PAN-AFRICANISM AND GLOBALIZATION
By Biko Agozino and a brother
I just read Pambazuka online and sent this comment about Shivji’s paper:
‘Professor Shivji's Dudley Lecture was a good read. I marvel at the inventiveness of Swahili and other African languages - turning modernization (utandawazi) into a network of thieves (utandawizi) effortlessly. In Igbo language, the closest equivalent would be Otu Uwa (one world) and Otu Ugha (liars club). I particularly enjoyed the reflection of the thoughts of Julius Nyerere on how he was wrong to oppose Kwame Nkrumah’s proposal for a unity government with the gradualist alternative of regional unity first. Also revealing is the information that Nkrumah started out as a gradualist himself by championing the regional unity stepping stone approach before quickly abandoning it for the Union government option.
However, I was expecting that the publication of the lecture as a book chapter would reflect what questions Issa was asked in Nsukka and how he answered them. For instance, with the global African presence, is it wise to dismiss globalisation simply as imperialism when it is clear that Pan Africanism was a globalized movement from the start? According to Shivji, ‘I will talk of African nationalism as an anti-thesis of globalisation. For me globalisation is imperialism.’ Why not attempt a theory of the democratization of globalization as Chomsky advised given that the first call for globalization came from the left – ‘workers of all countries, Unite!’?
This omission became glaring in the lecture especially because there was no serious analysis of slavery and its consequences. Rather, Issa took the Berlin conference initiative of 1850 as the first scramble for Africa whereas Dr Eric Williams correctly identified the first scramble as the centuries long enslavement of tens of millions of Africans and concluded correctly that what Shivji called the second scramble is actually the third.
Furthermore, what did Shivji mean by the quote: ‘Remember that the insurrection of ideas precedes the insurrection of the gun’? Speaking in Nsukka which was the battle ground in the Biafra-Nigerian civil war that claimed the lives of some of our brightest minds, including the irreplaceable Chris Okigbo, was he not being insensitive by implicitly invoking the insurrection of the gun in a university setting? I believe that Issa was harking back to the old maxim that armed struggle was the essential way to liberate Africa but we cannot accept that uncritically today given the damage that armed conflicts have wreaked on Africa and continue to do so.
Rather, we should embrace the African philosophy of non-violence which Gandhi admitted that he learned from the Zulu and move forward to build the Peoples Republic of Africa United Democratically (PRAUD) and extend it to the willing Caribbean with dual citizenship for the African Diaspora who desire it. We need to emphasize that our aim is not to fight against Europe and north America who have nothing to lose from African unity, our goal is to serve our people and not to fight against others as China successfully demonstrates. Do Not Agonize, Organize! I sent this to a respected brother who wrote back defending Shivji even before he read Shivji’s chapter:
‘I haven't read the lecture and will have to do so to fully understand where you are coming from. Understand your comment on problems with silencing/marginalization of slavery in a discourse on colonialism but not clear on what's wrong with the idea of insurrection of thought before insurrection of the gun. The quote, as you present it, does not seem to imply a fetishization of the insurrection of the gun as you suggest in finding him insensitive to Biafara and other concerns. A good point on non violence but I don't see the relevance in relation to your quote from Shivji; indeed, the Shivji quote you present seems to support your emphasis on the power of ideas=2 0over guns. And on globalization: There is an imperialist globalization to be rejected but does that mean in doing so one does not/can not recognize/imagine another form of global exchange. I'll be surprised - nay, shocked - if someone like Shivji is not aware of historic calls for global solidarity from the left. I'll have to disagree with the notion that the first call for globalization came from the left, as the worldwide expansion of capitalism (the beginnings of globalization) surely predates 'the left'. Will try and read Shivji later.’ And then I replied to him:
You are a hard marker you know, glad I did not take your class or you may have messed up my GPA. Okay, I might have been too hard on Shivji myself but the teleology from ideas to guns appears to privilege the gun ‘in the final analysis’. With shottas scaring the nation with them amanation (Junior Marvin), we must be skeptical of any notions of militarism, however disguised. Capitalism was never a call for globalization but a call for bourgeois nationalism. Marx and Engels were the first to see beyond Smith’s myopic Wealth of Nations in their critique o f impoverished political economy to identify the global wealth of the workers of the world.
Yes, let us reject imperialist globalization but more urgently, we must concentrate on building the democratic globalization instead of the essentialism of fighting globalization as if it is all negative. Cuba fights less against anyone despite the 50 year old blockade and more for the people, hence its success in using the African philosophy of non-violence to concentrate on education, health and social services as the best defenses against imperialist aggression. Japan did the same after world war 2 and so did Germany, China too to some extent, hence their relative insulation from the meltdown. I hope that the new Africa will concentrate on building and not on fighting.
‘Ah, my brother, you are curing while creating new ailments. Still haven't read Shivji so you might be right about his teleology on armed insurrection.
To critique and fight capitalist globalization is not to deny positives that emerge out of the process. After all, none other than Marx saw positives in the worldwide expansion of capitalism; indeed, he was over the top in his analysis and predictions of the progressive forces unleashed by capitalism. I don't think anti-globalization folks can be reduced to being essentialists who don't grasp the complexity and contradictory processes of globalization, but they do see much in it to resist and fight and no contradiction in doing that and pursuing good education and health services. Quite often they have to fight powerful elements of globalization to pursue these objectives, to democratize globalization.
Cuba is such a bad example of your non violence ethic, having fought countless wars in Africa and Latin America as part of their defense against 'imperialist aggression'. And they did this while concentrating on education, health and social services. You are in danger of setting up some binary formulations in the quest to assert the philosophy of non violence. Japan and Germany are also weak examples, given that their militarism was curbed by external forces, and they20play and an important role in the militarism of the lone superpower. I don't know about their relative insulation from the meltdown; the crises in Japan and Germany are profound. As for China, the reasons for their success and potential go way beyond any philosophy of non violence (which I don't know to be their philosophy; after all, the party that rules fought a serious war for the opportunities to address issues of education, health, etc). To understand China's trajectory we need to pay more attention to the hidden abodes of social relations of production there and their peculiar relations hip with the market (incidentally, Smith might have more to offer in this exercise than Marx but I'l leave that for another time). Such an exercise would reveal a lot more about the dynamic within China than fishing for examples of non violent philosophy.
