obrigada pelos comentarios positivos.

E estimulante trocar este tipo de ideais, ver a vossa motivacao, os bonitos exemplos dados. No fundo quem sabe o desejo de mudanca esteja tambem a flor da pele de pessoas com que nao contamos. Os do poder?!

Como disse a mudanca para melhor e trabalho de todos e manter as coisas melhoradas sera tambem trabalho de todos, e sera um trabalho permanente.

Mudanca da Noite para o Dia. Como consegui-la?
Existe um individuo em Angola com o poder para fazer o seguinte:

1) Contractar um grupo de conselheiros e elaborar e executar um plano de desenvolvimento economico para a capital e as provincias. Incluindo construcao de hospitais, escolas, universidades, centros tecnicos e de investigacao, habitacoes, criar um sistema de financiamento e treino para pequenos investidores Angolanos, construcao e manutencao de museus, centros de recriacao, construcao de estradas e de auto-estradas, criar centros agro-pecuarios, construcao e manutencao de barragens para abastecimento electrico etc, etc.

2) Estabelecer tabelas salariais que permitam aos Angolanos viverem dos seus salarios com dignidade (incluindo todos desde o varredor de rua ao primeiro ministro).

3) Dar preferencia a profissionais e aos trabalhadores Angolanos e em areas em que nao tivermos peritos, procura-los no mercado internacional pagando apenas o necessario/o que o mercado oferece (ate certo ponto o pagamento de balurdios a certos co-operantes estrangeiros preferencialmente aos de raca branca e reflexo de um certo complexo de inferioridade que muitos lideres ainda possuem), treinarmos e incentivarmos Angolanos para obterem conhecimentos nas areas em que carecermos de peritos.

4) Criar e executar um plano para o regresso de Angolanos no exterior em condicoes de dignidade.

5) Promover progamas de educacao social com os objectivos de nos ajudar a superar o trauma do colonialismo, esclarecer a importancia da estabilidade familiar, combate ao alcolismo, prostituicao, sida, etc, etc.Acredito que Angola possua recursos naturais e humanos suficientes para terminar com o ciclo vicioso e comecar o ciclo virtuoso! E existe uma pessoa com poder de iniciar um processo desta natureza tudo o que necessitaria como caracteristicas pessoais seriam a. vontade, b. visao, c. lideranca. Se essa pessoa acordasse um dia com a vontade para o fazer (so precisa de contratar as pessoas certas e de as despedir se depois de lhes ter posto a disposicao os recursos necessarios e ter dado um periodo de tempo razoavel, os resultados nao fossem atingidos).

E claro que a reconstrucao de Angola ira levar anos, mas a beleza a qual eu chamo mudanca DA NOITE PARA O DIA esta exactamente no processo, em si. Koluki, imagine so se voce acordasse amanha e recebesse um convite para fazer parte da equipa de conselheiros economicos. E claro, o trabalho nao seria concluido num dia. Mas a mudanca ocurreria no momento em que comecasse a trabalhar com um objectivo de ajudar a criar uma Nacao digna!

Imaginem acordar pela manha e ouvir na radio em Luanda que o ministerio da construcao com a participacao ira implementar um plano de construcao de habitacoes na areas perifericas de Luanda em que cada familia que enlistasse como aprendizes de pedreiros por um ano cinco jovens por exemplo, tivesse o direito de comprar uma casa a precos acessiveis/com financiamento subsidiado se necessario. Nao so os jovens estariam ocupados a aprender algo de util mas tambem de forma pratica a ajudar a resolver problemas de habitacao.

Imagine comerciais televisivos feitos com as misses Angola de varias idades a anunciarem como e bom e saudavel ser bonita e como pode ser humilhante destruidor do amor proprio servir de objecto sexual(especialmente de homens velhos e feios!). Mostrar comerciais com varios homens com aparencias de elite a morrer de sida. Algo de bem chocante com a dor o estigma, sofrimento que o sida produz. E no final perguntar e isso que voce quer para si?Programas televisivos com estorias de preferencia reais de familias felizes demonstrando como os valores morais lhes ajudam a manter essa felicidade.

Por a Bato como membro do grupo de planeamento dos programas ocupacionais para os jovens.

Acredito, sim que Angola podera mudar Da NOITE PARA O DIA, mas infelizmente nao com o lider que temos a. nao tem a vontade, b. nao tem a visao, c. nao tem a capacidade de lideranca necessaria, para tal!

Tenham um bom dia."

Proponho entao aos meus queridos amigos e amigas que por aqui passam, todos os dias ou so' de vez em quando, que considerem estas propostas em conjunto com o artigo em anexo e digam de sua justica o que acham poderiam ser as melhores, ou apenas possiveis, solucoes para os prubulemas que estamos cum eles...

Os meus agradecimentos antecipados pelos vossos comentarios.

A DETENCAO DE SARAH WYKES EM CABINDA

Para mim, ainda nao estao suficientemente claros os contornos da detencao em Cabinda, no passado domingo, da Dra. Sarah Wykes, investigadora vinculada a Global Witness, sob acusacao de espionagem, ou das circunstancias e condicoes da sua libertacao, ocorrida ontem.
Dito isso, e sabendo-se que Wykes se encontrava em Cabinda para, segundo a Global Witness , "falar com a sociedade civil, companhias e o governo para avaliar o progresso feito na melhoria da transparencia do dinheiro do sector petrolifero Angolano, que constitui a maior parte do orcamento do governo", parece-me no minimo estranho que ela tenha entrado no pais sem autorizacao do governo para tal. E, se entrou com autorizacao (visto) e conhecimento por parte do governo do programa da sua visita, nao e' compreensivel, nem admissivel, que ela tenha sido detida no exercicio da sua missao, a menos que isso possa ser justificado juridicamente sob o "estatuto especial" de Cabinda. Por isso prefiro aguardar pelas suas proprias declaracoes e, possivelmente, pelo pronunciamento de entidades juridicas internacionais, para emitir qualquer outra opiniao a nao ser, por agora, congratular-me com a sua libertacao, ainda que condicionada, pois continua impedida de sair do territorio nacional.

Entretanto, e notando previamente que a Iniciativa de Transparencia nas Industrias Extractivas (ITIE) nao e' uma iniciativa da Global Witness e que Angola ainda nao e' formalmente membro da ITIE (embora esta afirme na sua website que o sistema de publicacao das contas petroliferas vem melhorando no pais e que o governo Angolano deu o seu acordo a um programa de assistencia tecnica relacionada com a transparencia pelo Banco Mundial e esta' presentemente a considerar a implementacao ou nao da ITIE), tomo esta oportunidade para reproduzir aqui um texto que escrevi, a seu pedido, para um membro de uma ONG Angolana ligada ao sector da Justica Economica, em preparacao para a participacao da sua organizacao nas conferencias internacionais da ITIE, que tiveram lugar durante o ultimo trimestre do ano passado nas cidades de Bona, Alemanha e Oslo, Noruega:

A ITIE e' uma parceria internacional criada em 2003, em Londres, congregando varios paises doadores e implementadores, companhias extractivas, associacoes industriais do sector, instituicoes financeiras internacionais, ONGs internacionais (incluindo a Global Witness) e investidores internacionais. Essa parceria visa aumentar a transparencia dos fluxos de pagamentos das companhias envolvidas nessas industrias aos governos e entidades governamentais, assim como das receitas dos governos provenientes dessas industrias. As industrias extractivas incluem a exploracao de petroleo, gas e outros minerais (diamantes, ouro, cobre, platinium, etc.). Em linhas gerais, a ITIE pretende promover a obtencao de um acordo a nivel do pais aderente que estabeleca provisoes para a publicacao anual pelas companhias extractivas dos seus pagamentos ao governo e dos recebimentos por parte deste. Uma vez obtida a adesao do pais, essa publicacao devera' ser feita a uma terceira parte a ser identificada no seio da ITIE e os dados fornecidos deverao ser compilados e agregados conforme necessario para a producao de um relatorio anual sumarizado referente ao pais, o qual sera’ posto a disposicao do publico em geral para consulta.

