Nit la mu jëf la du la mu wax
Un homme se mesure à ce qu’il fait et non à ce qu’il dit (Proverbe Wolof – Senegal). Vos actions définissent qui vous êtes.
A man is measured by what he does, not what he says (Wolof Proverb – Senegal). – Your actions define who you are.
Senegal opposition presidential candidate Bassirou Diomaye Faye, a political newcomer popular among the masses, came out of Sunday’s elections in Senegal with a strong lead. On Monday morning, his main rival, Amadou Ba conceded defeat. Faye who has been brought to the front of the Senegalese politics just over a week after he was released from prison, has been mentored by the true candidate of the masses Ousmane Sonko who everybody loved, but who the government had managed to disqualify from standing for election because of a bogus conviction. Faye contested the elections as an independent given that his party Patriots of Senegal (PASTEF), founded by Ousmane Sonko, had been dissolved. He ran under the slogan of “Diomaye mooy Ousmane” (meaning, Diomaye is Ousmane in Wolof) given that most Senegalese who voted for him, were in reality voting for his beloved mentor Sonko. At 44 years-old, he will be the youngest African president, and fifth president of Senegal.
We applaud the victory of the people of Senegal who stood strong in the face of Macky Sall, the incumbent’s holdup tactics on the constitution and the power. We applaud the victory of the Senegalese masses who have shown that they would not stand still while their democracy is torn into pieces. We hope that Bassirou Diomaye Faye will keep his promises of including Sonko whom the people voted; Sonko campaigned by telling all that voting for Faye was like voting for him. We hope that Faye will keep the promises made of weeding out corruption, getting out of the CFA Franc zone, renegotiating mining and hydrocarbon contracts. The country is expected to start hydrocarbon production this year. He has his work cut out for him, with the high unemployment rate. Senegal is a young nation, and Senegalese dream of finally helping their country launch into the 21st century with pride; they are ready, and hopefully Faye will offer new opportunities to the disillusioned youth.
Below are excerpts from the BBC.
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Few had heard of him a year ago, and now he is set to become president.
Bassirou Diomaye Faye’s extraordinary rise caps a rollercoaster period in Senegalese politics that caught many off-guard. Months in jail alongside ally and kingmaker Ousmane Sonko ended suddenly, with the pair released the week before the presidential election.
Now Mr Clean, as he’s nicknamed, must get to work on the sweeping reforms he has promised.
“Methodical” and “modest” are words often used to describe the tax collector, who celebrates his 44th birthday on Monday.
Gas, oil, fishing and defence deals must all be negotiated to better serve the Senegalese people, says Mr Faye. He is ushering in an era of “sovereignty” and “rupture” as opposed to more of the same, he told voters, and that is especially true of ties to France. Senegal’s president-elect says he will drop the much-criticised CFA franc currency, which is pegged to the euro and backed by former colonial power France. Mr Faye wants to replace it with a new Senegalese, or regional West African, currency, although this will not be easy… Strengthening judicial independence and creating jobs for Senegal’s large young population are also key priorities for Mr Faye …
Both men founded the now-disbanded Pastef party, both men are tax collectors, and both men found themselves jailed last year on charges they said were politically motivated.
Mr Sonko ended up being convicted of two offences, which meant he was barred from the election, so Mr Faye stepped in.
“Bassirou is me,” Mr Sonko told supporters recently. “They are two sides of the same coin,” Pastef colleague Moustapha Sarré agrees.
… the pair’s relationship could usher in a new style of leadership.
“Maybe they will establish a tandem and break away from the hyper-presidential model of having an all-powerful head of state.
Despite the shortened campaign period, Senegal’s citizens were adamant they would turn out and use their vote, Christopher Fomunyoh – of the National Democratic Institute for international affairs – told BBC Newsday.
“Senegal is in the process of confirming that democracies can self-correct and come out stronger and more resilient.”
La force du scorpion est dans sa queue (Proverbe Peul – Niger, Mali, Cameroun, Burkina Faso, Nigeria, Sénégal, Guinée, Mauritanie, Guinée Bissau, Gambie, Tchad, Sierra Leone, Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire, Centrafrique).
The strength of the scorpion is in its tail (Fula proverb – Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Nigeria, Senegal, Guinea, Mauritania, Guinea Bissau, Gambia, Chad, Sierra Leone, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Central African Republic (CAR)).