'Capitalism was never a call for globalization but a call for bourgeois nationalism'. I disagree. Capitalists, as part of the process of accumulation and the pursuit of profit, have long called for unbridled access to the resources of the globe; it is a core feature of globalization. Bourgeois nationalism is but one form of rule that has governed this process. I think you are in danger of treating linked phenomena as conceptual isolates.
We all hope that the new Africa will concentrate on building and not fighting but I know we all remember how many in the 'old' Africa had to fight for the opportunity to build, and this was not because of some penchant for militarism.’
Mwalimu,
I accept your point that these things are articulated and not separate. I do agree that non-violence is not pacifism, after all Gandhi learned it from the Zulu of all warlike people. My argument remains that non-violence is the major contribution of African civilization to world civilization and that all people who have adopted it have reaped greater dividends from it than from warfarism. This includes even Uncle Santa where our people have made huge impacts not just from jumping into all the bacchanal there but more by offering intellectual and moral leadership in the direction of non-violence, as Obama seems to be offering; it is an African thing for a presidential candidate in the middle of a war to take an anti-war stance and still win, against a decorated war veteran, never happened before.
I strongly believe that the success of the post-war economies of Germany and Japan owe a lot to their concentration on the economy and relative withdrawal from military aggression. Of course, Marx was right that capitalism is not all bad and no good, it is indeed better than feudalism but still not the best for humanity and what is to be done is to form a party of the working people but not to form an army; Lenin added that what is to be done is to establish a newspaper with which to organize the party, not to form a suicide squad. Yes, Mao said that it is a false contradiction – violence versus non-violence – because it depends on the nature of the challenge. If the challenge is militaristic, then it is inevitable that the resistance would involve some military means as Fanon established although some people misunderstand him as the apostle of violence while he was showing that violence is often evidence of psychiatric problems.
But if the onslaught is ideological, economic and technological, then that is where we need to concentrate our efforts as the great Bob Marley theorized: ‘I and I don’t come to fight flesh and blood but spiritual wickedness in high places, so while they fight you down stand firm and give Jah thanks and praises, for I and I don’t expect to be justified by the laws of men, by the laws of men, though they find you guilty….’ Oh sure, he swore that he shot the sheriff but then the solution (as he saw it) is to legalize the herbs so that he would not be told to kill the seeds he planted and not to go on shooting sheriffs (with music and the wonderful thing about music is that when it hits you feel no pain). Sheriffs have more guns and would shoot more rebels down more easily.
The way to end wars, according to Marley, is not by building a stronger army but by ensuring that there are no longer first class and second class citizens of any nation; that the colour of one’s skin is of no more significance than the colour of one’s eyes. That was why there was no right to bear arms in the 10 point program of the Black Panther Party. I think that it will take a whole book to flesh out the arguments I am outlining here.
The brother concluded that the fun of the exchange was over because this last posting of mine clarified that we did not have any differences to debate anymore. Onwards to the Peoples Republic of Africa!
Friday, April 24, 2009
Thursday, February 26, 2009
'If' and if not?
By Biko Agozino
The poem, ‘If…’ by Rudyard Kipling was one of my favourites in High School after I saw a copy on the wall of my English Literature teacher. I copied it by hand on a large poster and kept in my room at home as an inspiration. However, another literature teacher from a girls’ school near home visited me at home once and saw the poem and immediately critiqued my poor handwriting. True to Kipling’s advice, I accepted the criticism and gave as my excuse, the fact that the civil war led to the loss of all the furniture in our school and at the end we sat on the floor and used cement blocks as writing desks with which to learn how to write. The teacher accepted my excuse but encouraged me to work on improving my handwriting.
That should have been the end of the matter but one of my cousins was furious with the teacher for trying to disrespect my prized poster poem. He challenged the teacher to look beyond the handwriting and see the philosophy of the poem as a guide for a young man growing up. Before I knew it, we were engaged in a heated debate about the contents of the poem.
The teacher said that it was actually his original intention to call attention to the content of the poem and that he was glad that my cousin raised it. He said that he did not trust an English man to provide the philosophy with which young African men should guide their lives long after the end of colonialism. He called it an example of colonial mentality. We all disagreed with him and said that it does not matter if a poem is written by an African or by a European, a good poem is a good poem.
The teacher disagreed with us and insisted that what is good for the rat is not always good for the cat and vice versa. So we challenged him to say exactly why he was against the poem. He invited us to read the poem more closely with him and ask the author, ‘What if not’ at every line, would you not be a man still even if you lived your life in a different way from his colonial prescriptions?
First of all, keeping your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you could be a very dangerous thing especially if you are the one responsible for them losing their heads. In that case, you are not likely to keep your head for much longer. If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, then you must be smoking or drinking something that you should not be smoking or drinking. When all men doubt you, it is not just some men, say a minority or even a majority, but all men, then you had better re-examine your own confidence for signs of false confidence. Otherwise, you might just come across as an arrogant aristocrat who does not care about what everybody thinks.
Waiting and not being tired of waiting could be simply a sign of lethargy and a dangerous one at that especially if you are talking about decolonization and the colonial masters want you to wait because you are not ripe for independence, as if you are some kind of bananas. Sometimes, waiting is not a virtue if you have waited centuries already, sometimes it is good to say that you are indeed tired of waiting and it does not follow that you will be less of a man when you tell the colonial overlord to get off your back, the teacher reasoned and we nodded.
How about not telling lies even when people lie about you or not hating people who hate you and yet not looking too good nor talking too wise? We asked him, trying to salvage something from my prized poem. He sucked his teeth at us and said that those are not prescriptions for being a man but prescriptions for being a good child. A good man will clear his name when people lie about him and a good man would hate it when the strong oppresses the weak. Who is to say what is too good or too wise? He asked us and without waiting for an answer, he told us not to mind the English man who thinks that he will always be better than us. Instead we should try to be the best that we could.