As receitas que os governos obteem dessas industrias proveem normalmente de impostos, royalties, bonus e outros pagamentos, mas a falta de transparencia e responsabilizacao sobre esses rendimentos, particularmente em paises quase exclusivamente dependentes dessas industrias como o nosso, faz com que em vez de contribuirem, como deveriam, para o desenvolvimento, levem facilmente a corrupcao e ao exacerbamento da pobreza, quando nao a conflitos militares, tendo-se provado ao longo dos anos a existencia, particularmente em Africa, de uma forte correlacao entre a presenca de vastos recursos naturais num pais e altos niveis de pobreza e propensao para conflitos nesse mesmo pais. Portanto, a primeira vantagem da adesao a ITIE e’ a minimizacao e, idealmente, eliminacao, desses efeitos perversos no processo de desenvolvimento do modus operandi das industrias extractivas e dos governos dos paises nos quais elas operam.

Um outro efeito perverso da corrupcao a volta das industrias extractivas e’ a alta propensao de essa corrupcao se generalizar ao resto do sistema governativo, economico e social do pais, ao ponto de provocar uma descida geral dos indices de desenvolvimento comparativamente a paises que nao possuam tais recursos, fazendo com que potenciais investidores nos sectores nao extractivos prefiram investir nestes ultimos paises em detrimento dos ricos em recursos naturais. Portanto, o aumento da transparencia e da informacao sobre os rendimentos do governo provenientes das industrias extractivas tem o potencial de dar poder aos cidadaos e ‘as instituicoes para responsabilizarem os governantes sobre a aplicacao desses rendimentos. As vantagens sao obvias: torna-se mais dificil para os governantes o desvio de fundos que deveriam ser empregues em programas de desenvolvimento social; o ambiente de negocios torna-se mais atractivo para os investidores nacionais e estrangeiros; as companhias envolvidas a montante e a juzante das industrias extractivas e noutros sectores economicos podem beneficiar de um ambiente de competicao empresarial mais saudavel, justo e honesto e, portanto, de uma maior predictabilidade para os seus investimentos e lucros e, no que toca particularmente ao sector petrolifero, de melhores perspectivas de seguranca energetica para o pais e o resto do mundo.

No entanto, a ITIE nao envolve apenas os parceiros acima citados, mas tambem outras partes publicas e privadas, nomeadamente grupos comunitarios e organizacoes da sociedade civil dos paises produtores, interessadas em contribuir voluntariamente para o desenvolvimento de um quadro institucional nacional que promova a transparencia e a responsabilizacao nas industrias extractivas. Assim, a adesao a ITIE permite promover o entendimento pelos cidadaos das despesas e receitas do estado e, dessa forma, contribuir para o debate publico e a escolha informada das opcoes de desenvolvimento mais apropriadas, sustentaveis e realisticas para o pais. Por exemplo, os processos de elaboracao, discussao, aprovacao e revisao do Orcamento Geral do Estado beneficiariam grandemente de um melhor conhecimento daqueles montantes e seus destinos, permitindo assim um envolvimento mais activo e produtivo dos parlamentares e da sociedade civil nesses processos, bem como o direccionamento efectivo para programas de combate a pobreza dos fundos excedentarios gerados pelos diferenciais entre o preco real do petroleo e as estimativas ex-ante do governo.

Por ultimo, mas nao menos importante, um beneficio absolutamente nao negligenciavel da adesao a ITIE seria a melhoria do ranking do pais nos indices de percepcao de corrupcao da Transparencia Internacional (uma ONG tambem afiliada a ITIE), com base nos quais cada vez mais a reputacao dos paises e’ medida, tanto para efeitos de investimento produtivo ou financeiro, quanto para ajuda internacional, ou mesmo turismo. A adesao a ITIE em muito contribuiria para esse desiderato, porque atraves dela os paises, organizacoes e instituicoes aderentes tambem podem obter assistencia tecnica para melhorarem as suas performances nos varios dominios da gestao e responsabilizacao governativa.

Em anexo, mando-lhe o texto de um discurso proferido, em 2003, pelo Presidente Obasanjo no decimo aniversario da Transparencia Internacional, da qual foi um dos fundadores, que ilustra a trajectoria da Nigeria nesse dominio:

Nigeria: From Pond of Corruption to Island of Integrity

Para mim, ainda nao estao suficientemente claros os contornos da detencao em Cabinda, no passado domingo, da Dra. Sarah Wykes, investigadora vinculada a Global Witness, sob acusacao de espionagem, ou das circunstancias e condicoes da sua libertacao, ocorrida ontem.
Dito isso, e sabendo-se que Wykes se encontrava em Cabinda para, segundo a Global Witness , "falar com a sociedade civil, companhias e o governo para avaliar o progresso feito na melhoria da transparencia do dinheiro do sector petrolifero Angolano, que constitui a maior parte do orcamento do governo", parece-me no minimo estranho que ela tenha entrado no pais sem autorizacao do governo para tal. E, se entrou com autorizacao (visto) e conhecimento por parte do governo do programa da sua visita, nao e' compreensivel, nem admissivel, que ela tenha sido detida no exercicio da sua missao, a menos que isso possa ser justificado juridicamente sob o "estatuto especial" de Cabinda. Por isso prefiro aguardar pelas suas proprias declaracoes e, possivelmente, pelo pronunciamento de entidades juridicas internacionais, para emitir qualquer outra opiniao a nao ser, por agora, congratular-me com a sua libertacao, ainda que condicionada, pois continua impedida de sair do territorio nacional.