Over the weekend, Niger suspended military “cooperation” with the USA, with immediate effect. As one who follows the progress in the region, it comes as no surprise, after Niger had previously kicked out the French troops from its territory [Bye Bye to French Troops in Niger, France set to Withdraw Troops and Ambassador from Niger]. It actually feels like the normal evolution of things. Operating from years of condescending treatments of those deemed inferior, particularly of Africans, the Americans had decided to dictate their will, like the French before, to Niger people and deny their sovereign rights to choose partnerships in their fight against terrorism. The spokesman of Niger’s government, Colonel Amadou Abdramane, exposed the fact that the military “cooperation” with the US was not even a real one, i.e. the US had installed their largest drone base in Africa, and possibly in the world, in Niger via a verbal agreement only, and the Niger people had to pay for the American base in their country, while the Americans never raised a hand to help Niger fight against terrorist attacks that were maiming their citizens. So, this was not really a partnership to help Niger at all, but rather an imposition on Niger, deemed the poorest country on earth, to pay for US military on its soil. Many call it a huge blow to the US, but as Americans had already refused to recognize the government of Niger back in October, and imposed sanctions against it, they should not have expected much else.
Below is an excerpt from Al Jazeera. Please also take the time to read the good article written on Reason website.
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Niger has suspended its military agreement with the United States “with immediate effect”, according to the ruling military spokesman Colonel Amadou Abdramane, in a blow to US security interests in the region.
The pact allowed US military personnel and civilian defence staff to operate from Niger, which plays a central role in the US military’s operations in Africa’s Sahel region and is home to a major airbase.
… Speaking on local television, Abdramane said the US delegation did not follow diplomatic protocol, and that Niger was not informed about the composition of the delegation, the date of its arrival or the agenda [in their eyes, we, Africans are not humans, and do not deserve minimum courtesy].
“Niger regrets the intention of the American delegation to deny the sovereign Nigerien people the right to choose their partners and types of partnerships capable of truly helping them fight against terrorism,” Abdramane said [similar to the French politics in Niger, Niger is not supposed to think on its own, but every partnership must be done in agreement with the metropolis].
… The US military had some 650 personnel working in Niger in December, according to a White House report to Congress. The US military operates a major airbase in the Niger city of Agadez, some 920km (572 miles) from the capital of Niamey, using it for manned and unmanned surveillance flights and other operations.
A drone base known as Air Base 201 near Agadez was built at a cost of more than $100m. Since 2018 the base has been used to target ISIL (ISIS) fighters and Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal Muslimeen (JNIM), an al-Qaeda affiliate, in the Sahel region.
Reporting from Washington, DC, Al Jazeera correspondent Shihab Rattansi said the move is “a huge blow to the US”.
“Niger is the centre of US operations in west and north Africa, notably at its Air Base 201, the most expensive construction project ever undertaken by the US government. It’s there for war on terror operations but it’s really there also for great power projection against countries like Russia and China.”
Last October, Washington officially designated the military takeover as a coup. But in December, the top US envoy for Africa, Phee, said the US was willing to restore aid and security ties if Niger met certain conditions.
The military said the delegation had accused Niger of partnering with Russia and Iran on “secret” deals, which the government denies. Officials also said the US had “threatened” action against Niger if the Niamey fails to cut ties with both countries.
The military government “forcefully denounces the condescending attitude accompanied by the threat of retaliation from the head of the American delegation towards the Nigerien government and people”, spokesman Abdramane added.
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Last week, March 10-11 marked the celebration of Malagasy New Year… the Malagasy new year is not in January, because the Malagasy calendar is a lunar calendar with thirteen lunar months of 28 days. Each lunar month starts with the first moon. Up until 1810, every region of Madagascar had its own calendar; then under the Kingdom of Madagascar whose kings reigned from 1810 to 1896, the calendar was standardized. From 1810 to 1881, the Kingdom of Madagascar’s new year always started with the first day of the month of Alahamady, i.e. the first moon of the month. This month corresponds to the end of the rainy season, and the rice harvest, rice being the staple food of the Malagasy people. Compared to the Gregorian calendar, the fararano and the Alahamady occur between March and April around the first moon closest to the 21 March equinox. With the fararano, in the olden days, Malagasy people would congratulate themselves on having emerged victorious from the violent winds, the torrential rains, landslides, devastating fires, but also from the period of Maintso ahitra or famine. The month of Alahamady is a month of celebration, and symbolizes power, wealth, and even royal power. The great king Andrianampoinimerina, at the origin of the unification of Madagascar, is quoted with this famous formula, “I have no enemy, except famine.” He was also born on the first day of the month of Alahamady, thus his formula symbolized victory in general, but victory over famine in particular.