The next stanza got even worse as the teacher queried who Kipling thought that he was addressing anyway. Why was he saying, ‘If you can dream, if you can think…’ Of course, we can dream and think because we are human just like him and a colonized people do not need to be reminded that dreams are no masters for they still struggled against the nightmare masters that they wanted to free themselves from. We reminded the teacher that maybe he was the knave who was twisting the truths of Kipling to make a trap for us fools but he fired back that we were no fools but free men and that poetry is not truth but arts. As for watching the things you gave your life broken, he said that a good man would at least try to protect or defend the country he gave his life to instead of just standing there and waiting for the invaders to destroy it before meekly trying to rebuild with, of all things, worn out tools. How pathetic, the teacher sighed.
The next stanza is all about gambling and the teacher advised us to avoid that kind of mentality if we ever hope to grow up as good men. We must never gamble all our resources away in one heap and hope to start again at the beginning because there may never be another beginning but a sad end. Instead, we should learn to invest our resources wisely and spread our investments rather than leave all our eggs in one basket. If it only takes a will to serve your turn when your body is tired, remember that you are part of a team and not just a selfish individualist poet. When you are tired, the teacher advised us, take time out and get some rest and let another member of your team continue.
The final stanza warns about the danger of losing your virtue when talking with crowds as if the masses are vile and would pollute your good qualities. At the same breath, the imperialist Kipling advised that we should walk with kings and retain the common touch as if people who live in republican democracies must be pitied for not having kings to walk with. If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, then you are dead already, cried the teacher. Finally, he intoned, what counts is not how many seconds you put into your minutes but how many miles you put into your minutes if you are a long distance runner. So do not let the devil fool you into thinking that yours is the earth and all that is in it, you are already a man my son and you will have to share the earth with billions of other men and women. Kipling is simply crazy, he concluded. I got up and tore off the poster from my wall and shredded it.
Monday, February 23, 2009
DOC, I AM SO LIKE YOU
BY BIKO AGOZINO
When I arrived in Trinidad newly, a student told me that if I had dark glasses on top of my white jacket, I would have looked just like the Doc. Like who? Dr. Eric Williams, he explained. I thanked him for the flattery but thought that I am not that short or that bald. Of course, I admire Eric Williams as an intellectual and as a nation-builder but I did not know much about his life.
An opportunity came when I was asked to facilitate a television studio panel discussion on ‘Democratic Fatherhood’ for NCC channels 4 and 16 that was broadcast on Independence Day 2008. I had read a speech by Erica Williams in which she paid tribute to her father even while admitting his shortcomings. I wanted the studio panel to read that speech before the programme but the producers said that they could reach Erica by phone and I was able to interview her on what type of father he was. We concluded that he was a democratic type of father.
Recently, I met Erica for the first time and while we had lunch in Movietown, she shamed me by asking if I had visited the Eric Williams Collection in the Main Library of UWI? No, I had not and she said, ‘shame on you’. I decided that I would go and see it and she told me that there was a seminar coming up with international participants and that it was going to be a good opportunity for me to see the collection with a group. I agreed.
I was amazed to discover how much I had in common with Dr Williams. The documentary, ‘The Will of the People’, produced by Che Rodriguez, opened with the unforgettable statement that Williams was a wizard and that like all wizards, he was regarded with awe, not always with love but always with respect. I often felt that that was how some people regarded me but I also wondered why the producer used the word wizard instead of the Trini creole equivalent, obeah man.
I also heard the voice of Williams, not for the first time for it has been played on radio before, but it struck me that he never raised his voice and I am told often that I am soft-spoken myself but not while I am on a stage. I could bawl when I am performing on stage but that is perhaps because I still need to attract attention whereas Williams was so sure that his audience was listening to every word he spoke. Although in one of the clips, two people were whispering to each other as he spoke.
Then he walked and I sat up instantly. In that clip of his visit to China that was repeated in the short documentary, Doctor Williams walked just like I do. He walked as if he was floating the way that the big masquerade would float during carnival rather than walk like the little mas, floating with the legs stretched out in front of him in short confident strides without bending the knees. What a strange coincidence for that is exactly how I walk, making some women in the village in Nigeria where I grew up to nick-name me Oje la nwayoo (the gentle walker).
I am not bragging but the similarities are startling to me. Eric Williams studied with scholarships and so did I, he got a first class honours degree and so did I, he got his PhD from the UK and so did I and his dissertation was published to wide acclaim and so was mine, he left the UK to teach in America at a historically black university and so did I and he relocated to Trinidad from there and so did I after roughly the same amount of years in the US. I was still thinking of these similarities when the film ended and we walked downstairs to the second floor of the library to view the Eric Williams Collection.
I could not believe my eyes when I saw his desk the way it was when he left it. The desk was chaotic, crowded with papers and books, files and folders exactly the way my table usually looks all the time! He was as messy as I am, no more, no less. Now I know that I am in good company and so when next a bossy cleaner tries to straighten out my desk at the office, I will tell her to go and see the Eric Williams Collection!
Of course, I am no Eric Williams and there would never be another one like him. For instance, I have no series of heavy industries that I established to build a new nation, I have not liberated any country from colonialism and I have not headed any state or government. Moreover, I do not own a collection of tobacco pipes or nicely carved elephant tusks nor will you find a picture of a group of children and I with a stick of cigarette between my lips.
Health education has enlightened us more on the harms of tobacco and environmental awareness has taught us not to display elephant tusks but in this case, it is a piece of history given to him on his state visits to African countries and the way he treasured the tusks shows his warmth towards mother Africa, though he swore allegiance to only one mother – Mother Trinidad and Tobago (two mothers?).
Biko Agozino is Professor of Sociology, Coordinator of Criminology Unit, Department of Behavioural Sciences and Deputy Dean for Graduate Studies and Research, Faculty of Social Sciences, UWI, St. Augustine.
When I arrived in Trinidad newly, a student told me that if I had dark glasses on top of my white jacket, I would have looked just like the Doc. Like who? Dr. Eric Williams, he explained. I thanked him for the flattery but thought that I am not that short or that bald. Of course, I admire Eric Williams as an intellectual and as a nation-builder but I did not know much about his life.
