….the key to development lies in men's minds, in the institutions in which their thinking finds expression and in the play of opportunity on ideas and institutions, 2 Caincross, (1961)

I believe that our concern at this colloquium is to consider how to give the present and future generations of Africans in Africa and in other continents access to the contributions of Africans, in their varied locations – to knowledge and to the development of humanity in diverse spheres of existence. We want to give Africans access to the creations of the minds of their forebears, and to propagate such in a way that gives dignity and enrichment to their lives and living. We want to cultivate in our peoples within and outside Africa empathy and respect for the enduring legacies from the past, and build upon such legacies to psychologically equip our peoples to face the challenges of living in a globalising world, a world which, as some, say, is characterised by a clash of civilisations

Africans need to confront the challenges of globalisation with integrity and respectability. To do this, we Africans have to convert our contributions, past and present, into social capital, which could be mobilised, collaboratively, to promote socio-economic and political development of our peoples across the various regions of the world. We need to know and understand ourselves and the rest of the world through cultivating and propagating knowledge of the contributions of Africans to humanity in the areas of art and technology, governance, customs, morality, religion and world views. In doing this, we need, to be realistic, to keep open the lines of communication which permit us to get a balanced view of the greatest creations of mankind as a whole.

It has been rightly observed that properly studied, and taught, we will find that the history of Africa will shed light on the historical unity of Africa and its relations with other continents, particularly the Americas and the Caribbean. A. Adu Boahen stated correctly that…

…For a long time, the creative manifestations of the descendants of Africans in the Americas were lumped together by some historians as a heterogeneous collection of Africanisms.…

However, the right approach to the study of the history of Africa leads to the appreciation of the fact that

…the resistance of the slaves shipped to America, the constant and massive participation of the descendants of Africans in the struggle for the initial independence of America and in national liberation movements, are rightly perceived for what they were: vigorous assertions of identity, which helped forge the universal concept of mankind…it is now quite clear that ways of feeling, thinking, dreaming and acting in certain nations of the western hemisphere have been marked by their African heritage. The cultural inheritance of Africa is visible everywhere, from the southern United States to northern Brazil , across the Caribbean and on the Pacific seaboard. In certain places it even underpins the cultural identity of some of the most important elements of the population.

…the efforts of the peoples of Africa to conquer or strengthen their independence, secure their development and assert their cultural characteristics, must be rooted in historical awareness, renewed, keenly felt and taken up by each succeeding generation….3

•  Adu Boahen (ed.), 1965, pp. xxii-xxiii

Pan-Africanism as an intercontinental and international movement, came into existence in response to, and was driven by the type of inspirations which I have just sketched out. Pan-Africanism was a response to the gruelling challenges that confronted Africans in Africa and in the Diaspora in the age of triumphal racism expressed in direct colonisation and imperialism as well as humiliating social existence under apartheid regimes in different regions of the world.

…Pan-Africanism was a major force which provided intellectual foundations and organisational skills for the anti-colonial movements in Africa and in the Diaspora. Pan-Africanism provided a common platform and common fronts for Africans in Africa and those in the Diaspora to fight against the debilitating scourge of slavery and colonialism – both undergirded by racism. Pan-Africanism was concerned with regaining not only the sovereignty and independence, as well as personal liberties of Africans across continents; but also of the dignity of the African personality.

The purpose of this paper is not to write a history of Pan-Africanism as ideology and movements. Many scholarly works have already been produced on the subject, even when we recognize the need for further research for the benefit of our peoples. I present in this paper some highlights on the ideology and its expression in different movements which contributed immensely to the decolonization processes in Africa, and the Caribbean, and to the attainment of personal liberties, human and citizen rights in the United States of America – and in parts of South America .

The highlights are aimed at providing a model and an inspiration for action by our generation who are confronted with challenges as the world is being rapidly transformed into a unipolar one, with assimilating control of the West, under the captaincy of the United States of America (with Europe as allies) and with Western economic, political and cultural dominance being propelled by overwhelming technological superiority and military power.

The increasing appreciation of the rest of the world that the emergent power relations could translate into a new era of Western “imperialism”, based on science and technology and finance capital, has led to different reactions in other cultural regions of the world. Reactions to the globalization processes have led some analysts to the perception of Clash of Civilizations.

I believe that Africans can build upon the legacy of Pan-Africanism, but re-contextualize it to develop appropriate policy tools with which, like the earlier Pan-Africanists, they could collaborate to protect their sovereignty, cultures, human and citizen rights, and mobilize in various ways to work together to develop their states, nationality groups and communities across the continents.