Entretanto, e notando previamente que a Iniciativa de Transparencia nas Industrias Extractivas (ITIE) nao e' uma iniciativa da Global Witness e que Angola ainda nao e' formalmente membro da ITIE (embora esta afirme na sua website que o sistema de publicacao das contas petroliferas vem melhorando no pais e que o governo Angolano deu o seu acordo a um programa de assistencia tecnica relacionada com a transparencia pelo Banco Mundial e esta' presentemente a considerar a implementacao ou nao da ITIE), tomo esta oportunidade para reproduzir aqui um texto que escrevi, a seu pedido, para um membro de uma ONG Angolana ligada ao sector da Justica Economica, em preparacao para a participacao da sua organizacao nas conferencias internacionais da ITIE, que tiveram lugar durante o ultimo trimestre do ano passado nas cidades de Bona, Alemanha e Oslo, Noruega:

A ITIE e' uma parceria internacional criada em 2003, em Londres, congregando varios paises doadores e implementadores, companhias extractivas, associacoes industriais do sector, instituicoes financeiras internacionais, ONGs internacionais (incluindo a Global Witness) e investidores internacionais. Essa parceria visa aumentar a transparencia dos fluxos de pagamentos das companhias envolvidas nessas industrias aos governos e entidades governamentais, assim como das receitas dos governos provenientes dessas industrias. As industrias extractivas incluem a exploracao de petroleo, gas e outros minerais (diamantes, ouro, cobre, platinium, etc.). Em linhas gerais, a ITIE pretende promover a obtencao de um acordo a nivel do pais aderente que estabeleca provisoes para a publicacao anual pelas companhias extractivas dos seus pagamentos ao governo e dos recebimentos por parte deste. Uma vez obtida a adesao do pais, essa publicacao devera' ser feita a uma terceira parte a ser identificada no seio da ITIE e os dados fornecidos deverao ser compilados e agregados conforme necessario para a producao de um relatorio anual sumarizado referente ao pais, o qual sera’ posto a disposicao do publico em geral para consulta.

As receitas que os governos obteem dessas industrias proveem normalmente de impostos, royalties, bonus e outros pagamentos, mas a falta de transparencia e responsabilizacao sobre esses rendimentos, particularmente em paises quase exclusivamente dependentes dessas industrias como o nosso, faz com que em vez de contribuirem, como deveriam, para o desenvolvimento, levem facilmente a corrupcao e ao exacerbamento da pobreza, quando nao a conflitos militares, tendo-se provado ao longo dos anos a existencia, particularmente em Africa, de uma forte correlacao entre a presenca de vastos recursos naturais num pais e altos niveis de pobreza e propensao para conflitos nesse mesmo pais. Portanto, a primeira vantagem da adesao a ITIE e’ a minimizacao e, idealmente, eliminacao, desses efeitos perversos no processo de desenvolvimento do modus operandi das industrias extractivas e dos governos dos paises nos quais elas operam.

Um outro efeito perverso da corrupcao a volta das industrias extractivas e’ a alta propensao de essa corrupcao se generalizar ao resto do sistema governativo, economico e social do pais, ao ponto de provocar uma descida geral dos indices de desenvolvimento comparativamente a paises que nao possuam tais recursos, fazendo com que potenciais investidores nos sectores nao extractivos prefiram investir nestes ultimos paises em detrimento dos ricos em recursos naturais. Portanto, o aumento da transparencia e da informacao sobre os rendimentos do governo provenientes das industrias extractivas tem o potencial de dar poder aos cidadaos e ‘as instituicoes para responsabilizarem os governantes sobre a aplicacao desses rendimentos. As vantagens sao obvias: torna-se mais dificil para os governantes o desvio de fundos que deveriam ser empregues em programas de desenvolvimento social; o ambiente de negocios torna-se mais atractivo para os investidores nacionais e estrangeiros; as companhias envolvidas a montante e a juzante das industrias extractivas e noutros sectores economicos podem beneficiar de um ambiente de competicao empresarial mais saudavel, justo e honesto e, portanto, de uma maior predictabilidade para os seus investimentos e lucros e, no que toca particularmente ao sector petrolifero, de melhores perspectivas de seguranca energetica para o pais e o resto do mundo.

No entanto, a ITIE nao envolve apenas os parceiros acima citados, mas tambem outras partes publicas e privadas, nomeadamente grupos comunitarios e organizacoes da sociedade civil dos paises produtores, interessadas em contribuir voluntariamente para o desenvolvimento de um quadro institucional nacional que promova a transparencia e a responsabilizacao nas industrias extractivas. Assim, a adesao a ITIE permite promover o entendimento pelos cidadaos das despesas e receitas do estado e, dessa forma, contribuir para o debate publico e a escolha informada das opcoes de desenvolvimento mais apropriadas, sustentaveis e realisticas para o pais. Por exemplo, os processos de elaboracao, discussao, aprovacao e revisao do Orcamento Geral do Estado beneficiariam grandemente de um melhor conhecimento daqueles montantes e seus destinos, permitindo assim um envolvimento mais activo e produtivo dos parlamentares e da sociedade civil nesses processos, bem como o direccionamento efectivo para programas de combate a pobreza dos fundos excedentarios gerados pelos diferenciais entre o preco real do petroleo e as estimativas ex-ante do governo.

Por ultimo, mas nao menos importante, um beneficio absolutamente nao negligenciavel da adesao a ITIE seria a melhoria do ranking do pais nos indices de percepcao de corrupcao da Transparencia Internacional (uma ONG tambem afiliada a ITIE), com base nos quais cada vez mais a reputacao dos paises e’ medida, tanto para efeitos de investimento produtivo ou financeiro, quanto para ajuda internacional, ou mesmo turismo. A adesao a ITIE em muito contribuiria para esse desiderato, porque atraves dela os paises, organizacoes e instituicoes aderentes tambem podem obter assistencia tecnica para melhorarem as suas performances nos varios dominios da gestao e responsabilizacao governativa.

Em anexo, mando-lhe o texto de um discurso proferido, em 2003, pelo Presidente Obasanjo no decimo aniversario da Transparencia Internacional, da qual foi um dos fundadores, que ilustra a trajectoria da Nigeria nesse dominio:

Nigeria: From Pond of Corruption to Island of Integrity

OIL GAME - THE SCRAMBLE FOR AFRICA'S BLACK GOLD: THE NORWEGIAN COUNCIL FOR AFRICA 2007 ANTHOLOGY

"Oil Game - The Scramble for Africa's Black Gold"

Nao e' todos os dias que se recebe, pelo correio, um livro acompanhado por uma carta do editor com os seguintes dizeres: "Here you have a copy of the Anthology "Oil game - the scramble for Africa's oil". As a contributor and co-author of the book, we hope you are as pleased with the book as we are. With this year's anthology we have managed to collect a good variety of thematic articles on the challenges related to the increased interest in the African oil. Just as important are the up to date country profiles from every single African country, which makes this the only up to date reference work on Africa in Norwegian. (...) Thank you so much for your contribution. With great gratitude and lots of greetings from the Norwegian Council for Africa." Well, the gratitude and greetings are duly and humbly reciprocated and I feel deeply honoured for having been invited to contribute to such a prestigious work. Ja no que toca a estar tao satisfeita com o livro quanto os seus editores, a parte o facto de ter gostado muito da ilustracao do livro a preto e branco (a excepcao da capa e contra-capa), a coisa fica mais complicada porque nao entendo 'patavina' de Noruegues e o livro e' apenas publicado nessa lingua... prometo, no entanto, publicar aqui proximamente o meu artigo, "Angola, Petroleo & Economia Pos-Conflito: Que Fazer?", originalmente escrito em Portugues e publicado numa versao anterior no Semanario Angolense, Luanda, em Junho deste ano (tendo esta ultima versao sido tambem publicada pela revista angolana "Figuras & Negocios"). A carta que recebi esta manha (21/12/06) acompanhando o livro foi antecedida de um convite, em Setembro passado, de onde se destacava o seguinte: " The current 'oil bonanza' in Africa is often described in media under the dichotomy 'Africa’s oil – a curse or blessing'. Our anthology aims to discuss the broad spectre of issues between these two extremes. Through 15-20 articles, we wish to discuss and describe a range of problems, opportunities, countries, issues and cases related to oil in Africa. We will, however, prioritize contributions from Africa, preferring African writers to describe their own continent. Since the oil industry is a very international business where also Norwegian oil companies compete for contracts in Africa, we will also focus on Norway’s relation to the African oil 'adventure'. The anthology will be published this fall as the fifth in our Africa-yearbook series. (...) The Norwegian Council for Africa (NCA) was established in 1967 as the anti-colonial and anti-apartheid umbrella organization in Norway. During the last decade the NCA has evolved into a solidarity organisation for the whole of Africa, using information as our tool to justice and development for the African continent. Our earlier publications include titles such as For a fistful of dollars – trading Africa’s future (2003), Media in Africa – Africa in the media (2002-03), Africans on Africa (2000-01), Debt, Structural Adjustment and Conflicts in Africa (1996-97) and Democracy in Africa (1995). Among the contributors, we can mention: Wangari Maathai, Kofi Annan, Thabo Mbeki, Julius Nyerere, Kenneth Kaunda, Adurey Gatzekpo, Susan George, Samir Amin, Patricia McFadden, Adebayo Olukoshi, Yash Tandon and many others." A Antologia deste ano inclui tambem, a titulo postumo, um artigo do martir Nigeriano de Ogoniland, Delta do Niger, Ken Saro-Wiwa (1941-1995).