An opportunity came when I was asked to facilitate a television studio panel discussion on ‘Democratic Fatherhood’ for NCC channels 4 and 16 that was broadcast on Independence Day 2008. I had read a speech by Erica Williams in which she paid tribute to her father even while admitting his shortcomings. I wanted the studio panel to read that speech before the programme but the producers said that they could reach Erica by phone and I was able to interview her on what type of father he was. We concluded that he was a democratic type of father.
Recently, I met Erica for the first time and while we had lunch in Movietown, she shamed me by asking if I had visited the Eric Williams Collection in the Main Library of UWI? No, I had not and she said, ‘shame on you’. I decided that I would go and see it and she told me that there was a seminar coming up with international participants and that it was going to be a good opportunity for me to see the collection with a group. I agreed.
I was amazed to discover how much I had in common with Dr Williams. The documentary, ‘The Will of the People’, produced by Che Rodriguez, opened with the unforgettable statement that Williams was a wizard and that like all wizards, he was regarded with awe, not always with love but always with respect. I often felt that that was how some people regarded me but I also wondered why the producer used the word wizard instead of the Trini creole equivalent, obeah man.
I also heard the voice of Williams, not for the first time for it has been played on radio before, but it struck me that he never raised his voice and I am told often that I am soft-spoken myself but not while I am on a stage. I could bawl when I am performing on stage but that is perhaps because I still need to attract attention whereas Williams was so sure that his audience was listening to every word he spoke. Although in one of the clips, two people were whispering to each other as he spoke.
Then he walked and I sat up instantly. In that clip of his visit to China that was repeated in the short documentary, Doctor Williams walked just like I do. He walked as if he was floating the way that the big masquerade would float during carnival rather than walk like the little mas, floating with the legs stretched out in front of him in short confident strides without bending the knees. What a strange coincidence for that is exactly how I walk, making some women in the village in Nigeria where I grew up to nick-name me Oje la nwayoo (the gentle walker).
I am not bragging but the similarities are startling to me. Eric Williams studied with scholarships and so did I, he got a first class honours degree and so did I, he got his PhD from the UK and so did I and his dissertation was published to wide acclaim and so was mine, he left the UK to teach in America at a historically black university and so did I and he relocated to Trinidad from there and so did I after roughly the same amount of years in the US. I was still thinking of these similarities when the film ended and we walked downstairs to the second floor of the library to view the Eric Williams Collection.
I could not believe my eyes when I saw his desk the way it was when he left it. The desk was chaotic, crowded with papers and books, files and folders exactly the way my table usually looks all the time! He was as messy as I am, no more, no less. Now I know that I am in good company and so when next a bossy cleaner tries to straighten out my desk at the office, I will tell her to go and see the Eric Williams Collection!
Of course, I am no Eric Williams and there would never be another one like him. For instance, I have no series of heavy industries that I established to build a new nation, I have not liberated any country from colonialism and I have not headed any state or government. Moreover, I do not own a collection of tobacco pipes or nicely carved elephant tusks nor will you find a picture of a group of children and I with a stick of cigarette between my lips.
Health education has enlightened us more on the harms of tobacco and environmental awareness has taught us not to display elephant tusks but in this case, it is a piece of history given to him on his state visits to African countries and the way he treasured the tusks shows his warmth towards mother Africa, though he swore allegiance to only one mother – Mother Trinidad and Tobago (two mothers?).
Biko Agozino is Professor of Sociology, Coordinator of Criminology Unit, Department of Behavioural Sciences and Deputy Dean for Graduate Studies and Research, Faculty of Social Sciences, UWI, St. Augustine.
Sunday, January 11, 2009
African Time
Managing African Time
By Biko Agozino
bagozino@yahoo.com
The application of the concept of African Time was evident at a Nigerian High Commission in the Caribbean where the visiting Consul General and his staff were assisted by the High Commission staff to register hundreds of Nigerians for the new electronic ECOWAS passport. The process appeared to be chaotic in a way that seemed consistent with the concept of African fractals. For instance, the staff started work in the PM and ended in the AM daily!
The chaos seemed to have a method to it as they started with a long list of first-come, first served Nigerians that ran into nearly five hundred. But the data-capturing machine was slow, grew too hot sometimes and had to be switched off to let it ‘sleep’ or cool down and so, by the second night which was intended as the last night of the visit, they had only managed to scratch the surface of the ever-growing list. Exceptions were announced for the pregnant women in the crowd and then for families with little children and then there were suspected man-know-man and eye-service as some complained. Then the list was completely abandoned the next day when, without explanation, the team announced that they would stay for two more days, including a Saturday. They now collected the passports of those present whenever they started work and refused to accept any more for processing during that day/night. Some had to go as early as 7 AM and wait until past midnight to be served. Rather than set an office time for the work, they chose to set a quota of work to be done on a day.
Those who grumbled most loudly were often the ordinary Nigerian immigrants, most of who worked as security guards. The High Commission staff had a ready mantra that they chanted against allegations of favouritism: there was a professor sitting quietly among the applicants, waiting to be served and if they could not serve him, it was implied, why would they attend to the common folks? That excuse enraged a few of the men who started shouting on the top of their voices that they too were human even without degrees and without being doctors.
I doubt if there is any other diplomatic service in the world that would meet with a full professor in a foreign land who is also a fellow citizen and have him wait until midnight on two occasions only to be refused registration for a new passport, even if he was the last person to be attended to. The professor surprised everyone by responding to that final refusal, not with anger but with praise for the dedication of the staff beyond the call of duty, wishing them safe journey and told them to manage their time better to be even more productive with their commendable dedication.
That was a testament to the poor management of the human resources available to us as a nation. True, refusing registration to the professor afforded him the opportunity to wait and listen to the biographies of the less fortunate immigrants in more detail as they voluntarily shared their tales of woes, threats, fears and aspirations. The professor encouraged one to write up a particularly dramatic story of love and troubles ‘for papers’ and send it to The Commonwealth Short Stories Competition. He queried what was the point for a high school graduate like him to aspire to writing when a whole professor was not being shown respect just because he was not super-rich? His dream was to save up money and go and reopen his fishing line trade in Onitsha Main Market. But the prize money might help you to set up your shop, the professor implored, urging him not to give up on further education. But how could he, on a minimum wage and long hours of work? He asked.