Pan-Africanism was first and foremost concerned with self-discovery, and regaining respectability and dignity of the African peoples, and building upon the re-established identity, to pool resources for economic and social development of African states and societies. Hence, the concern of the leading lights of the Pan-African movement with such grandiose schemes that were propagated notably by William Du Bois and Marcus Garvey .

William Du Bois and Marcus Garvey mobilised intellectuals, politically articulate individuals, and social groups from the United States , the Caribbean and Africa, and worked with Africans who were in different capitals in Europe , to achieve their goals. They shared the vision, even when they differed on methods, that “Africans at home and abroad” should “be given an opportunity in life to develop themselves to the highest”.

Michael Manley extolled Garvey 's intellectual contribution to twentieth century national liberation movements which stemmed from his insistence that “the capacity to demand freedom must begin first of all with a process of inner psychological liberation”, his “perception of destiny” based on “a spirit of self-reliance…” 4

The first Pan-Africanists experienced hostile reactions from the dominant powers in colonial Africa, Caribbean, and from the white supremacists in the United States and South America . That was a reflection of the eternal truth in action – that those who exercise dominion over others never willingly let their victims go. Hence, the necessity for struggle on the part of the oppressed.

The battle cry that “Africa Must be free” and “Africa Must Unite” not only influenced notable African leaders like Kwame Nkrumah and Julius Nyerere, its impact was obvious in the events which led to the formation of “ the Organization of African Unity” (OAU) now being transformed into African Union (AU). Essien Udom points out the impact of these ideas on the thought of Kwame Nkrumah saying that

“ Africa Must be free ” and “ African Must Unite ” are also titles of Nkrumah 's books. He notes that

…To both Garvey and Nkrumah these aspirations meant the liberation of Africa and the African diaspora, and cooperation between them, not only for their advancement, but for the advancement of mankind as a whole” 5

We need to be reminded that Pan-Africanism was built and articulated upon intellectual foundation and respect for knowledge for the promotion of self-identity and respect for the African personality. Of Garvey , Essiem-Udom writes

I am convinced that his thoughts issued from a profound philosophical frame of reference and an unparalleled faith in man as man. Furthermore, Garveyism is a disciplined philosophy and I suspect that his method of protest was probably determined and limited by it.

He had an undying faith in the infinite possibilities of human intelligence for the highest possible achievements. He wrote, “Nature's endowment is prolific and grand. The assumption and firm belief is that there is no human limit. The only limit is transgression of Divinity”…. He believed unswervingly that intellectual capabilities are common to all men: “The creative source of life made common intelligence, something that is the possession of every man”… Human freedom issues from this “unique sovereignty” in man, the capacity to think and reason – the bulwark against tyranny. His optimism and belief in reason is revealed in his assessment of the future of tyrannical rule in the apartheid Republic of South Africa: “Fools that they are, who know not that prison bars cannot deaden or kill the souls and minds of men; fools that they are, who do not realise that there is no power on earth to suppress the hopes of man”.

It is a measure of his greatness that one can relate to his ideas according to one's understanding and needs, and that many of his essential ideas are just as valid today for Africa and the African disaspora. 6

Essien-Udom, ibid

Immanuel Geis ' analysis of the legacy of Marcus Garvey should serve us as inspiration. He says:

… Garvey 's indirect historical effect was not insignificant. He was the first to mobilize the Afro-American masses and to give them a new sense of self-awareness by teaching them not to be ashamed of their descent. His attempt to overcome the century-old inferiority complex which sprang from slavery and his emphatic commitment to Africa had a fascination for young intellectuals in Africa as well as for students at American negro colleges and universities who came from Africa (Azikiwe and Nkrumah ) or from the West Indies (Padmore). Finally he influenced the African masses to an extent which Du Bois could never have dreamed of. That Garvey was able to win over men like Duse , Johnson , Bruce , Fortune, Ferris and McGuire , besides apparently fraudulent elements, point to the attraction of his personality and his programme. Apparently he not only appealed to the broad masses but also to at least part of the articulate elite. In Africa Sekyi, who had written for the African Times and Orient Review in his London student days, was sufficiently interested in Garvey 's movement to remain in contact by correspondence with Duse during his UNIA period. He criticized one defect of Pan-Africanism in the New World which was already noticeable in Du Bois – the sparse knowledge of what conditions were really like in Africa . In this respect Duse in particular was able to play the role of intermediary, on account of his wide ranging contact with Africans and his first visit to Black Africa in 1920. At the convention of 1922 he had Sekyi's article in the African Times and Orient Review on ‘Education in West Africa' ‘read before the Convention as a matter of enlightenment…' because, as he wrote to Sekyi, ‘the opinion you have expressed in regard to the UNIA…represents my view, and in my humble way, I have endeavoured and I am endeavouring to educate the people here as to the prevailing conditions on the West Coast of Africa as I saw them personally whilst there….