Mais detalhes poderao ser encontrados aqui (para quem entende Noruegues...).

"Oil Game - The Scramble for Africa's Black Gold"

Nao e' todos os dias que se recebe, pelo correio, um livro acompanhado por uma carta do editor com os seguintes dizeres: "Here you have a copy of the Anthology "Oil game - the scramble for Africa's oil". As a contributor and co-author of the book, we hope you are as pleased with the book as we are. With this year's anthology we have managed to collect a good variety of thematic articles on the challenges related to the increased interest in the African oil. Just as important are the up to date country profiles from every single African country, which makes this the only up to date reference work on Africa in Norwegian. (...) Thank you so much for your contribution. With great gratitude and lots of greetings from the Norwegian Council for Africa." Well, the gratitude and greetings are duly and humbly reciprocated and I feel deeply honoured for having been invited to contribute to such a prestigious work. Ja no que toca a estar tao satisfeita com o livro quanto os seus editores, a parte o facto de ter gostado muito da ilustracao do livro a preto e branco (a excepcao da capa e contra-capa), a coisa fica mais complicada porque nao entendo 'patavina' de Noruegues e o livro e' apenas publicado nessa lingua... prometo, no entanto, publicar aqui proximamente o meu artigo, "Angola, Petroleo & Economia Pos-Conflito: Que Fazer?", originalmente escrito em Portugues e publicado numa versao anterior no Semanario Angolense, Luanda, em Junho deste ano (tendo esta ultima versao sido tambem publicada pela revista angolana "Figuras & Negocios"). A carta que recebi esta manha (21/12/06) acompanhando o livro foi antecedida de um convite, em Setembro passado, de onde se destacava o seguinte: " The current 'oil bonanza' in Africa is often described in media under the dichotomy 'Africa’s oil – a curse or blessing'. Our anthology aims to discuss the broad spectre of issues between these two extremes. Through 15-20 articles, we wish to discuss and describe a range of problems, opportunities, countries, issues and cases related to oil in Africa. We will, however, prioritize contributions from Africa, preferring African writers to describe their own continent. Since the oil industry is a very international business where also Norwegian oil companies compete for contracts in Africa, we will also focus on Norway’s relation to the African oil 'adventure'. The anthology will be published this fall as the fifth in our Africa-yearbook series. (...) The Norwegian Council for Africa (NCA) was established in 1967 as the anti-colonial and anti-apartheid umbrella organization in Norway. During the last decade the NCA has evolved into a solidarity organisation for the whole of Africa, using information as our tool to justice and development for the African continent. Our earlier publications include titles such as For a fistful of dollars – trading Africa’s future (2003), Media in Africa – Africa in the media (2002-03), Africans on Africa (2000-01), Debt, Structural Adjustment and Conflicts in Africa (1996-97) and Democracy in Africa (1995). Among the contributors, we can mention: Wangari Maathai, Kofi Annan, Thabo Mbeki, Julius Nyerere, Kenneth Kaunda, Adurey Gatzekpo, Susan George, Samir Amin, Patricia McFadden, Adebayo Olukoshi, Yash Tandon and many others." A Antologia deste ano inclui tambem, a titulo postumo, um artigo do martir Nigeriano de Ogoniland, Delta do Niger, Ken Saro-Wiwa (1941-1995).

Mais detalhes poderao ser encontrados aqui (para quem entende Noruegues...).

WHAT'S IN A NAME

"It is not what you call me, but what I answer to, that matters most"

African Proverb

(in "Capitalist Nigger - The Road to Success", by Chika Onyeani)

Picture: Kongo Mask

Here’s something to READ and HANDLE with care:


Extracts from Chika Onyeani’s CAPITALIST NIGGER – THE ROAD TO SUCCESS – A Spider Web Doctrine

FOREWORD

"CAPITALIST NIGGER is a no-holds-barred discussion of the Black Race. It combines a powerful punch because the author believes that there is no better time to openly debate the state of the Black Race than now. The book asserts that the Negroid Race is a non-productive race. “We are a consumer race”, the author insists. “We produce nothing and consume what others produce.” The author scores the bull’s-eye when he lays the blame for the present state of the Black Race on the fact that his people don’t possess what he calls “the killer-instinct of the Caucasian Race” and their lack of “whatever it takes” attitude.

CAPITALIST NIGGER is purely and simply about making money in any way possible; about changing the attitude of the Black Race.
Onyeani’s espousal and advocacy of the “Spider Web Economy” doctrine is bound to revolutionize economic thinking for years to come.

CAPITALIST NIGGER is a book no person other than Chika Onyeani could have written. It is a testimony of his life-long courage. It is an anguished cry to the Black Race to move from being a Consumer Race to a Productive Race. It is compellingly required reading.


INTRODUCTION


POWER OF A WORD


“IT IS NOT WHAT YOU CALL ME, BUT WHAT I ANSWER TO, THAT MATTERS MOST.”
An African Proverb


According to Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, Tenth Edition, the word “Nigger” has now come to rank as “perhaps the most offensive and inflammatory racial slur in English….. it is otherwise a word expressive of racial hatred and bigotry.” Ordinarily, according to the same dictionary, the word itself refers to a black person, having been used by such considered writers like Joseph Conrad, Mark Twain and William Shakespeare. This word has caused all kinds of invectives between Blacks and Caucasians. Caucasians think by calling Blacks (Negro, Blackman, African-American, mulatto) “Niggers”, they are putting them down and putting them “in their place”, which would anger most Blacks. Blacks on their part have always obliged the Caucasians by doing exactly as they have anticipated.