Okro no be soup, na management, goes a Nigerian saying which encapsulates a sense that management means just getting by rather than satisfactory performance. This might be a clue to our legendary (mis)management of our abundant national, human, natural and material resources. Starting with time resources, we have a concept of African Time that suggests that events would tend to start later than expected and continue beyond the intended time. Trinidadians call it Trini Time and African Americans call it CP or Colored Peoples Time. Where did this laid-back approach to time evolve from?
One suggestion could be the concept of African Fractals which Ron Eglash used to describe the tendency among Africans to design their physical and mental environments in fractal patterns tending towards chaos whereas Europeans prefer lineal Cartesian grids that tend to be easier to control or manage. My hypothesis is that Africans evolved African fractal designs in response to the predatory threats that Africans faced for centuries. If the Africans who turned up in time for meetings with the predators were consistently the ones that were first kidnapped and enslaved, why would Africans act as if keeping to time was beneficial? Any other species of animals hunted as intensely and as extensively as Africans were hunted for centuries would have adapted by evolving complex strategies for survival to make it more difficult for predators to catch them. What Eglash called African Fractals may not be fractal at all, it may be African Wholeness since it applied to the whole African worldview, as a young African Trinidadian painter, Shawn Peters, retorted when I first saw his paintings and told him that the motifs were full of African Fractals.
The chaos approach to the management of time may work better sometimes than lineal time-management but we must also look at ways that we could bring out the best in our amazingly dedicated fellow-citizens through strategic planning and more effective deployment of limited time, human and material resources in public service. I recommend the following:
1) It was admirable and praise-worthy to see our fellow citizens work such long hours at night but they could have achieved a lot more by resting at night and working normal office hours during the day. Working until 2:00 AM on consecutive nights might look like patriotic efforts from our diplomats beyond the call of duty but it is simply wasteful hard work when modern technology is available to help them to work smart and achieve more. It is also counter-productive because the late night means that they sleep in and start the next day at midday, obviously skipping breakfast, while applicants assemble as early as 7:00 AM. This is a penny wise pound foolish approach to time management that should be avoided.
2) Make sure that the tireless lady, who took the finger-prints and digital photos as well as complete the electronic applications (again) while interviewing the applicant to make sure that he/she was a true Nigerian, has a comfortable desk and chair to work those long hours from and adequate division of labour with the rest of the staff. She was even the one who went out to call in the next applicants when the colleague sitting at the door as if the door-keeper could have done that. Later, that role was assigned to other colleagues but it meant that our apparently tireless lady missed the opportunity to stretch her legs and had to stop and go for a brisk walk when her back pain got worse but no one trained to continue while she rested. I advised her to rest her back to avoid the back ache and she complained that her desk would not let her lean back for she still needed to stretch to take the finger-print. Another colleague should have been in charge of the finger-printing. She was sitting on a cushion to help her arm-chair become more comfortable but the wise thing would have been to offer her a more comfortable chair.
3) This whole drama could have been less of an ordeal for the staff and the fellow citizens they were serving if the data-capturing machine, laptop with software and digital camera were supplied to the High Commission so that a team of four from New York would not need to make international travels at huge costs that could have bought the equipments for the High Commission with spare change left. What if the equipments got lost or damaged as they were being carried from post to post? I hope that they have back-ups for the applications they processed.
4) The appointment system should be used to space-out applicants so that parents would not have to drag out their young ones, workers would not risk a sack and the staff processing the applications would be less stressed if the mass of the people did not stay all day and night on multiple days without knowing if they would be ‘lucky’ to be served or ‘helped’. The initial announcement was that the team from New York would not even visit this particular country and advised the citizens here to travel to another country and meet them there for the exercise at huge costs to themselves and risk to their jobs. They later changed their mind and agreed to visit the High Commission but only for a day and half. At the end of the full day or night, they suddenly announced that they would stay some extra two days and work a full day on Saturday as well to help their fellow citizens. That was charming but it was suspected by some that they may have over-slept and missed their flight or that they were doing it for the extra US$20.00 ‘processing fees’ that they were collecting from applicants who had paid the full electronic application fees of US$110. Why not trust Nigerian officials to collect the whole fees in cash from those not able to pay by credit card?
5) This brings me to my final suggestion: It is about information management. The staff could have provided more information to the applicants by explaining that they needed the $20.00 for mailing back their passports by recorded delivery when they are issued, for example, the explanation that I tried to guess for skeptical fellow citizens. The electronic forms should have been saved on the website by the software instead of making the applicant enter the details all over again because the only thing that the reference number could recall was the confirmation of payment slip and not the full application with next of kin and state of origin.
By Biko Agozino
bagozino@yahoo.com
The application of the concept of African Time was evident at a Nigerian High Commission in the Caribbean where the visiting Consul General and his staff were assisted by the High Commission staff to register hundreds of Nigerians for the new electronic ECOWAS passport. The process appeared to be chaotic in a way that seemed consistent with the concept of African fractals. For instance, the staff started work in the PM and ended in the AM daily!
The chaos seemed to have a method to it as they started with a long list of first-come, first served Nigerians that ran into nearly five hundred. But the data-capturing machine was slow, grew too hot sometimes and had to be switched off to let it ‘sleep’ or cool down and so, by the second night which was intended as the last night of the visit, they had only managed to scratch the surface of the ever-growing list. Exceptions were announced for the pregnant women in the crowd and then for families with little children and then there were suspected man-know-man and eye-service as some complained. Then the list was completely abandoned the next day when, without explanation, the team announced that they would stay for two more days, including a Saturday. They now collected the passports of those present whenever they started work and refused to accept any more for processing during that day/night. Some had to go as early as 7 AM and wait until past midnight to be served. Rather than set an office time for the work, they chose to set a quota of work to be done on a day.
Those who grumbled most loudly were often the ordinary Nigerian immigrants, most of who worked as security guards. The High Commission staff had a ready mantra that they chanted against allegations of favouritism: there was a professor sitting quietly among the applicants, waiting to be served and if they could not serve him, it was implied, why would they attend to the common folks? That excuse enraged a few of the men who started shouting on the top of their voices that they too were human even without degrees and without being doctors.