Contacts with Africa were also maintained by J.E. Bruce (Grit), especially with Agbebi and Casely Hayford. The correspondence with Agbebi's son provides some clues which illustrate Garvey 's influence in Lagos . In this case an important medium seems to have been the sale of shares in the Black Star Line. According to Agbebi Jr the shares were such a success that Agbebi hardly knew how to cope with the demand for them and the amounts of money coming in: ‘The matter of the Black Star Line has become very serious in this place. Hundreds of pounds are coming to me daily, but I cannot take them.' He also goes on to say:

We are faring better with our local branch of the UNIA in this place…but we are trying to pull on, and when we have the Black Star Line, it will be better for us…The people of this place are now so enthusiastic as the people in the United States, and when once I have been sent out and have got our people all over Nigeria interested, I think the word must be done. 7

Another testimony to the geographical extent of Garvey 's influence, which reached even to the interior of West Africa, comes from Ibadan (today the capital of the western region of Nigeria ) in the form of a diary kept by Jacob Akinpelu Obisesan , a lay churchman in one of the independent African churches.

Pan-Africanism as a movement involved building linkages between Africans in Africa and Africans in diaspora. Such linkages include (i) back to Africa movement or emigrations – mostly from North America, the Caribbean and Brazil – into parts of Africa (notably West Africa, but also South Africa and Ethiopia), (ii) American Christian evangelism featuring African-American missionaries, (iii) a new Middle Passage in the form of a stream of African students matriculating at American black schools and universities; (iv) several varieties of pan-Africanist activities, ranging from conferences, organizations and educational, literary or commercial activities, and (v) persistence (or continuities) and transformation of African cultural values in the Caribbean and Latin America. 8

The spirit of pan-Africanism infused scholarly activities that promoted ties between African scholars across continents. Such were the ties between Leopold Sedar Senghor and Aime Cesaire . All spheres of scholarship in the humanities were influenced by pan-Africanist spirit as African scholars focussed on Africanity in their works, establishing and developing a distinctive African content and perspective in the study of history, religion, morality, languages and literatures and diminishing in the process the entrenched prejudices against Africa and Africans in existing Euro-centric scholarship.

It seems obvious that part of the impact of pan-Africanism, and a product of regained sovereignty and independence in Africa, as well as the increasing respect for the African, is the expanding network of centres or schools for African studies and/or African-American studies in different parts of the world.

A major setback to the efforts of the pioneer pan-Africanists was the relatively poor knowledge of Africa and what conditions were really like in Africa . Africans in Africa and those in diaspora knew little of one another.

There have been tremendous improvement since then. This colloquium is also concerned with deliberating on how to widen and deepen our knowledge and understanding of one another. Like the pioneer pan-Africanists, we are concerned with building solidarity, based on our common or shared identity, in order to work together to promote the development of our nations, states and communities.

One beneficial feature of the globalising age is the shrinking of space and time with the revolutionary impact of Information and Communications Technology.

The pioneer pan-Africanists set a good agenda, which we could reformulate for the new tasks that our generation faces. In a sense, our generation has a more enabling environment to work in. We have also a critical mass of enlightened people to mobilize than was available to the pioneers.

The planning of the colloquium recognizes the critical issues at stake. This colloquium is in a sense a continuation of the search for solidarity based on knowledge which the Government of Senegal under Leopold Senghor began, and was followed by Nigeria in 1977 with the hosting of the “World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture” (FESTAC '77) which proceedings were published in ten volumes.

In what follows, I offer some suggestions, in brief outlines, on how we could confront the challenges of globalisation, in solidarity built on increasing knowledge of ourselves, and upon a determination to promote the development of our peoples.

I think we cannot overstate the fact that without a sound knowledge of ourselves, and acceptance of our identity as Africans, our search for development will continue to suffer set-backs. Seeking to develop in the mould prescribed by our erstwhile imperial rulers will always be short-sighted and futile. This has been the experience of African States and of other developing countries since the attainment of formal independence. Most of them have trading post economies.