“We are creatures of habit. We like to take advantage of every situation. And Caucasians have been taking advantage of the Black Race in every situation from the enslaving of Africans and plucking them to America to the present time of trying to demean us by the word Nigger. What is really in a word? We make it what we want it to mean. By accepting what others want us to believe a word means, we are invariably giving them the satisfaction of feeling superiority over us. But when we hardly notice such an appellation as meaningless, it not only makes the user of the word totally stupid, it also takes away his feeling of superiority.”


EXTRACT


In October 1960, Nigeria received its independence from Britain. By then, Ghana the former Gold Cost had been independent for three years under the great Osagyefo Kwame Nkrumah. It was a time for celebrating Africa’s coming of age, as more and more African countries received their independence either from Britain or France. It was especially a poignant time for Africa, as then British Prime Minister Harold McMillan articulated his now famous “winds of change” sweeping Africa. We had high hopes for Africa, for the Black race, that the insidious imposition of foreign rule on us, the looting of Africa’s natural resources by our colonial masters and the disrespect and disdain that these colonial masters accorded us would be things of history.

That is more than forty years ago. Unfortunately, the promise of independence has not been fulfilled. Today, Africa has become more desolate; there is more starvation, diseases and non-provision of essential services than when we got our independence. There are all kinds of wars in Africa and millions of lives have been lost. There are more dictators in Africa than the rest of the world put together. The majority of so-called African leaders want to stay in power until the day their bodies are put in the grave. Through buffoonery, utter mismanagement and downright stealing of the wealth of the masses, these leaders have so impoverish Africa that we are now nothing but a beggar continent. We beg for everything; we are more dependent on our colonial masters than when we received our independence from them. Africa owes the West more money than we and our generations to come can repay.
I arrived in America in December of 1967 as an official of what we believed was going to be a dynamic African nation – the young Republic of Biafra. But Biafra was defeated and Nigeria remained one, as a giant of Africa. In that last 32 years, I have watched with horror and outright helplessness as the downward slide of the African race continues to escalate. But rather than address the problems, we resort to blaming the Caucasians, Asians and others for our misfortune. We are not men enough to accept responsibility for our actions.

Africans blame either the British, French or little Portuguese/Spanish for their problems. Africans in America blame the Caucasians for all their problems, or any other ethnic group they have allowed to take over their neighbourhoods, a frequently recurring phenomenon. Africans blame the IMF, the World Bank, the G8, the former colonial masters for the abject poverty in our respective countries. We blame the wars ravaging several African sectors on the interference of our former colonial masters on “our internal affairs”. Ha! – some kind of independence!

In the 32 years I have been in America, I have never had a discussion with any of my brothers or sisters without it resorting to the African (Black)/Caucasian (White) relationship. If we go to a restaurant, we blame the Caucasian or Asian for sitting us at the back, near the kitchen, or too much in the front, because he doesn’t want to antagonise his Caucasian clientele. When we decide to buy a house in a Caucasian neighbourhood, we blame the people for refusing to sell to us because of their belief that we spend more time and money on visible luxurious and ultimately worthless items, than in maintaining our property, which to everyone but us is a major part of their investment and retirement portfolio.

The blame game has become a permanent part of our lives to the exclusion of any other solution that could be more viable in solving our problems. It has become the most productive part of our lives, because without it the African cannot really point to much that they are in charge of producing. It is better to blame others than to confront the truth of our being responsible for whatever has happened to us as an African race.

I decided to write Capitalist Nigger to open a debate on the state of the African race. But in doing so, my intention was not to treat my own contribution to the debate with kid gloves. It is to tell it like it is, the truth and nothing but he truth. My observations are bound to infuriate a lot of my people. Even the title of this book is bound to make a lot of people angry. Many people will be angry, to say it mildly, when I question the intelligence of my people compared to the Asians (Indians, Pakistanis, Malaysians, Filipinos) and others who attained independence at the same time as most African countries. If the book generates the kind of dialogue, debate or argument for or against the position I have taken, so be it. But it would even be more relevant if in the process, solutions are offered to help extricate Africans from being a consumer to a productive race.

I decided to write Capitalist Nigger also as a doctrine of making money and creating wealth. I am not ashamed to say that I am also purely motivated by the same greed that motivates Caucasians with “killer-instincts” and “devil-may-care” convictions. I see myself as an Economic Warrior for my people and not a victim, I have decided to confront the truth of my misfortune and when I see the mirror I see the culprit standing right in front of me – it is me. As the saying goes, truth shall set you free. The Truth in being a Capitalist Nigger is that it sets you free. The Truth in being a Capitalist Nigger is that it sets you free. Being a Capitalist Nigger puts you in control of every aspect of your life – you are in charge and nobody else.

You want your children to have good grades in school? Then practice Capitalist Niggerism because then you will not blame the teachers for failing your children or blame the nationwide testing services for using non-black questions in their testing. You will be in control because you will totally understand that everything that happens to your child at school is a result of the learning environment you have provided him or her at home.

If you want to have a good job, practice Capitalist Niggerism, because you want to beat the people who expect you to fail because they believe you are stupid. You will succeed because you work harder and twice as hard as the average Caucasian. You will not gripe or whine about it because you are a Capitalist Nigger, you know you are in charge in every aspect of the process. Because of your belief in Capitalist Niggerism, you set out to learn about your job and excel and shame everybody else. I remember in the early seventies when I joined Endo/Dupont, the pharmaceutical division. There was not another African in my division and to the amazement of the Regional Managers, I was always the number one winner when it came to sales contests. But the British Divisional Manager who recruited me knew that I could do it because the only question he had asked me at my interview was whether I was Igbo from Nigeria and I had replied in the affirmative.

You want to create wealth, join Wall Street. Don’t make excuses that Blacks don’t know how to invest their money. Go after the Caucasians. Use their guilt to your advantage.

Another important point which I raised in this book concerns the long study I have conducted regarding the economic behaviour of East Indians and Pakistanis. It is an economic doctrine I have christened the “Spider Web Doctrine”, because I believe we all understand how spiders behave. They build a web, and if an ant or fly dares enter the web, they are not allowed to come out. The spider closes its web. That is exactly how the Indians have employed the spider web doctrine to become a major economic force worldwide. The Indians have created a virtual economy in the communities they live. When a dollar comes into the community, that dollar does not leave the community. They reinvest it by buying from other Indians.

Indians have studied the art of being a major economic force in America without antagonising any particular group. You don’t see them in hostile neighbourhoods, where they could be held hostage by the anger of that group. They are mostly in business which caters to every group – newspaper retailing, taxi/limousine, gas station ownership, and motel/hotel operators.

The Jews have used to some extent this “Spider Web Economic” doctrine, but not on the scale of Indians. The Indians are its best ardent practitioners. It is the only and best economic method I have seen which can easily catapult an economy like ours out of its indolent state.

I feel totally liberated. I feel free. I feel I am in charge. I am in control. From here on, whatever happens is because I allowed it to happen. I have made what I believe is my own major contribution to the debate on the state of the Black Race. Whether you agree with me or not is immaterial. The only important point is that we must stop the blame game and accept responsibility for the present state of the Black Race. Truth shall set you free, it has set me free."