I doubt if there is any other diplomatic service in the world that would meet with a full professor in a foreign land who is also a fellow citizen and have him wait until midnight on two occasions only to be refused registration for a new passport, even if he was the last person to be attended to. The professor surprised everyone by responding to that final refusal, not with anger but with praise for the dedication of the staff beyond the call of duty, wishing them safe journey and told them to manage their time better to be even more productive with their commendable dedication.
That was a testament to the poor management of the human resources available to us as a nation. True, refusing registration to the professor afforded him the opportunity to wait and listen to the biographies of the less fortunate immigrants in more detail as they voluntarily shared their tales of woes, threats, fears and aspirations. The professor encouraged one to write up a particularly dramatic story of love and troubles ‘for papers’ and send it to The Commonwealth Short Stories Competition. He queried what was the point for a high school graduate like him to aspire to writing when a whole professor was not being shown respect just because he was not super-rich? His dream was to save up money and go and reopen his fishing line trade in Onitsha Main Market. But the prize money might help you to set up your shop, the professor implored, urging him not to give up on further education. But how could he, on a minimum wage and long hours of work? He asked.
Okro no be soup, na management, goes a Nigerian saying which encapsulates a sense that management means just getting by rather than satisfactory performance. This might be a clue to our legendary (mis)management of our abundant national, human, natural and material resources. Starting with time resources, we have a concept of African Time that suggests that events would tend to start later than expected and continue beyond the intended time. Trinidadians call it Trini Time and African Americans call it CP or Colored Peoples Time. Where did this laid-back approach to time evolve from?
One suggestion could be the concept of African Fractals which Ron Eglash used to describe the tendency among Africans to design their physical and mental environments in fractal patterns tending towards chaos whereas Europeans prefer lineal Cartesian grids that tend to be easier to control or manage. My hypothesis is that Africans evolved African fractal designs in response to the predatory threats that Africans faced for centuries. If the Africans who turned up in time for meetings with the predators were consistently the ones that were first kidnapped and enslaved, why would Africans act as if keeping to time was beneficial? Any other species of animals hunted as intensely and as extensively as Africans were hunted for centuries would have adapted by evolving complex strategies for survival to make it more difficult for predators to catch them. What Eglash called African Fractals may not be fractal at all, it may be African Wholeness since it applied to the whole African worldview, as a young African Trinidadian painter, Shawn Peters, retorted when I first saw his paintings and told him that the motifs were full of African Fractals.
The chaos approach to the management of time may work better sometimes than lineal time-management but we must also look at ways that we could bring out the best in our amazingly dedicated fellow-citizens through strategic planning and more effective deployment of limited time, human and material resources in public service. I recommend the following:
1) It was admirable and praise-worthy to see our fellow citizens work such long hours at night but they could have achieved a lot more by resting at night and working normal office hours during the day. Working until 2:00 AM on consecutive nights might look like patriotic efforts from our diplomats beyond the call of duty but it is simply wasteful hard work when modern technology is available to help them to work smart and achieve more. It is also counter-productive because the late night means that they sleep in and start the next day at midday, obviously skipping breakfast, while applicants assemble as early as 7:00 AM. This is a penny wise pound foolish approach to time management that should be avoided.
2) Make sure that the tireless lady, who took the finger-prints and digital photos as well as complete the electronic applications (again) while interviewing the applicant to make sure that he/she was a true Nigerian, has a comfortable desk and chair to work those long hours from and adequate division of labour with the rest of the staff. She was even the one who went out to call in the next applicants when the colleague sitting at the door as if the door-keeper could have done that. Later, that role was assigned to other colleagues but it meant that our apparently tireless lady missed the opportunity to stretch her legs and had to stop and go for a brisk walk when her back pain got worse but no one trained to continue while she rested. I advised her to rest her back to avoid the back ache and she complained that her desk would not let her lean back for she still needed to stretch to take the finger-print. Another colleague should have been in charge of the finger-printing. She was sitting on a cushion to help her arm-chair become more comfortable but the wise thing would have been to offer her a more comfortable chair.
3) This whole drama could have been less of an ordeal for the staff and the fellow citizens they were serving if the data-capturing machine, laptop with software and digital camera were supplied to the High Commission so that a team of four from New York would not need to make international travels at huge costs that could have bought the equipments for the High Commission with spare change left. What if the equipments got lost or damaged as they were being carried from post to post? I hope that they have back-ups for the applications they processed.
4) The appointment system should be used to space-out applicants so that parents would not have to drag out their young ones, workers would not risk a sack and the staff processing the applications would be less stressed if the mass of the people did not stay all day and night on multiple days without knowing if they would be ‘lucky’ to be served or ‘helped’. The initial announcement was that the team from New York would not even visit this particular country and advised the citizens here to travel to another country and meet them there for the exercise at huge costs to themselves and risk to their jobs. They later changed their mind and agreed to visit the High Commission but only for a day and half. At the end of the full day or night, they suddenly announced that they would stay some extra two days and work a full day on Saturday as well to help their fellow citizens. That was charming but it was suspected by some that they may have over-slept and missed their flight or that they were doing it for the extra US$20.00 ‘processing fees’ that they were collecting from applicants who had paid the full electronic application fees of US$110. Why not trust Nigerian officials to collect the whole fees in cash from those not able to pay by credit card?
5) This brings me to my final suggestion: It is about information management. The staff could have provided more information to the applicants by explaining that they needed the $20.00 for mailing back their passports by recorded delivery when they are issued, for example, the explanation that I tried to guess for skeptical fellow citizens. The electronic forms should have been saved on the website by the software instead of making the applicant enter the details all over again because the only thing that the reference number could recall was the confirmation of payment slip and not the full application with next of kin and state of origin.
Sunday, September 28, 2008
Grandpa, How Did You Vote?
BY BIKO AGOZINO
Americans are a people who have a love affair with history-making. There are many monumental moments in history when Americans left their gigantic marks in epochal moves that have helped to change the course of history on grand scales. There is no need to recount such historic events to prove the obvious point. Suffice it to say that Americans are presented with another such epochal moment of change-making choice by the candidacy of Barack Obama.
