AFRICA DAY

I just found out the other day that tomorrow, May 25, is Africa Day. I can hear your collective yawns. So what, you must be thinking… well, I wondered the same thing. Apparently it was originally a day to commemorate the founding of the Organisation of African Unity, which later was succeeded by the African Union.

The African Union is “based on the common vision of a united and strong Africa and on the need to build a partnership between governments and all segments of civil society, in particular women, youth and the private sector, in order to strengthen solidarity and cohesion amongst the peoples of Africa”.

Beyond the AU mission statement, African Day has become about celebrating not only our unity, but the things that make us African and the uniqueness of our continent. Africa Day is supposed to be about acknowledging the good stuff and finding ways to make life better for all Africans everywhere. We need a huge dose of good luck, because I am hearing only bad news on Radio Africa… I love that song. If you are below a certain age you will be thinking: what song? The group that sang Radio Africa was called Latin Quarter – the babies can look it up on the Internet.

Latin Quarter made their hit in 1985 and one of the lines mentions Mugabe…. funny how Comrade Bob is still calling the shots over 20 years later. But then, that is just classic Africa, isn’t it? Life presidents, puppet governments, lousy opposition parties and all.

Africa has had a few tough decades with interference from our not-so-neighbourly neighbouring continents. And while the neighbours appear to be trying to make up for the bad times, conspiracy theories abound on how they are now colonising our minds since they no longer have legal access to our bodies. Maybe, maybe not. What is clear is that we have failed to learn key lessons about taking care of ourselves. We can be like penguins in a hole, looking up with our mouths open, waiting for someone to throw us a free fish.

And when the free fish comes, do you know what we do with it? We spirit it out of the warehouses and go and sell it. Yes, I have seen free donated medicines being sold on the open market. And then whatever cannot be peddled will rot on the shelves – if we cannot get cash for it, then no one can have it.

But there is some good news. Watching National Geographic and similar nature broadcasters will tell you that we are spared a lot of Nature’s horror. Winters, tsunamis, earthquakes, volcanoes, hurricanes, tornadoes, locusts… Nature seems to be giving us the head start that technology did not. It absolutely broke my heart to hear that we’d actually consider cutting down an amazing natural forest to plant sugar cane so that the children of our nation can grow fat and unhealthy on sugar while the wallets of a select few grow fat and healthy. That was one of the lowest points of many.

While we have the rhythm and the drums and the amazing ability not to get sunburnt, Nature has been so good to us that we are fat and lazy and self-pitying. And when the wind blows, it bends us. It makes us steal and cheat and cut corners. You cannot trust a relative to manage your little business without ripping you off; you cannot trust your MP to open his mouth on your behalf the whole year in Parliament and you cannot trust the powers that be to punish those who steal from public funds. No one is really thinking of God and country in my part of Africa.

However, the happy reality is that the rest of the world got the technology, but now they are trying to get back to nature, while we got the nature and we are killing it to get the technology. We have the chance to learn from the mistakes of the rest of the world and tailor Africa whichever way we want. We are staring big fat opportunity in the face right now. It is a great time to be African – will you open your eyes and see it?

Published on Sunday May 24, 2009