***

P.S.: I've decided to include here an extract from my participation in a discussion on the "Negritude Movement", at Black Looks, for its relevance to the main theme of this book:

"First, I think that the answers to all these questions hinge on whether the n-word stands for Negro, or for Nigger. I must say that in my own research I never came across a description of Negritude as “Niggerness” and I suspect this may have a lot to do with the translations of the particular publications we read, or how we ourselves translate the original words written in French by the “founding fathers” of Negritude.In my recollection, they use the words Negre/Noir=Negro as the racial archetype equivalent to Caucasian, hence its acceptability in academia. In this sense, Negro/Noir has no pejorative or “denigrating” connotations: it’s used just like Martin Luther King and Malcolm X, for instance, have used it. In Portuguese, as in French, Negro/Negre/Noir is the acceptable term to refer to the so-called “negroid” race, whereas Preto=Black can have derogatory undertones and can be understood, depending on the context and intention of its use, as the equivalent to “Nigger”,which I believe was invented in the States to have exclusively racist connotations…From there, I found that the Negritude movement’s main claim regarding the “Negro Essence” is that, contrary to (still) prevailing stereotypes, the Negro is not a “lesser” human and by no means “less intelligent” than the Caucasian or any other race, s/he just has a different approach to understanding and conceptualising their surrounding universe. Hence Senghor’s famous phrase, which encapsulates much of the essence of Negritude: “The reason is Hellenic and the emotion is Noir/Negre/Negro”, by which he meant that the Negro rationality was founded on and derived from the human senses and its profound interaction with and dependence on nature, whereas the Caucasian one was primarily based on abstract (from nature) calculation…"

"It is not what you call me, but what I answer to, that matters most"

African Proverb

(in "Capitalist Nigger - The Road to Success", by Chika Onyeani)

Picture: Kongo Mask

Here’s something to READ and HANDLE with care:


Extracts from Chika Onyeani’s CAPITALIST NIGGER – THE ROAD TO SUCCESS – A Spider Web Doctrine

FOREWORD

"CAPITALIST NIGGER is a no-holds-barred discussion of the Black Race. It combines a powerful punch because the author believes that there is no better time to openly debate the state of the Black Race than now. The book asserts that the Negroid Race is a non-productive race. “We are a consumer race”, the author insists. “We produce nothing and consume what others produce.” The author scores the bull’s-eye when he lays the blame for the present state of the Black Race on the fact that his people don’t possess what he calls “the killer-instinct of the Caucasian Race” and their lack of “whatever it takes” attitude.

CAPITALIST NIGGER is purely and simply about making money in any way possible; about changing the attitude of the Black Race.
Onyeani’s espousal and advocacy of the “Spider Web Economy” doctrine is bound to revolutionize economic thinking for years to come.

CAPITALIST NIGGER is a book no person other than Chika Onyeani could have written. It is a testimony of his life-long courage. It is an anguished cry to the Black Race to move from being a Consumer Race to a Productive Race. It is compellingly required reading.


INTRODUCTION


POWER OF A WORD


“IT IS NOT WHAT YOU CALL ME, BUT WHAT I ANSWER TO, THAT MATTERS MOST.”
An African Proverb


According to Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, Tenth Edition, the word “Nigger” has now come to rank as “perhaps the most offensive and inflammatory racial slur in English….. it is otherwise a word expressive of racial hatred and bigotry.” Ordinarily, according to the same dictionary, the word itself refers to a black person, having been used by such considered writers like Joseph Conrad, Mark Twain and William Shakespeare. This word has caused all kinds of invectives between Blacks and Caucasians. Caucasians think by calling Blacks (Negro, Blackman, African-American, mulatto) “Niggers”, they are putting them down and putting them “in their place”, which would anger most Blacks. Blacks on their part have always obliged the Caucasians by doing exactly as they have anticipated.

“We are creatures of habit. We like to take advantage of every situation. And Caucasians have been taking advantage of the Black Race in every situation from the enslaving of Africans and plucking them to America to the present time of trying to demean us by the word Nigger. What is really in a word? We make it what we want it to mean. By accepting what others want us to believe a word means, we are invariably giving them the satisfaction of feeling superiority over us. But when we hardly notice such an appellation as meaningless, it not only makes the user of the word totally stupid, it also takes away his feeling of superiority.”


EXTRACT


In October 1960, Nigeria received its independence from Britain. By then, Ghana the former Gold Cost had been independent for three years under the great Osagyefo Kwame Nkrumah. It was a time for celebrating Africa’s coming of age, as more and more African countries received their independence either from Britain or France. It was especially a poignant time for Africa, as then British Prime Minister Harold McMillan articulated his now famous “winds of change” sweeping Africa. We had high hopes for Africa, for the Black race, that the insidious imposition of foreign rule on us, the looting of Africa’s natural resources by our colonial masters and the disrespect and disdain that these colonial masters accorded us would be things of history.

That is more than forty years ago. Unfortunately, the promise of independence has not been fulfilled. Today, Africa has become more desolate; there is more starvation, diseases and non-provision of essential services than when we got our independence. There are all kinds of wars in Africa and millions of lives have been lost. There are more dictators in Africa than the rest of the world put together. The majority of so-called African leaders want to stay in power until the day their bodies are put in the grave. Through buffoonery, utter mismanagement and downright stealing of the wealth of the masses, these leaders have so impoverish Africa that we are now nothing but a beggar continent. We beg for everything; we are more dependent on our colonial masters than when we received our independence from them. Africa owes the West more money than we and our generations to come can repay.
I arrived in America in December of 1967 as an official of what we believed was going to be a dynamic African nation – the young Republic of Biafra. But Biafra was defeated and Nigeria remained one, as a giant of Africa. In that last 32 years, I have watched with horror and outright helplessness as the downward slide of the African race continues to escalate. But rather than address the problems, we resort to blaming the Caucasians, Asians and others for our misfortune. We are not men enough to accept responsibility for our actions.

Africans blame either the British, French or little Portuguese/Spanish for their problems. Africans in America blame the Caucasians for all their problems, or any other ethnic group they have allowed to take over their neighbourhoods, a frequently recurring phenomenon. Africans blame the IMF, the World Bank, the G8, the former colonial masters for the abject poverty in our respective countries. We blame the wars ravaging several African sectors on the interference of our former colonial masters on “our internal affairs”. Ha! – some kind of independence!

In the 32 years I have been in America, I have never had a discussion with any of my brothers or sisters without it resorting to the African (Black)/Caucasian (White) relationship. If we go to a restaurant, we blame the Caucasian or Asian for sitting us at the back, near the kitchen, or too much in the front, because he doesn’t want to antagonise his Caucasian clientele. When we decide to buy a house in a Caucasian neighbourhood, we blame the people for refusing to sell to us because of their belief that we spend more time and money on visible luxurious and ultimately worthless items, than in maintaining our property, which to everyone but us is a major part of their investment and retirement portfolio.

The blame game has become a permanent part of our lives to the exclusion of any other solution that could be more viable in solving our problems. It has become the most productive part of our lives, because without it the African cannot really point to much that they are in charge of producing. It is better to blame others than to confront the truth of our being responsible for whatever has happened to us as an African race.

