Essays on Pan-Africanism

Shiraz Durrani

Description

Essays on Pan-Africanism begins with essays by Shiraz Durrani, Abdilatif Abdulla, Issa Shivji, Firoze Manji, Sabatho Nyamsenda, Willy Mutunga and Noosim Naimasiah on various aspects of Pan-Africanism. This is followed by Remembering the Champions of African Liberation, with articles on Patrice Lumumba by Antoine Lokongo, Abdulrahman Babu by Amrit Wilson, Makhan Singh by Hindpal Singh and Piyo Rattansi, followed by Tajudeen Abdul Raheem's last Pan African Postcard (2009) and Debating and Documenting Africa - A Conversation. The Preface, Pan-African Thought, is by Prof. Issa Shivji. The book incorporates Karim Essack's compilation, The Pan African Path (1993) with historical records and documents on Pan-African history, with a new Preface by Prof. Issa Shivji. The final section has documents on Pan-Africanism, including the Kampala Declaration (1994)

Sujets

• African Studies
• Ethnic Studies
• African
• HISTORY
• POLITICAL SCIENCE
• Histoire
• África
• Postcolonialism
• African people
• Pan-Africanism
• General officer
• Social sciences
• History of Africa
• World
• General
• Africa

Informations

• Publié par: Vita Books
• Date de parution: 22 février 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9789914992106
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 30 Mo