Years to come, children, grandchildren, nieces, nephews, social scientists, historians, journalists, biographers, film makers and total strangers would be asking eligible American voters of today how they cast their votes on November 4th 2008. For instance, ‘Grandpa, how did you vote in 08?’
Some would answer that it was the first time that they ever voted in their lives, the first time that they participated in a presidential campaign, or the first time they contributed money to a presidential campaign with much enthusiasm. They could look at the grandkid with a broad smile and say, ‘Grandma and I are proud to have helped to elect the first black president of the United States of America.’ Wow!
The future generations would look at your choice as awesome and feel connected to the history that you would make with the way you cast your votes on that day. Many first grade students may be showing and telling about the grandparents who helped to elect the first black president!
Some may vote against the first black president but how would they explain it to their descendants?
Would they lie about their vote and let their conscience prick them for not choosing the road hitherto less traveled on? The sports-loving Americans know when they have a chance to win a grand slam with a slam dunk and they would not pass over the opportunity to win personal, national and international glory with one rare chance to change history with a single vote.
Some Americans would choose the chance to tell their grandkids with a clear conscience that even if they always voted for a different party in the past or because they have always been independent voters, they voted this time to help make huge history by electing the first black president of the country.
Voting for Senator John McCain to be the first prisoner of war who could have become president or to make Governor Sarah Palin the first female vice president are also historic but not on the scale of electing Senator Barack Obama as President and, as his Vice President, Senator Joe Biden (who moved that historic Congress motion for the unconditional release of saint Nelson Mandela from prison that was voted down by some who must now be obviously regretting the way that they had voted down that motion that signified American sound judgment).
Of course, it is not just because the candidate is ‘Black’; he is also incredibly good with sound policies, a solid team behind his successful ground-breaking campaign and with a rallying call for meaningful change that energized millions of voters. In fact, Obama is not even black since all ‘Black’ people are really brown in color; just as ‘White’ people are, without exception, not white but pink in color; just as Asians are far from being ‘Yellow’, for that matter.
It just so happens that the people called ‘Black’ in America have had a peculiar history that makes the voting on November the 4th more symbolic and more significant as a chance to make history by voting for Obama. That is probably why many Americans are yet to make up their minds how to vote on that day, they are probably weighing the enormity of the historical responsibility riding on those votes that they are about to cast. But as Americans like to say, this historic choice is really a no-brainer.
History tells us that the majority of pragmatic Americans would choose to make history by voting Obama-Biden overwhelmingly. And long after the votes are counted and recounted to be certain that all votes were properly tallied, proud Americans would seek to hold the first black president accountable by offering support, criticism, policies, prayers and services to help make sure that their votes would be more than symbolic since they could also help to make his regime one of the most epochal and most successful presidencies ever. The rest of the world would be happy to oblige with admiration for a good example of American democracy. You Go Americans. Si Se Pueda!
Dr. Biko Agozino is Professor of Sociology, Criminology Unit Coordinator and Deputy Dean for Graduate Studies and Research, Faculty of Social Sciences, The University of the West Indies, St. Augustine, Trinidad and Tobago. bagozino@yahoo.com or onwubiko.agozino@sta.uwi.edu
To leave a comment or read more on my web log, please go to:
http://massliteracy.blogspot.com/
Americans are a people who have a love affair with history-making. There are many monumental moments in history when Americans left their gigantic marks in epochal moves that have helped to change the course of history on grand scales. There is no need to recount such historic events to prove the obvious point. Suffice it to say that Americans are presented with another such epochal moment of change-making choice by the candidacy of Barack Obama.
Years to come, children, grandchildren, nieces, nephews, social scientists, historians, journalists, biographers, film makers and total strangers would be asking eligible American voters of today how they cast their votes on November 4th 2008. For instance, ‘Grandpa, how did you vote in 08?’
Some would answer that it was the first time that they ever voted in their lives, the first time that they participated in a presidential campaign, or the first time they contributed money to a presidential campaign with much enthusiasm. They could look at the grandkid with a broad smile and say, ‘Grandma and I are proud to have helped to elect the first black president of the United States of America.’ Wow!
The future generations would look at your choice as awesome and feel connected to the history that you would make with the way you cast your votes on that day. Many first grade students may be showing and telling about the grandparents who helped to elect the first black president!
Some may vote against the first black president but how would they explain it to their descendants?
Would they lie about their vote and let their conscience prick them for not choosing the road hitherto less traveled on? The sports-loving Americans know when they have a chance to win a grand slam with a slam dunk and they would not pass over the opportunity to win personal, national and international glory with one rare chance to change history with a single vote.
Some Americans would choose the chance to tell their grandkids with a clear conscience that even if they always voted for a different party in the past or because they have always been independent voters, they voted this time to help make huge history by electing the first black president of the country.
Voting for Senator John McCain to be the first prisoner of war who could have become president or to make Governor Sarah Palin the first female vice president are also historic but not on the scale of electing Senator Barack Obama as President and, as his Vice President, Senator Joe Biden (who moved that historic Congress motion for the unconditional release of saint Nelson Mandela from prison that was voted down by some who must now be obviously regretting the way that they had voted down that motion that signified American sound judgment).
Of course, it is not just because the candidate is ‘Black’; he is also incredibly good with sound policies, a solid team behind his successful ground-breaking campaign and with a rallying call for meaningful change that energized millions of voters. In fact, Obama is not even black since all ‘Black’ people are really brown in color; just as ‘White’ people are, without exception, not white but pink in color; just as Asians are far from being ‘Yellow’, for that matter.
It just so happens that the people called ‘Black’ in America have had a peculiar history that makes the voting on November the 4th more symbolic and more significant as a chance to make history by voting for Obama. That is probably why many Americans are yet to make up their minds how to vote on that day, they are probably weighing the enormity of the historical responsibility riding on those votes that they are about to cast. But as Americans like to say, this historic choice is really a no-brainer.
History tells us that the majority of pragmatic Americans would choose to make history by voting Obama-Biden overwhelmingly. And long after the votes are counted and recounted to be certain that all votes were properly tallied, proud Americans would seek to hold the first black president accountable by offering support, criticism, policies, prayers and services to help make sure that their votes would be more than symbolic since they could also help to make his regime one of the most epochal and most successful presidencies ever. The rest of the world would be happy to oblige with admiration for a good example of American democracy. You Go Americans. Si Se Pueda!