I decided to write Capitalist Nigger to open a debate on the state of the African race. But in doing so, my intention was not to treat my own contribution to the debate with kid gloves. It is to tell it like it is, the truth and nothing but he truth. My observations are bound to infuriate a lot of my people. Even the title of this book is bound to make a lot of people angry. Many people will be angry, to say it mildly, when I question the intelligence of my people compared to the Asians (Indians, Pakistanis, Malaysians, Filipinos) and others who attained independence at the same time as most African countries. If the book generates the kind of dialogue, debate or argument for or against the position I have taken, so be it. But it would even be more relevant if in the process, solutions are offered to help extricate Africans from being a consumer to a productive race.

I decided to write Capitalist Nigger also as a doctrine of making money and creating wealth. I am not ashamed to say that I am also purely motivated by the same greed that motivates Caucasians with “killer-instincts” and “devil-may-care” convictions. I see myself as an Economic Warrior for my people and not a victim, I have decided to confront the truth of my misfortune and when I see the mirror I see the culprit standing right in front of me – it is me. As the saying goes, truth shall set you free. The Truth in being a Capitalist Nigger is that it sets you free. The Truth in being a Capitalist Nigger is that it sets you free. Being a Capitalist Nigger puts you in control of every aspect of your life – you are in charge and nobody else.

You want your children to have good grades in school? Then practice Capitalist Niggerism because then you will not blame the teachers for failing your children or blame the nationwide testing services for using non-black questions in their testing. You will be in control because you will totally understand that everything that happens to your child at school is a result of the learning environment you have provided him or her at home.

If you want to have a good job, practice Capitalist Niggerism, because you want to beat the people who expect you to fail because they believe you are stupid. You will succeed because you work harder and twice as hard as the average Caucasian. You will not gripe or whine about it because you are a Capitalist Nigger, you know you are in charge in every aspect of the process. Because of your belief in Capitalist Niggerism, you set out to learn about your job and excel and shame everybody else. I remember in the early seventies when I joined Endo/Dupont, the pharmaceutical division. There was not another African in my division and to the amazement of the Regional Managers, I was always the number one winner when it came to sales contests. But the British Divisional Manager who recruited me knew that I could do it because the only question he had asked me at my interview was whether I was Igbo from Nigeria and I had replied in the affirmative.

You want to create wealth, join Wall Street. Don’t make excuses that Blacks don’t know how to invest their money. Go after the Caucasians. Use their guilt to your advantage.

Another important point which I raised in this book concerns the long study I have conducted regarding the economic behaviour of East Indians and Pakistanis. It is an economic doctrine I have christened the “Spider Web Doctrine”, because I believe we all understand how spiders behave. They build a web, and if an ant or fly dares enter the web, they are not allowed to come out. The spider closes its web. That is exactly how the Indians have employed the spider web doctrine to become a major economic force worldwide. The Indians have created a virtual economy in the communities they live. When a dollar comes into the community, that dollar does not leave the community. They reinvest it by buying from other Indians.

Indians have studied the art of being a major economic force in America without antagonising any particular group. You don’t see them in hostile neighbourhoods, where they could be held hostage by the anger of that group. They are mostly in business which caters to every group – newspaper retailing, taxi/limousine, gas station ownership, and motel/hotel operators.

The Jews have used to some extent this “Spider Web Economic” doctrine, but not on the scale of Indians. The Indians are its best ardent practitioners. It is the only and best economic method I have seen which can easily catapult an economy like ours out of its indolent state.

I feel totally liberated. I feel free. I feel I am in charge. I am in control. From here on, whatever happens is because I allowed it to happen. I have made what I believe is my own major contribution to the debate on the state of the Black Race. Whether you agree with me or not is immaterial. The only important point is that we must stop the blame game and accept responsibility for the present state of the Black Race. Truth shall set you free, it has set me free."

***

P.S.: I've decided to include here an extract from my participation in a discussion on the "Negritude Movement", at Black Looks, for its relevance to the main theme of this book:

"First, I think that the answers to all these questions hinge on whether the n-word stands for Negro, or for Nigger. I must say that in my own research I never came across a description of Negritude as “Niggerness” and I suspect this may have a lot to do with the translations of the particular publications we read, or how we ourselves translate the original words written in French by the “founding fathers” of Negritude.In my recollection, they use the words Negre/Noir=Negro as the racial archetype equivalent to Caucasian, hence its acceptability in academia. In this sense, Negro/Noir has no pejorative or “denigrating” connotations: it’s used just like Martin Luther King and Malcolm X, for instance, have used it. In Portuguese, as in French, Negro/Negre/Noir is the acceptable term to refer to the so-called “negroid” race, whereas Preto=Black can have derogatory undertones and can be understood, depending on the context and intention of its use, as the equivalent to “Nigger”,which I believe was invented in the States to have exclusively racist connotations…From there, I found that the Negritude movement’s main claim regarding the “Negro Essence” is that, contrary to (still) prevailing stereotypes, the Negro is not a “lesser” human and by no means “less intelligent” than the Caucasian or any other race, s/he just has a different approach to understanding and conceptualising their surrounding universe. Hence Senghor’s famous phrase, which encapsulates much of the essence of Negritude: “The reason is Hellenic and the emotion is Noir/Negre/Negro”, by which he meant that the Negro rationality was founded on and derived from the human senses and its profound interaction with and dependence on nature, whereas the Caucasian one was primarily based on abstract (from nature) calculation…"

AFRICA'S SIREN CALL IS IMPOSSIBLE TO RESIST

WHEN EXILES RETURN


By Ken Wiwa





[Ken Wiwa is one of the world's most influential young human rights activists and authors. The son of acclaimed playwright and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa (executed by the government of Nigeria in 1995), his first book, In the Shadow of a Saint, was published in the UK, Holland, US and Canada to critical acclaim.]

PORT HARCOURT, Nigeria - Whenever I return to my family's home on the Atlantic coast of southern Nigeria, I remember the old African saying that we return to old watering holes for more than water; we return because friends and dreams are there to meet us. Our myths and proverbs sustain Africans during winters of exile, but like so much about Africa, the dream of an idyllic homecoming is often the preamble to a rude awakening.

When the writer Ngugi wa Thiong'o returned to Kenya this summer after 22 years of self-imposed exile, his journey took a familiar arc. Acclaimed by thousands on his return, Ngugi declared in the first flush of homecoming that he had "come back with an open mind, an open heart and open arms." Dedicating his return to the collective struggle of the Kenyan people, Ngugi humbly confessed that he had "come to learn." Less than two weeks later Ngugi was robbed by gunmen and his wife was sexually assaulted. It was a bitter lesson but, unfortunately, a very African one.

The idea of returning is a dream that teases and torments many African expatriates. I am still trying to find a line through the complex thread of reasons that compels me to leave my young family behind in Toronto every three months and make the trip to Nigeria, a country that fills me with memories I would rather forget. The simplest line runs through my sense of duty to my family and in particular to my parents, which is strange because my mother lives in Britain and my father died nine years ago.

Actually, "died" is a somewhat inadequate description. My father is Ken Saro-Wiwa, the author who was hanged by the late General Sani Abacha for daring to speak out against official corruption and misrule. But I always return to Nigeria, partly in homage to my father's memory and the sacrifices he made for me.

I also return because, for those whom I have left behind for an easier life in the West, my homecoming provides emotional comfort and financial support. My coming back confirms that I have not forgotten or abandoned them to their fate. Going home is not just about me, it is also about those left behind.