Extrait

Published in 2022.
Vita Books
P.O. Box 62501-00200
Nairobi. Kenya
http://vitabooks.co.ke
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Distributed Worldwide by:
African Books Collective
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ISBN 978-9914-9875-6-0 (Paper)
ISBN 978-9914-9921-0-6 (eBook)
© 2022 Individual authors
Photos and illustrations: those who made them available to Vita Books.
Design and layout by Brian Rowa
Cell: [phone]
[e-mail]
iiKwame Nkurumah
Patrice Lumumba
Credit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan-Africanism
Credit: delgado jones
https://www.pinterest.co.uk/delgado6005/lumumba/
Essays on Pan-Africanism
iiiivContents
PART 1 3
PREFACE: Prof. Issa Shivji: Towards a Resurgence of the Pan-African Thought 3
Shiraz Durrani: Forward to a Socialist Pan-African Movement 9
Abdilatif Abdulla: Kuhusu Mwanamajumui (2020) 20
Abdilatif Abdulla: About Pan-Africanism (2020) 23
Issa G. Shivji: Pan-Africanism in Mwalimu Nyerere’s Thought (2009) 26
Firoze Manji: Pambazuka News: A Progressive Pan-African Movement (2006) 40
Sabatho Nyamsenda: Umajumui wa Afrika: Kurunzi la Mapambano (2021) 49
Sabatho Nyamsenda: Pan-Africanism (2021) 55
Noosim Naimasiah: Azimio La Elimu (2017) 61
Debating and Documenting Africa: A Conversation (2008) 70
Willy Mutunga: Pan-African Jurisprudence for the Liberation of Africa (2018) 87
Remembering the Champions of African Liberation
Antoine Roger Lokongo: Patrice Lumumba’s Relevance (2013) 108
Amrit Wilson: Remembering Abdul Rehman Babu (2021) 114
Hindpal Singh: Makhan Singh: Father of TU and a Great Freedom Fighter (2016) 127
Piyo Rattansi: On Makhan Singh (2006) 130
Tajudeen Abdul-Raheem: City Beautification is Destroying Livelihoods (2009) 131
BIODATA OF AUTHORS 136
PART 2: The Pan African Path: The Road To Liberation
Karrim Essack: The Pan African Path: The Road To Liberation 144
PREFACE: Prof. Issa Shivji: The Enigmatic Essack 145
A Tribute to Cde. Karrim Essack by his brother and a fellow freedom fighter 147
1. Goals of Pan Africanism By I. Bunting [Vincent Harding] 165
2. Pioneers of Pan Africanism: David Walker & Martin Decany
[Vincent Harding] 171
3. Marcus Garvey By Marie Shaba 184
4. The Fifth Pan African Congress - Manchester - 1945 191
5. Ideological Thrust at the Sixth Pan African Congress 195
6. The Period From 1974 to the Eve of the Seventh Pan African Congress 217
Annexure. From: 7th Pan Afri can News, May 1993 230
PART 3: Documentation of Pan-Africanism
The Kampala Declaration (1994) 245
Mwakenya’s Statement (1994) 252
Photo Documentation, 7th Pan-african Congress, Kampala (1994) 257
Vincent Harding (1981): There Is A River: The Struggle For
Freedom in America 261
12PART 1: Essays on Pan-Africanism
PREFACE: Prof. Issa Shivji: Towards a Resurgence of the Pan-African
Thought
This volume contains essays on Pan-Africanism written by Pan-Africanist
intellectuals at various times. It incorporates a book compiled by Karim
never become dated for the desire of global Africans for Freedom continues
African Thought began over a century and half ago spearheaded by
AfricanAmericans and African-Caribbean. The birth of the Pan-African Thought
was an important turning point in the struggle for African Freedom, who’s
dramatic expression on the world stage was the Haitian Revolution led by the
great Black revolutionary Toussaint Louverture over three centuries ago. Just
as the Haitian Revolution was part of the long human struggle for freedom,
so is the Pan-African Thought part of the ubiquitous human conversation on
national liberation and social emancipation, rarely acknowledged as such
by the dominant Eurocentric discourse which is blinded by the pigment of
the skin and dipped in the blood of capitalist plunder and pillage.
turns, retreat and resurgence, confusion and clarity, celebrated and demonised
in equal measure by Africans themselves as much as by imperialist thought
marauders.
The Pan-African struggle may be broadly divided into three phases. The
be recognised as equal human beings. The discourse of resistance was
dominantly couched in anti-racist racial language and idiom. Roughly, the
four Congresses were attended primarily by the African Diaspora under
the leadership of such Pan-Africanist giants as W.E.B. Dubois and George
Padmore, there was a strong presence of Africans from the continent -
including Nkrumah, Kenyatta, Ras Makonnen, Hastings Banda – at the
Fifth Congress. The Congress was marked by unambiguous resolutions
362demanding independence and self-determination, condemning imperialist
oppression and capitalist exploitation and charting out the movement
forward to build a social-democratic United Africa.
Armed with the Pan-Africanist thought Kwame Nkrumah returned to
Ghana, West Africa. His initial aim was to create a West African
Federation but he had to have a base. In Ghana he led the independence
struggle. In 1957, Ghana became the first Black independent country. In
describing it as a revolution, C. L. R. James may have overstated his case,
nonetheless it was an earth-shaking event. Nyerere called Ghana “our first
liberated zone”. Following independence, Nkrumah steadfastly occupied
himself to liberate the rest of Africa and to advance the cause of African
unity driven by the Pan-Africanist ideology. With the help of George
Padmore, he organised a number of African People’s Conferences attended
by liberation movements, African trade unions and intellectuals. This series
of conferences was taken over by the conferences of states, which
eventually resulted in the formation of the Organisation of African Unity
(OAU). For Nkrumah who advocated for the immediate formation of the
United States of Africa, OAU was a compromise. Nkrumah believed that
once the independent African states had consolidated themselves, political
classes would have vested interest in maintaining their sovereignties from
which they benefitted and African unity would become a distant dream. In
many ways, he proved to be prophetic. To this day we still remain disunited
in what Nyerere used to call Vinchi or statelets.
and for African unity like Nkrumah. In a military coup engineered by the
CIA, Nkrumah was overthrown in 1966.
Another great paragon of Pan-Africanism in the post-independence period
was undoubtedly Julius Nyerere. While both of them were unquestionably
their approaches. Nyerere believed in building unity step by step, possibly
proceeding to continental unity through regional integration of whatever
kind. Nkrumah considered regional integration as balkanisation of Africa
on a grander scale. Moreover, as both Nkrumah and Nyerere recognised,
imperialism would use separate African states against each other. They
have been proved right. Today, both on continental and regional levels we
remain divided. And the rise of the new crop of narrow nationalists who
thrive on dividing their people along ethnic, tribal and religious lines have
473no purchase on Pan-Africanism, even as a vision. The last African leader,
who in his own somewhat eccentric fashion expounded the cause of
Panerstwhile imperial forces led by the USA. Ironically at the time, the USA
I believe we are now in the third phase in the evolution of Pan-Africanism,
the phase of social emancipation. In some way, Nkrumah foreshadowed the
third phase in his book Class Struggle in Africa written in exile in Guinea.
Admittedly, the book is somewhat schematic and suffers from
over-generalisations. Nonetheless, it shows that Nkrumah had begun to
move away from the national to the class question or, more accurately,
subordinate the national to the class question. The main question of the first
phase – equality and dignity – and the question of the second phase –
national liberation - remain unresolved. The rise of the Black Lives Matter
movement shows once again that the question of equality and dignity is far
from being realised. State nationalism of the immediate post-colonial
period also failed to resolve the question of national liberation. African
territorial nationalism could not withstand the ideological onslaught and,
much less, the economic dictates of neo-liberalism. The ethno-nationalism
of what could tentatively be described as post-neoliberal period has no
vision of Pan-Africanism or a consistent programme of national liberation
beyond glib rhetoric and demagoguery. Stuck in the rhetoric of
development and economic diplomacy narrow (resource) nationalists
fail to see that development itself is a political question. If only they
understood the deep meaning of Mwalimu Nyerere’s concept that
development is a rebellion for it projects a total transformation of economic
structures and social relations! In sum, the phase of social emancipation has
to address all the three questions in an integrated way in different degrees
of intensity depending on concrete conditions.
I believe that the ideology to lead us in the third phase of struggle is New
Pan-Africanism. We have to revisit and refurbish Pan-Africanism. While
there cannot be a text-book blue print of New Pan-Africanism, we can
perhaps suggest some of its salient features.
The New Pan-Africanism must be:
• Thoroughly and consistently anti-imperialist. Its anti-imperialism
must be grounded in a deep understanding of global and local forces
and the various manifestations of imperialist ideology including its
584subordinate and subservient variants like Zionism, racism, sexism,
homophobia, xenophobia and all kinds of fundamentalisms, including
market fundamentalism.
• Thoroughly and consistently pr