Why is Africa so backward from the rest of the world?

 While walking in the loneliness of the night yesterday, returning home from viewing center, I was having similar thought in mind, mine was more of: what's wrong with the black man?, why do we thrive so much on greed?, why do we see ourselves as inferior?, why does the white man think himself a superior being to the black man?... All these questions kept resonating in my mind, couple with some reasons as to why this is. I may never fully understand this, but I bet It had it's strong hold in colonialism.

Whether we like it or not, colonialism did so much damage to Africans, not just physically, but also mentally. And that mental damage seems to have been passed down and is being reenforced by neo-colonialism antics. You see, the white man still thrives on the antics of divide and conquer(if you read "How Europe underdeveloped Africa" by Walter Rodney, you'd understand), and this is the reason why they control every aspects of our lives, from the media to religion, education, and even changing the very fabric of our culture. Now, it's not easy to escape from this kind of mental entrapment, it is an anchor keeping us from forging ahead, from realizing and profiting from the vast potential of the African continent.

As Africans we need to disabuse, invaginate, rediscover ourselves again. A sort of spiritual babtism, unfortunately getting educated has not helped much, if anything, it's one of the tool of the bourgeoisie to keep our minds under lock and key. But, we need to begin to use a reverse tactics to decolonize our minds. We need spiritual reawakening, we need to take control of our education, our media, we need to see religion as a  personal thing not a we thing, we need to imbibe a  Pan-African consciousness in every facets of our lives. This is how we change the narrative.

How we go about these(as mentioned above) is entirely up to the individual and the collective, we must ask ourselves; what kind of Africa do we want for our children unborn?. That question right there, is the sort of questions the American founding fathers had in mind. 

The damage was done long time ago, and it's still being done in a much subtle way today. However, we must grow the consciousness of resistance within. Maybe we need an African Che Guevara (smiles). We sure do, but the revolution this time has to be mutually exclusive, that's the kind they cannot fight. The world is more interconnected today than it has ever been, a global village. We had the now defunct OAU, later replaced with AU just like EU, this organization was(is) supposed to lead the rebirth of Africa, oh less I forgot, it was the idea of the imperialist to keep Africa in check, and the African leadership has maintained decorum since then, refusing to challenge the very power keeping Africa from ever flourishing.

The imperialist knew something about the black man; his love for material possession and greed. They've exploited this weakness, creating division amongst us, and getting rid of anyone who dares the status quo. How come this antiquated antics is still being deployed on Africans today, as it was deployed on our ancestors?... Perhaps, the answer to that question is not far-fetched, maybe we need to defeat the enemy within, maybe we need to learn to put the community first, maybe we need to learn to treat each other with dignity, maybe we need to develop a Pan-African consciousness, where we show the true spirit of Africa to the rest of the world.

Africa is the cradle of civilization, the rest of the world has its root in Africa, hence we must begin to take a sense of pride in that, and utilize our god-given potential without fear or favour. Africa is self-sufficient, this was the aura of early Africans before the arrival of the imperialists and the Arabs. We must reclaim that sense of pride in-that the ancient Timbuktu was a cradle of knowledge, from Mali to Egypt, to the great Benin kingdom, a marvel of civilization in its own right. From the Zambezi to the Volta, from the Nile, the river Niger, the Kilimanjaro, to the great Kikuyu, Africa is more than a geographical sphere, it is the labyrinth of humanity. We're the touch bearer, so we must begin to imbibe the consciousness of the touch bearer, for that is a responsibility, and it's no ordinary one.

It's got to be a mental rebirth.

_Tahir Usman_