There are many like me - second-generation African émigrés or those who left as children - living in Europe and North America who feel a psychic need to reconnect with the mother continent. It is a strange and cruel paradox that, while many young Africans are desperate to leave the continent, those who have been lucky enough to escape the harsh economic environment of Africa will, at some point, hear the continent calling them back.

Among the generations of Africans who came of age during colonialism, outspoken writers and artists like my father and Ngugi are legion; Jack Mapanje of Malawi, Ahmadou Kourouma of Ivory Coast and Wole Soyinka, the Nigerian winner of the Nobel Prize for literature, are some of the more well known.

Lucky are the ones who live to relate their story and even luckier are those who have been exiled and then are able to return for the ceremony of an African homecoming. But for every Ngugi wa Thiong'o, there are thousands who make the trip alone and unheralded. Mostly the returnees are the old who, like the lions of the Serengeti, make the arduous journey to the place of their birth to die.

Ngugi was hardly an unwary exile, though. He of all expatriated Kenyans will have known that Africa, if we can generalize about the most diverse continent in our universe, is the land of the paradox, a place of astounding generosity and communal spirit with a streak of violence and cruelty. Ngugi has tasted its bitter pill before, in 1977, when he was imprisoned without trial for a year.

In 1982, fearing for his safety, Ngugi escaped into exile. The paradox of Ngugi's physical exile was that here was a writer who, even in his prime in Kenya, insisted that the African mind had been exiled by colonialism. In works like the novel "A Grain of Wheat" and his famous polemic, "Decolonizing the Mind," Ngugi proselytized for African literature in indigenous languages.

Ngugi's devotion to his own language, Gikuyu, speaks to the nostalgia for home - the need to locate the authentic self and free it from foreign influences; it is this lingering need to reconnect with an identity untainted by the complications of a foreign culture that often compels Africans to return. After all, this is what Ngugi said when he and his wife had taken refuge in New York after the attack: "Kenya is my country. and I will come over and over again."

We return even though we know that going home is a journey fraught with complications: the sepia tint of nostalgia is pitched against the dark memories of one's exit, which was often under traumatic circumstances; the euphoric thoughts of homecoming will be punctuated by the guilt of having to face those you might have left behind or neglected. Going home is like re-entry from a parallel universe, an experience that can leave you feeling disorientated and alienated: a native stranger.

The risks for returned exiles are real and self-evident, but we just have to take sensible precautions, pour a libation to the ancestors and pray that we don't fall foul of the laws of diminishing returns. When we have safely negotiated our terms and conditions of re-entry, we can only hope that our friends and dreams will be there to greet us when we stoop to slake our thirst at the water hole.

WHEN EXILES RETURN


By Ken Wiwa





[Ken Wiwa is one of the world's most influential young human rights activists and authors. The son of acclaimed playwright and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa (executed by the government of Nigeria in 1995), his first book, In the Shadow of a Saint, was published in the UK, Holland, US and Canada to critical acclaim.]

PORT HARCOURT, Nigeria - Whenever I return to my family's home on the Atlantic coast of southern Nigeria, I remember the old African saying that we return to old watering holes for more than water; we return because friends and dreams are there to meet us. Our myths and proverbs sustain Africans during winters of exile, but like so much about Africa, the dream of an idyllic homecoming is often the preamble to a rude awakening.

When the writer Ngugi wa Thiong'o returned to Kenya this summer after 22 years of self-imposed exile, his journey took a familiar arc. Acclaimed by thousands on his return, Ngugi declared in the first flush of homecoming that he had "come back with an open mind, an open heart and open arms." Dedicating his return to the collective struggle of the Kenyan people, Ngugi humbly confessed that he had "come to learn." Less than two weeks later Ngugi was robbed by gunmen and his wife was sexually assaulted. It was a bitter lesson but, unfortunately, a very African one.

The idea of returning is a dream that teases and torments many African expatriates. I am still trying to find a line through the complex thread of reasons that compels me to leave my young family behind in Toronto every three months and make the trip to Nigeria, a country that fills me with memories I would rather forget. The simplest line runs through my sense of duty to my family and in particular to my parents, which is strange because my mother lives in Britain and my father died nine years ago.

Actually, "died" is a somewhat inadequate description. My father is Ken Saro-Wiwa, the author who was hanged by the late General Sani Abacha for daring to speak out against official corruption and misrule. But I always return to Nigeria, partly in homage to my father's memory and the sacrifices he made for me.

I also return because, for those whom I have left behind for an easier life in the West, my homecoming provides emotional comfort and financial support. My coming back confirms that I have not forgotten or abandoned them to their fate. Going home is not just about me, it is also about those left behind.

There are many like me - second-generation African émigrés or those who left as children - living in Europe and North America who feel a psychic need to reconnect with the mother continent. It is a strange and cruel paradox that, while many young Africans are desperate to leave the continent, those who have been lucky enough to escape the harsh economic environment of Africa will, at some point, hear the continent calling them back.

Among the generations of Africans who came of age during colonialism, outspoken writers and artists like my father and Ngugi are legion; Jack Mapanje of Malawi, Ahmadou Kourouma of Ivory Coast and Wole Soyinka, the Nigerian winner of the Nobel Prize for literature, are some of the more well known.

Lucky are the ones who live to relate their story and even luckier are those who have been exiled and then are able to return for the ceremony of an African homecoming. But for every Ngugi wa Thiong'o, there are thousands who make the trip alone and unheralded. Mostly the returnees are the old who, like the lions of the Serengeti, make the arduous journey to the place of their birth to die.

Ngugi was hardly an unwary exile, though. He of all expatriated Kenyans will have known that Africa, if we can generalize about the most diverse continent in our universe, is the land of the paradox, a place of astounding generosity and communal spirit with a streak of violence and cruelty. Ngugi has tasted its bitter pill before, in 1977, when he was imprisoned without trial for a year.

In 1982, fearing for his safety, Ngugi escaped into exile. The paradox of Ngugi's physical exile was that here was a writer who, even in his prime in Kenya, insisted that the African mind had been exiled by colonialism. In works like the novel "A Grain of Wheat" and his famous polemic, "Decolonizing the Mind," Ngugi proselytized for African literature in indigenous languages.

Ngugi's devotion to his own language, Gikuyu, speaks to the nostalgia for home - the need to locate the authentic self and free it from foreign influences; it is this lingering need to reconnect with an identity untainted by the complications of a foreign culture that often compels Africans to return. After all, this is what Ngugi said when he and his wife had taken refuge in New York after the attack: "Kenya is my country. and I will come over and over again."

We return even though we know that going home is a journey fraught with complications: the sepia tint of nostalgia is pitched against the dark memories of one's exit, which was often under traumatic circumstances; the euphoric thoughts of homecoming will be punctuated by the guilt of having to face those you might have left behind or neglected. Going home is like re-entry from a parallel universe, an experience that can leave you feeling disorientated and alienated: a native stranger.

The risks for returned exiles are real and self-evident, but we just have to take sensible precautions, pour a libation to the ancestors and pray that we don't fall foul of the laws of diminishing returns. When we have safely negotiated our terms and conditions of re-entry, we can only hope that our friends and dreams will be there to greet us when we stoop to slake our thirst at the water hole.