As Alioun Diop stated in 1962:

It indeed took technical progress for us to discover the acute degree of our misery and to enable us to compare ourselves with the West and to suffer from like discrepancies in the standards of life and security. But if the Emergent World shouts its hunger and the intractable ferocity of its economic status, the extension and gravity of its political meaning nevertheless stems from its cultural concern…

It is due to the fact of having been kept from the table of human dignity that the Emergent World has suffered most cruelly, rather than from hunger for earthly foods…

For the engulfing of our lands with the laws and authority of western civilization goes hand in hand with scorn and mortal depreciation for our traditions and cultures, our values and those spiritual laws most intimately connected with our vital equilibrium.

Hence, this reaction universally observed in all the Emergent World: the will to claim, defend and develop our cultural heritage, a testimonial to the dignity of our personality…

This dignity and this feeling, which is ours, of human dignity, find their primary sources for their expression in the political independence of all of the Emergent World. Because the primary requirement for the birth of dignity is the political sovereignty of the ignored or mistreated community. Not because we want particularly to save the assets of a culture struck with obsolescence, but because we wish to free the total initiative of man and consequently the community which has forged for him a language and a cultural consciousness…

Therefore, the origin of political thinking of indeed a cultural concern of the eminent dignity of man.

But these leaders of Western politics are even more distrustful of the cultures of the Emergent World…

There is indeed a human law, true in all times and in all places. By nature any authority is bound to deny, reject or suppress any fact or truth which it cannot control or direct…

Everything contributes to emphasize the cultural aspirations and concerns of the political activities of the Emergent World: the expression of technology (which brings into focus our misery and our deficiencies); the struggle against our nakedness (whose virtue is to exalt our faith and our dignity) and even some consequences of the Cold War. (Certain aggressions tend to subject our aspirations to those of the Cold War partners)….

But everything else contributes to give a political function to our cultural achievements….

The very nature of these achievements is directed more to the West than to our own people in its first phase. Political, historical, spiritual works, all are directed towards the cultural authority of the West, firstly to challenge it as a universal authority then to enrich and universalize it by de-westernizing it and by cultivating in it the cultural genius of the emergent world…. 9

We need a veritable Renaissance of knowledge, skills and of our culture.

It is pertinent to observe that the European countries themselves had had to rebuild their societies and states in the aftermath of the collapse of the Roman Empire . The renaissance movements in Europe had their spiritual, cultural and technological dimensions. The Renaissance Movements were about using their past-history and culture – to rebuild their societies and states. Even in the nineteenth century when the Germanic states were constructing their unification, they invoked their past to empower their endeavours. Similarly the Italian states built their new united state on the spiritual and cultural foundation of the Risorgimento . The Chinese cultural revolution and the Japanese path to development situated in the context of their respective spirituality and cultural identity have object lessons for us Africans – within and outside Africa .

Africa and Africans have a rich heritage of history and cultural achievements, knowledge of which should be cultivated and used to drive our efforts at economic, social and technological development. Not only is it established that Africa provides the origins of Man, Africa's history spans the achievements of Ancient Egypt, the Egyptian Middle Kingdom, Ethiopia, the ancient empires of Ghana, Mali, Songhai, Kanem-Borno, Asante, Danxome, Oyo, and up to the eve of the European conquest, the Zulu empire, the Mfecane and so on. Africa's economic history includes records of skills in entrepreneurship and management as shown in the long-distance trading activities across West Africa , the trans-Saharan trade and the trade along the sea Coasts.

Slavery and colonialism dealt devastating blows to the African personality – to his spirituality, culture and psyche. Yet Africa has been and continues to be a major contributor to the growth of Christianity and Islam, in addition to her home-grown faiths and religions. Africans in the diaspora have carried substantial elements of these contributions to the Caribbean and the Americas in particular.

Africa 's contributions to humanity need to be researched, understood and disseminated to restore her deserved dignity and respectability. As Kwame Nkruma said:

…We have never had any doubt about the intellectual capacity of the Africans. History tells us of the great medieval civilizations of Africa and the part that higher institutions of learning played in the academic and cultural life of the Africa Centrs of learning such as Walata, Djenne, and Timbuktu had a singular impact on African education in medieval times…the University of Sankore…already qualified to be numbered amongst the foremost intellectually-inspired of the world… 10

Africans within and outside the African continent, need to work together to achieve the African renaissance, and use the knowledge and skills acquired to serve as our compass in making our own contributions to our contemporary world. We need to cultivate and disseminate knowledge of our past and present to promote our values, contributions and potentialities for the development of our societies, nation-states, our continent and the world in general.