Dr. Biko Agozino is Professor of Sociology, Criminology Unit Coordinator and Deputy Dean for Graduate Studies and Research, Faculty of Social Sciences, The University of the West Indies, St. Augustine, Trinidad and Tobago. bagozino@yahoo.com or onwubiko.agozino@sta.uwi.edu
To leave a comment or read more on my web log, please go to:
http://massliteracy.blogspot.com/
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Willie Lynch Failed
How to Free the Enslaved
Dear Children,
You may be wondering why I sent you the Willie Lynch speech for discussion. The reason is that some people believe that his fear-envy-distrust methods still work today to prevent black men from being true men and to prevent black men and black women from building healthy families. There are no chains around our feet (as Bob Marley sang) but if we suffer from mental slavery, then we are not yet free from slavery. The key to freedom is therefore the mind or the awareness that we are not yet free. The speech emphasized that the way to maintain slavery is to weaken the mind of the men and keep them physically strong.
That method failed because our ancestors maintained a strong mind and we are lucky today to have strong minds of our own to protect and advance our freedom. In other words, we must use all the educational opportunities available to us to make our minds stronger so that no one would enslave our people ever again. The slave-holders failed in their attempts to weaken our minds, we owe it to ourselves to make sure that we do not allow our minds to grow weaker. So education is the key to our freedom and equality as human beings, we must take it seriously.
No matter how strong a person is physically, if he is not well educated, then he will be a servant to people who are weaker physically but wiser. The most famous people in the world are not the strongest but often the wisest. Human beings are not as strong as many wild animals but human beings are more dominant because of our intelligence, unity, creativity, courage and love.
The speech of Willie Lynch also said that a good way to dominate black people is to keep us divided by making the young fight against the old, making women fight against the men and making the light-skinned fight against the dark-skinned. They try to keep us divided by making us distrust one another and only trust the slave-holder. Again the method failed woefully because our people still retain the respect that we show to elders, our men and our women continue to love one another and we love all people who are good to our people no matter what skin complexion they have. This means that we must love all (our) people and maintain our unity in order to prevent others from enslaving us ever again.
Willie Lynch talked about black people as if we were horses to be broken down and controlled. He assumed that if you humiliate a black man in the presence of his woman or children, then the woman and the children will never show respect to the man again. The good news is that black people are not horses, we are human beings and no amount of effort to humiliate us or turn us into wild beasts would succeed.
Again, education, love and unity will prevent anyone from treating us like beasts of burden. Horses do not speak a language but Mr Lynch called for our languages to be destroyed and replaced with a deceptive language which says that ‘our crops’ are not really our crops but those of the slave-master. Again, this has not succeeded because our people know that we need to study and work smatter to create wealth for ourselves because their wealth is not really ours.
So my beloved children, do not let anyone stop you from getting the best education possible, do not let anyone make you to hate your elders, do not let anyone make you to hate your women, do not let anyone make you to judge anyone based on the colour of the skin rather than the content of the character. Develop your minds by reading histories and biographies, science and philosophy and not only fiction, develop a scientific mind by asking questions, develop your language skills by speaking publicly about what you need without fear, speak up for the voiceless, show love to everyone and support justice and fairness and no one will ever enslave you. Keep writing too.
Lots of love.
Dad
Dear Children,
You may be wondering why I sent you the Willie Lynch speech for discussion. The reason is that some people believe that his fear-envy-distrust methods still work today to prevent black men from being true men and to prevent black men and black women from building healthy families. There are no chains around our feet (as Bob Marley sang) but if we suffer from mental slavery, then we are not yet free from slavery. The key to freedom is therefore the mind or the awareness that we are not yet free. The speech emphasized that the way to maintain slavery is to weaken the mind of the men and keep them physically strong.
That method failed because our ancestors maintained a strong mind and we are lucky today to have strong minds of our own to protect and advance our freedom. In other words, we must use all the educational opportunities available to us to make our minds stronger so that no one would enslave our people ever again. The slave-holders failed in their attempts to weaken our minds, we owe it to ourselves to make sure that we do not allow our minds to grow weaker. So education is the key to our freedom and equality as human beings, we must take it seriously.
No matter how strong a person is physically, if he is not well educated, then he will be a servant to people who are weaker physically but wiser. The most famous people in the world are not the strongest but often the wisest. Human beings are not as strong as many wild animals but human beings are more dominant because of our intelligence, unity, creativity, courage and love.
The speech of Willie Lynch also said that a good way to dominate black people is to keep us divided by making the young fight against the old, making women fight against the men and making the light-skinned fight against the dark-skinned. They try to keep us divided by making us distrust one another and only trust the slave-holder. Again the method failed woefully because our people still retain the respect that we show to elders, our men and our women continue to love one another and we love all people who are good to our people no matter what skin complexion they have. This means that we must love all (our) people and maintain our unity in order to prevent others from enslaving us ever again.
Willie Lynch talked about black people as if we were horses to be broken down and controlled. He assumed that if you humiliate a black man in the presence of his woman or children, then the woman and the children will never show respect to the man again. The good news is that black people are not horses, we are human beings and no amount of effort to humiliate us or turn us into wild beasts would succeed.
Again, education, love and unity will prevent anyone from treating us like beasts of burden. Horses do not speak a language but Mr Lynch called for our languages to be destroyed and replaced with a deceptive language which says that ‘our crops’ are not really our crops but those of the slave-master. Again, this has not succeeded because our people know that we need to study and work smatter to create wealth for ourselves because their wealth is not really ours.
So my beloved children, do not let anyone stop you from getting the best education possible, do not let anyone make you to hate your elders, do not let anyone make you to hate your women, do not let anyone make you to judge anyone based on the colour of the skin rather than the content of the character. Develop your minds by reading histories and biographies, science and philosophy and not only fiction, develop a scientific mind by asking questions, develop your language skills by speaking publicly about what you need without fear, speak up for the voiceless, show love to everyone and support justice and fairness and no one will ever enslave you. Keep writing too.
Lots of love.
Dad
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