Page 41 - Demo

CommunityISSUE 36 APRIL 2025 41It kind of makes me think that we Africans like to expend our energies on what we call the problem of Africa and the so-called solutions from a perspective that says someone else is at fault and thus needs to change, instead of asking, what do I have to change in myself to make Africa work? I think we have over-flogged the issue of colonization or the issue of what was done to Africa by Europeans, and we now need to look inward and then %u201cmove forward%u201d with new perspectives about how we can genuinely make Africa a better home for all. We need to take a critical look at our personal and general outlook on the African narrative and how such narratives are informed by our perception of Africanism or what we think makes us Africans. First, to think that anything that is genuinely African must be anti-Europe or anti-Asia is nothing but stupidity. Ancient Africans traded with merchants from Spain (Europe), Chinese merchants (Asia), and merchants from other parts of the world. The perspective around our Africanness was different then, and so was the interaction. There was no concept of %u2018superior white%u201d or %u201cinferior black%u201d and thus no need to look behind your shoulders to see if someone thought you were a monkey dressed in a garment. It was just about people of different racial backgrounds interacting and trading. But now that we find ourselves in a systemic situation that was put in place intentionally to create a %u201csuperior white%u201d and %u201cinferior black%u201d narrative, what must we do to take off that false garment and take up our real identity? The blame game definitely will not be one of the solutions.Second, a good portion of those making this content about %u201cdecolonization of the African mind%u201d do so from outside of the continent. They don%u2019t even have a first-hand experience of what it feels like to live on the continent or what the various aspects of what make up the African reality. And I get it, a person can only speak on how things affect them in their local environment and not necessarily from how it affects the global community. But as Africans suffering the same systemic issues globally,