- Feb 27, 2007
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Ankhur,
In my view, the title...Father of Pan-Africanism...is not in dispute, just being shared, based on the record. As previously stated, I have no dog in this hunt and respect both Brothers equally.
The "dog" I have is called confusion. Confusion leads to conflict, un-necessary conflict.
One of the biggest obstacles to African Unification is rooted in what has risen from the ideas of Blyden. No matter how you look at it, Blyden's ideas are rooted in his white preacher. That is the problem we have with Blydenism. We take ideas that have been planted in our community by our enemies. And, because men like Blyden preach those ideas, we think thay are African ideas. They are not African ideas and values.
No. What Blyden is actually the father of is absolutely not Pan-Africanism which is a geo-polotical theory. There is no point in me trying to soft peddle this fact. Blyden was an advocate of white racism with a black face. What we must understand is that racism preached by a black African is still racism, not Pan-Africanism.
Blyedn's ideas, at best, formed what became known as "negritude". "Negritude" is currently peddled under the label of "afrocentricity". Neither "afrocentricity nor "negritude" is Pan-Africanism. Both are based on racism and/or ethnocentrism. Pan-Africanism is not racism and it is not ethnocentrism.
Blyden was a high official in the Liberian government. While the founders of Liberia had some good and positive ideas about Africa, many had perverted ideas towards Africans and Africanness. I am now inclined that most if not all of these perverted ideas come from a perverted religion called Christianity.
Look at it this way. The American Colonization Society was controlled mainly by whiite Europeans, not Africans. They wanted to get Africans out of America to make this white man's country more of a white man's country. So, they supported the colonization of Liberia.
Most of the colonizers were supported by American Christians and missionaries. So, their idea was to impose Christianity on west Africans. Keep in mind that Islam was and is the main religion in west Africa. So, to impose Christianity is bound to bring conflict. And, it did.
Early on, Liberia was very similar to what we have now in the zionost monstrocity of israel. The settlers wanted to impose western religion, namely Christianity, on Muslims. So, they set up a power structure in which only western Christians could participate. This meant that native Africans could not exercise their political and civil rights. Only so-called Americos could have political power. And what did they do with it? They used it to give African lands and resources to white western Euroepans, especially Firestone Company. It is precisely this model that is the basis on neo-colonialism, not Pan-Africanism, and it is the major obstacle to Unification in Africa.
Firestone got with started a rubber plantation around 1900 in Liberia. Later, it was determined that "The Plantation workers allege, among other things, that they remain trapped by poverty and coercion on a frozen-in-time Plantation operated by Firestone in a manner identical to how the Plantation was operated when it was first opened by Firestone in 1926." And, it gets worse: "...Firestone managers in Liberia admitted that the company does not effectively monitor its own policy prohibiting child labor." And worse: "... also noted that workers' housing provided by Firestone has not been renovated since the houses were constructed in the 1920s and 1930s."
Let us not fool ourselves, the problems created by Bldenism in Liberia contributed directed to the Liberian Civil War and the same things in Sierre Leone, Ivory Coast and now Guinea. An army sargeant rose up overthrew the Blydenism goverment of Liberia. He executed the Unlce Tom leaders. And, this eventually led to civil war. And this civil war spread to surrounding countries.
So, I do not take this issue about about Blyden ligtly at all. The jury is taill out on how this will ultimately work out. I think the current president of Liberia is trying hard to get the country on the right track. But, she must deals with the Blyden demons to do so. And, elections are scheduled for June in Guinea. The end of militray rule in Guinea is a positve step. But, if it brings Blydenism back to power, we will see more warfare all over west Africa, including Nigeria.