Starting in 1897, the celebration was officially abolished by the French colonial period which viewed it as pagan, and as a tradition that would undermine the Malagasy conversion/obedience as it linked them to their pasts, their ancestors, and culture; it was thus celebrated in secret by some. Since the 1990s, the celebration is now seeing a resurgence. Today, it is a national celebration known as the Taombaovao Malagasy, literally Malagasy New Year. It lasts 2 days and is observed throughout the entire territory. It helps to convey and spread the 7 foundations of the Malagasy philosophy: faith in zanahary (The Creator, God), the value of Aina (life), the fahamasinana (the sense of the sacred), the fihavanana (solidarity and mutual aid), the fahamarinana (the sense of fairness and justice), the fahasoavana (happiness) and the link to ancestral heritages.
This year, it was celebrated on 10 and 11 March. In the opening, Princess Ratsimamanga, a descendent of Queen Ranavalona III, the Last Monarch of the Kingdom of Madagascar, performed the rite of Tsodrano, the blessing, and said during the official ceremony to all officials and public present, “I bless you in the name of the seven royal tombs so that you and your families be in good health, so that you could have the strength to contribute the the well-being of the nation.” She added, this Taombaovao ceremony symbolizes “a spiritual renewal in the hearts of Malagasy people… Us, Malagasy, our ancestors have not gone far, and are always with us. It is our ancestors who pray for us to be together, for us to produce good things in the future, for the harvest to be good.”
After the blessing, comes the ceremony of Tatao, where the people share a plate of rice cooked in milk and sprinkled with honey. Princess Ratsimamanga explained, “rice represents abundance so that there will be no famine. Milk is for offspring. And the honey is to make things sweet. These three things that we put in the pot and share with everyone symbolize the fact that we are productive, that we have the strength to fight evil in the country.”
Il ne faut pas s’effrayer d’un python à cause de sa longueur (Proverbe Bété – Côte d’Ivoire).
You should not be frightened by a python because of its length (Bété proverb – Ivory Coast).
Slavery dealt a big blow to Africa. It dealt a big blow to her strength (imagine losing millions upon millions of some of your strongest children), to her self-confidence (imagine her children fearing for their lives chased into the depths of forests and savannahs), and to her soul. Then came colonization with forced labor, depersonnalization, confiscation of History, disregard for local cultures, cultural alienation, and colonial oppression. Slowly, the awakening is upon us; and slowly Africans are linking back to that glorious past of African civilizations, science, and cultures. The poem below by Ivorian author Véronique Tadjo is anchored upon that re-discovery of the African self in all its splendor, and connection to its roots in order to continue the legacy.
The poem “Raconte-moi” was published in Latérite / Red Earth, written in homage to Senufo culture, which won a literary prize from the Agence de Coopération Culturelle et Technique. The poem below was re-published re-published in Anthologie Africaine: Poésie Vol2, Jacques Chevrier, Collection Monde Noir Poche, 1988, and translated to English by Dr. Y. Afrolegends.com .
“Raconte-moi” de Véronique Tadjo / “Tell me” from Véronique Tadjo
| Raconte-moi
La parole du Griot Qui chante l’Afrique Des temps immémoriaux Il dit Ces rois patients Sur les cimes du silence Et la beauté des vieux Aux sourires fanés Mon passé revenu Du fond de ma mémoire Comme un serpent totem A mes chevilles lié Ma solitude Et mes espoirs brisés Qu’apporterais-je A mes enfants Si j’ai perdu leur âme ? |
Tell me
The word of the Griot Who sings Africa From times immemorial He says These patient kings On the peaks of silence And the beauty of the old ones With faded smiles My past returned From the depths of my memory Like a totem snake To my ankles linked My loneliness And my hopes shattered What will I brink To my children If I lost their soul? |
Un bambou tendre ne peut pas être ardemment désiré (pour la construction). – Un homme qui essaie de bâtir un mariage solide tout en courant après d’autres femmes est comme celui qui utilise des pousses de bambou pour construire une hutte. (Proverbe Chewa – Malawi, Mozambique, Zambie.)
