THE TYRANNY OF THE NEO-COLONY

by Mumia Abu-Jamal

[Col. Writ. 9/1/02]

"Not yet Uhuru" -- Oginga Odinga, Kenyan freedom fighter

For many, perhaps most African-Americans, Africa, that vast, ancient Mother of Mankind, is both mystery and myth. The land of our forefathers, the land our ancient ones prayed to return to, and a land bequeathed endless and unrelenting miseries as a result of the twin demons of slavery and colonialism.

But, to be sure, Africa is more; it is the land of the lost dreams of liberation struggles, ones so lost that we prefer to pass over the ills of Africa today, with perhaps the vain hope that if we don't speak ill of her, her ailments will go away.

As I have suggested, that is a vain hope, for as hope did not vanquish colonialism, so too, it will not vanquish the present disease of quasi-neo-colonialism.

Many present African states date their independence, not from the cessation of hostilities between adversaries, but from deals cut sitting at nice tables in the parlors and hotels of Europe, deals that left powerful bits in the mouths of colonialists.

This is the case with Kenya, according to a riveting book written by the former political detainee, and member of Parliament, Koigi wa Wamwere, who suffered through brutal imprisonments during the Kenyatta and Moi regimes.

Wamwere, born in the Gikuyu clans that was home to the Kenyan freedom fighter, and first president, Jomo Kenyatta, tells a story of an average, poor, struggling family, that fought against the brutal terrorism of the British colonialists, and one that continued under African rule. His family seemed to sense something was wrong, when Kenyatta was released from prison (He was imprisoned by the British for being a leader of the so-called Mau Mau, which was called a terrorist group by the British):

When Kenyatta was in jail, the settlers were asking themselves: "Whom can we groom to take over the leadership so that our influence is not broken?" When he was released he answered them: "We are determined to have independence in peace, and we shall not allow hooligans to rule Kenya...

Mau Mau was a disease which had been eradicated and must never be remembered again.

Kenyans were astounded. Instead of promising Africans freedom, equality, justice and restoration of stolen lands, Kenyatta begged colonial settlers to forgive him: "I suffered a prison and detention term, but that is out of the past and I am not going to remember it... If I wronged you forgive me, if you wronged me, I forgive you... Let us forgive and forget." People could not understand Kenyatta when he called Mau Mau a disease and asked settlers to forgive him. Was he regretting his people's struggle for independence? Was fighting for freedom wrong and criminal? (Koigi wa Wamwere, "I Refuse to Die: My Journey for Freedom" [New York: Seven Stories Press, forthcoming Nov. 2002])

Wamwere's Africa, like that of Nigerian scholar-activist, Wole Soyinka, is not pretty. It is a story of political corruption, of clan conflict, of power politics exercised in African nations, but for the continued economic interests of white foreigners. In Nigeria, American and British oil interests dominate the politics and economic life of the nation. In Kenya, land, titles, prestige and economic power remains in British hands, who share with an African elite.

Even when elected to Parliament from his home district, Wamwere is not free from the fear and police repression of the ruling elite. In a tale told deep in irony, the former Parliamentarian feels freer, and safer, in the fetid bowels of a Maximum Security prison, than in the halls of Parliament, where armed soldiers overlook every discussion, and question every alliance, and threaten death to those who question the Supreme Ruler.

As a youth during the 1960s, Jomo Kenyatta's stirring "Facing Mount Kenya" was a biting rebuke to the evils of British colonialism in Kenya, and throughout Africa. For the youth of today, immersed in a degraded, commercialized hip-hop culture, will its nationalistic elements read and embrace the New Africa of Koigi wa Wamwere's "I Refuse to Die"? To do so means to oppose the repressive dictatorships of the present, who may have democratic forms, but really preserve the same old economic relationships that have enriched European economies and impoverished the vast majority of African peoples.

The great Osagyefo, Kwame Nkrumah once said, "Political independence without economic independence is but an illusion."

Under African heads-of-state, many of the old colonies have indeed succumbed to the fate predicted by the late Dr. Frantz Fanon; a neo-colonialism, one headed by African elites, which still deprives the people of the fullest enjoyment of life, liberty and the fruits of the land.

 

Text © copyright 2002 by Mumia Abu-Jamal.
All rights reserved.
Reprinted by permission of the author.

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