Those who came into this
world from the 80s upwards
and are not into music, may not
know who James Brown was. He
was the quintessential musician
and showman; one of the best
performers of his generation. I
can almost imagine the nostalgic
smiles on the faces of those of my
generation as they remember JB
– the ‘hardest working man in
showbiz’ as he liked to call
himself – and his many hit songs.
At a point, almost all his songs
became hit songs and youths of
the 60s and 70s avidly collected
them irrespective of colour. Even
then, there were hits within hits.
And a song like ‘It’s a man’s
world’ will always be an
evergreen. He was more than a
musician however. He was also a
black icon who tried to use his
enormous influence to awake the
consciousness in Blacks all over
the world but especially in
America. His song ‘Say it loud, I
am black and proud’ was about
the ‘loudest’ of the
songs he used to
send his message of
black awareness.
I was probably
caught up in the
black consciousness
of the sixties and
seventies when I
wrote a poem titled
‘White is for leprosy’.
I was in my teens.
The poem was about
kids playing outside
in the park. The
black kids were so
proud of their
luxuriant black skin
that they saw the
‘paleness’ of the
white skin as a
disease. They
jokingly and
derisively pointed to the white
kids and asked a parent if the
white kids had leprosy. I had
never seen a leper before I wrote
the poem. All I knew was how the
Bible described a leper. The Good
Book said his skin was ‘as white
as snow’. Hence the title of the
poem. In my young mind, I was
hoping for the time when our
melanin rich skin would be seen as
an advantage rather than a
disadvantage; when those of the
black skin would pity rather than
envy those with the white skin. It
was a futuristic poem which
envisioned such a time when Blacks
would have come to their own in
the affairs of the
world and be more
confident of their
skin colour.
The poem was
written about fifty
years ago. It is sad
that nothing much
has changed in the
way the black skin
and what it covers
is regarded. It is
even sadder that
people of my
generation are not
likely to witness
any significant
change. The dream
for the future that
the poem was
wrapped around is
still a pipe dream.
Last year marked
another watershed
in the battle over race
discrimination with the killing of
George Floyd. Sports that had
significant black representative
forced the world to pause and
acknowledge the injustice Blacks
face on an everyday basis. This led
to some multinationals making
sympathetic noises and effecting
cosmetic changes. But nothing
fundamental has changed as the
recent shootings in America have
shown. In my mind, nothing
fundamental will change until
Blacks get more comfortable in their
own skin – forgive the pun- and stop
chasing the White calendar and
milestones. The narrative that
white is good and black is evil has
to be changed. The notion that only
Whites can define what civilisation
is has to be expunged. The mindset
that Blacks are inherently
inferior to Whites has to be
adjusted. None of these
assumptions is based on truth and
so must be challenged. The lie that
some White explorers discovered
Africa is just what it is; a lie. The
history of the world has always been
written by Whites. It is time for
Blacks to visit the past and begin
to write their own story.
We are told that civilisation
started from Africa. What happened
to that civilisation? Blacks had
learnt to fend for themselves
according to the dictates of the
time. They learnt to feed
themselves; they learnt to heal
themselves; they learnt what herbs
to use for difficult child births; they
learnt to defend themselves by
‘fortifying’ their bodies against the
weapons of their time – knives,
machete, arrows and Dane guns.
They developed their own
recreation and their art forms. But
it was in the area of spiritual
prowess that our forefathers had an
edge. They learnt the power of the
spoken word and used the power to
magical effects. They could speak to
the elements and be obeyed. Some
could disappear from a dangerous
scene and reappear elsewhere. Our
‘masters’ didn’t understand these
powers. And because they didn’t
understand, they feared them and
labelled them evil. We believed them
just because they said so. So we lost
our knowledge, we lost our mysticism,
we lost our potency, we lost our
spirituality, we lost our edge. We
allowed them to define good and evil
on their terms.
Despite the passage of time, our
leaders still look up to the West. It
must stop. Despite past
marginalisation and manipulation,
some of our people still believe in the
goodness of the West. It is wishful
thinking. We have to stop relying on
the West for our every need. It is a
beggarly mentality. We must look
inwards and develop those things that
are unique to us. Like a good chess
player, we must objectively appraise
our strengths and deploy them. We
must look at our assets and seek to
develop rather than exploit them. We
must seek to feed ourselves and
educate our minds. All other forms of
‘civilisation’ will follow. The earlier we
can wean ourselves off age-old
attachments, the better for the Black
race. The first battle to be won is the
battle of the mind – our minds have
to be at the right place – and we
desperately need the set of leaders
who can help us achieve this. For
Blacks all over the world to be
respected, Africa as a continent must
earn respect.
One can imagine for example how
Blacks all over the world would feel if
the most efficacious Covid-19
medicine or vaccine was developed in
Africa by Africans. It would have been
a defining moment. Instead, we are
typically waiting for the West to heal
itself and send the left-over crumbs
to us. Or worse, we are waiting for
them to tell us why we have survived
the worst of the virus when it has
brought the rest of the world,
especially the ‘mighty West’, to its
knees. Why can’t we tell our own
Covid-19 story?