It is generally accepted that knowledge should be used to cultivate and promote the values, contributions and potentialities of our social, cultural and spiritual environment.

The African Renaissance, like the earlier European one, is to serve to promote our progress on the basis of increasing knowledge and understanding of the heritage of our peoples in all areas of human endeavour. Among other expectations or goals, the renaissance was to:

•  be a movement in the direction of rediscovery of knowledge, ideas and institutions.

•  Leads to a rediscovery of self-identities shorn of the denigrating images of a past characterized by oppression and denials by others who had enslaved or colonized our peoples, establishing in the process alien rule and institutions over our continent and over our peoples in diaspora in other continents.

•  Find expression in new directions to rebuild our societies and states, and their related institutions on the basis of continued contributions to the knowledge of ourselves, our relations with the rest of the world, as well as of our needs for one another, as Africans within Africa and as Africans in other continents, and

•  Based on levels of achievements on goals listed in (i) to (iii) above, lead to the emergence of leadership elites in our various communities and nation-states who would be committed to new forms of social order that would project distinctive core African identities and values upon the international community. In other words, our knowledge of our heritage as Africans should be brought to bear upon our manners of arranging our lives, our societies and states away from the paradigms, structures and values of inherited colonial states and their institutions. 11

We need to begin seriously to analyse the ancient history and civilizations of Africa in a much wider context; that is, to situate these two closely related phenomena within a broad scope of global experience, emphasizing and spreading appreciation of the roles of Africa in the emergence and development of human.

As with the past, distant and recent, so with the contemporary times, we need through scholarship to project into the world the distinctive Africanity of our being and of our contributions to ideas that rule the world.

Through curriculum development, research activities and dissemination of knowledge, we have to focus on

•  our respective societies and nations;

•  our socio-political regions

•  Africa , and

•  Africa's presences or continuities in other parts of the world, notably in the Americas and the Caribbeans, as well as Europe .

It is a harculean task, but one that must be faced with seriousness. At the present all our efforts add up to very little compared with what we should have done. But the beginnings are generally in the right direction.

We need to network for academic and related professional activities, nationally, regionally and across continents.

I suggest that apart from institutions of every nation, we need to use existing socio-political integration schemes – regionally and continentally, to promote cooperation, and harmonization of research and dissemination of knowledge. There are many issues of common concern around which we could pool our intellectual capital in research and knowledge sharing.

UNESCO's initiatives in encouraging the dissemination of the history of Africa and the diaspora deserve to be followed up.

NOTES

•  J.D.Y. Peel (1968), Aladura: A Religious Movement Among the Yoruba , London , O.U.P.

•  A.K. Caincross (1961), Economeca , 28, pp.235-251

•  A. Adu Boahen ( ed ) (1985), General History of Africa . VII: Africa Under Colonial Domination . 1880-1935 , UNESCO, Heinemann , California , pp. xxii-xxiii.

•  Rupert Lewis & Maureen Warner-Lewis (eds), (1986) Garvey , Africa, Europe, The Americas , Institute of Social and Economic Research, University of the West Indies, Jamaica

Immanuel Geiss (translated by Ann Keep ) (1974), The Pan-African Movement , London, Methuen & Co. Ltd

There are extensive bibliographies in both books.

•  E.U. Essien-Udom, ‘ Mwalimu Marcus Garvey ', Warner-Lewis (eds) op.cit. pp.200-205.

•  Essien-Udom, ibid , p. 205

•  Immanuel Geiss , op.cit , pp. 274-275

•  R.D. Ralston & Albuquerque Mourao, ‘Africa and the New World ' in Adu-Boahen ( ed ), op cit, pp. 746-781

•  Alioune Diop (1962) “Political and Cultural Solidarity in Africa ” Presence Africaine, Vol. 13, No. 41, second Quarter pp. 65-71.

•  Kwame Nkrumah (1962), Ghana 's Cultural History, Presence Africaine Vol. 13, No. 41, second Quarter p.7

•  B. Olatunji Oloruntimehin (2007) Culture And Democracy , Lagos , CBAAC Occasional Monograph, No 5.

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