A tender bamboo cannot be eagerly desired (for building). – A man trying to build up a strong marriage while going after other women is like one who uses bamboo shoots to make a hut. (Chewa proverb – Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia.)
We have seen that there were quite a few African kings who forbade the sale of liquor by Europeans on their territories: Gungunyane of the kingdom of Gaza in Mozambique, Mirambo: the Black Napoleon, king of the Nyamwezi people in Tanzania, and now the Almanny (which means leader) cited during Wadstrom report to the British Committee in 1790s (Royal Resistance to Slavery: the Case of an Almany of West Africa in 1780s). Just like Gungunyane, Mirambo thought that alcohol weakened societies. There are quite a few other African leaders throughout history. Why would they prohibit the sale of alcohol on their territories? In history, we have seen this tactic used by the Europeans in the Americas where they gave cheap liquor to the Native Americans turning them drunkards, violent, in order to dispossess them of their lands. Below is an account by the abbey Gregoire who clearly saw alcohol as a tool used to destabilize African societies during slavery times. It is good to note that history repeats itself: today in many African countries, the main breweries are owned by European companies, and particularly in countries with a lot of resources, the people have been slowly turned into drunkards (this will be a story for another day) while their resources get siphoned out.
Abbe Gregoire, for his part, emphasizes that Barrow attributes: “…the current barbarity of some parts of Africa to the slave trade. To obtain it, the Europeans created it, and they perpetuate the usual state of war; they poisoned these regions with their strong liquors, by the accumulation of all kinds of debauchery, seduction, rapacity, cruelty. Is there a single vice whose example they do not daily reproduce before the eyes of the Negroes brought to Europe, or transported to our colonies? I am not surprised to read in Beaver, certainly a friend of the Negroes, and who in his African memoranda is full of praise for their native virtues and their talents: “I would rather carry thither a rattlesnake than a Negro who would have lived in London “.
Bwemba Bong, Quand l’Africain etait l’or noir de l’Europe. L’Afrique: actrice ou victime de la traite des noirs? MedouNeter (2022), p. 165; Barrow, African memoranda, relative to an attempt to establish a British settlement in the Island of Boulam, by Phylips Beaver, in 4, London 1805. I would rather carry thither a rattle snake, etc., p. 397, cited by abbey Gregoire, p. 43-44.
The Swede abolitionist and explorer Carl Bernhard Wadström (Charles Berns Wadström) once described his travels in West Africa from October 1787-1788 with fellow Swede Anders Sparrman and Carl Axel Arrhenius. They were sent by King Gustav III of Sweden, with the official goal of making new discoveries in natural sciences, history, and of course the non-official goal to help with the king’s colonial ambitions. The scientific expedition was quickly aborted when they were in Senegal, where they then witnessed diverse aspects of the transatlantic slave trade. As we saw earlier, Wadström was later called in 1790, to testify in front of the British Government Select Committee; published in a report entitled “Minutes of the evidence taken before a Committee of the House of Commons, being a Select Committee, appointed to take the Examination of Witnesses respecting the African Slave Trade.” Wadström described the advanced industries found in that part of Africa, ranging from textile, indigo, soap, leather, and gold… he even noted that he had never seen such advanced work in Europe! Accompanied by his doctor friend Sparrman and chemist Arrhenius, they were dumbfounded to realize that Africans had a large materia medica which listed over 3000 plants.
The Select Committee on the Slave Trade was keen to know about the quality of culture in that part of Africa. They asked Wadström: “Have they any manufactures amongst them?”
Mr Wadström’s reply was most edifying: “I have been surprised to see with what industry they manufacture their cottons, their indigo, and other dying articles, as well as several sorts of manufacture in wood; they make soap; they tan leather, and work it exceedingly well, and even with good taste … they work bar iron … into several articles, as for instance, lances, instruments for tillage, poniards, &c.; they work in gold very ingeniously, and so well, that I never have seen better made articles of that kind in Europe; a great number of articles for ornaments of gold, silver, brass, leather, &c.”
Wadström further stated that: “Their cloth and their leather they manufacture with uncommon neatness; and I have samples with me to shew [sic] in case it should be desired.”
As we saw earlier, the king who was called Dalmanny was a well educated man; he had held the position of Grand Marabout before becoming King. His subjects were very honest and hospitable and showed Wadström “all civility and kindness.” In addition, they had “an extraordinary genius for commerce.” Interestingly, they also had a “Materia Medica” of “about 2,000 or nearer 3,000” plants.
African Heritage 