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“The alienation to Europeans of enormous tracts of land which were once available for African use, and the consequent rise of an alien absentee land interest, a class of European settlers and concessionaires, intent on raising the money value of their holdings and on acquiring political ascendancy as a means to that end, is the basic trend in the colonial land question.â€
"The African is robbed of most of his lands, through legal extortion and forced concession.â€
From “The Land Question†Section of Towards Colonial Freedom
If we are to reclaim our full legacy and heritage as a people, including our land, Africa urgently requires self-conscious, and self-organized popular agencies that are especially designed to carry out large-scale innovation diffusion aimed at the political education of the broadest African demographic segments. This is the only way to guarantee social political and economic outcomes that are commensurate with the peoples’ interest.
In the language of cybernetics we need to have the required variety of political, social, economic and commercial/business responses if we are to succeed in contemporary society. By succeed we understand that to mean prosper and grow, not merely, or more accurately barely subsist. In an era increasingly defined by cybernetic technologies, techniques and conventions, we face a stark choice. We can either intelligently cogitate on the various vital political economics matters with increasing effectiveness or suffer being further marginalized. (If one could imagine our societies becoming any more marginalized.)
Clearly these agencies must have their primary objective the achievement of Pan-Africanism, that is a continental socialist government.
To build Pan-Africanism we must have the mass political agencies and the pre-requisite inter-agency cooperation synergy based on the concepts of cooperation and the principle of the identity of meaning. To that end we must commit to building and supporting existing agencies and institutions involved in the development of our culture and struggle. In the final analysis it is these entities that are the true driving force behind what Osagyefo called “positive action†and thus are the key to developing mass Pan-African political consciousness. The Pan-African Nation that Nkrumah describes fully in “Class Struggle in Africa†can be realized in this historical epoch.
A large part of effective self-conscious, and self-organized agency - (and therefore of unity, cooperation, collaboration, partnering and coalition building et al) - is effective communication of critical ideological information. Perhaps the greatest ideological task we have before us is the education of our people about the true nature of neo-colonialism.
Osagyefo understood that the prerequisite political and social consciousness would not spontaneously evolve. Because our development from communal based groups to socialist civilization was arrested by the forceful intrusion of imperialism in its various forms and aspects, our circumstances dictated deliberated intervention of African revolutionary forces and personalities. Consequently, Nkrumah observed that there was an urgent need to take on the “task of training cadres to educate the masses so that our socialist policies could be understood,†and so that the basic tenets of socialist instruction are “ taken to the people†to develop their socialist conscience.
Stating that â€we aimed in Ghana to create a socialist society with which each would give according to his ability and receive according to his needs†he called on advanced CPP party members “vanguard activistsâ€, many of whom were “drawn from the political education section of the party,†to create a structure to produce â€a steady flow of ideologically sound cadres to carry on the work of politicization of the masses.â€
The CPP and Dr. Nkrumah create Winneba because “ it became necessary to establish an institution where training and instruction could be given.†An institution that was designed to â€â€¦provide ideological education for party members and for all from African and the world who wish to equip themselves with knowledge of the ...colonialism, neocolonialism†(These extracts can be found in Revolutionary Path pages 161-2) rejuvenates. This is precisely what we need today if we are going to complete our mission.
***
At the dawn of the new century a PAC cadre, then Secretary General, Tami Plaatjie, made the following prediction:
This century is the century of Africans in Africa and the Diaspora. Capitalism, imperialism and neo-colonialism will finally perish because their interests are not for the advancement and betterment of the quality of life of the Africans. It is in this regard that capitalism and imperialism have the seeds for their own destruction.
The land reclamation struggles in Africa, in areas such as Azania, Namibia, Kenya, and Zimbabwe have exposed the hand of neo-colonialism.
In Kenya, the Kenyan government is using deadly force to preserve the immoral possession of land by British settlers. The UK governments and US are using every means at their disposal to malign and isolate the sovereign Zimbabwe Republic as a prelude to overthrowing its government. Immense pressure is brought to bear on left of center parties such as the ANC to insure that they do not embrace the revolutionary position of full restitution of the land, as advocated by Osagyefo. (I refer to his statement that we must reclaim every inch of land, every mine, on our continent.
Recently, the new US Ambassador to South Africa, Jendayi Frazer in her recent statement declared that the US was ready to invade Zimbabwe. This treasonous woman spoke about the need to assemble a “coalition of the willing†to be spearheaded by the US to invade sovereign Zimbabwe.
In a recent Herald article, the Speaker of the Zimbabwean Parliament, Emmerson Mnangagwa made the following comment at a special SADC parliamentarian forum on the debt issue:
"We should be mindful of the fact that debt has become one of the most powerful tools that multilateral, bilateral and private creditors are using to continue hemorrhaging the continent and keeping it in bondage with dire political and social consequences.â€
Creditors using debt as tool of bondage
Aug 25
Herald Online
This eloquent and direct comment on one of the preferred "non-violent" forms of neo-colonialism is indicative of the kind of reasoning on the part of Zimbabwe's patriots that has the west and sell - outs working overtime to overthrow the current government, in the name of returning democracy to Zimbabwe.
In Kenya the government there has used deadly force against Kenyan citizens demanding the return of land stolen from them by the British colonialists; killing a 70-year-old Masai man. The Kenyan government has affirmed that they intended to continue their pro-settler policies.
All of these are aspects of a single phenomena, neo-colonialism. As Osagyefo pointed out, Lenin was right when he wrote that Imperialism was the highest stage of capitalism, and Osagyefo correctly added that neo-colonialism was the last phase of imperialism.
Africans I will repeat again, we must prepare for war, because our enemies are determined to foist it on us, whether we wish it or not. These circumstances have emphasized the need for Africa and Africans to step up our efforts to defeat neo-colonialism, a victory that can only be achieved through Pan-Africanism.
Pan-Africanist leaders, such as Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, have warned us for several decades of the sinister designs and machinations of neo-colonialism; and the need for us to organize to resist its multi-prong methods, including mass violence; cultural and psychological warfare; and financial, commercial and economic domination. It is time for us Africans to face the facts and prepare ourselves adequately to finish the uncompleted part of the African liberation struggle. Dr. Nkrumah understood that the final battle with neo-colonialism would be inevitably a military one; as he stressed in several of his books, Handbook of Revolutionary Warfare, Challenge of the Congo, Dark Days in Ghana in particular. It is precisely to combat neo-colonialism, and the other facets of imperialism (settler states/apartheid, and all remaining vestiges of general colonialism) that he called for the creation of the All-African Peoples Revolutionary Army, with a continental militia component of the armed peoples, in Handbook of Revolutionary Warfare.
***
Revolutionary Warfare
Osagyefo wrote the following in Handbook of Revolutionary Warfare.
"Internally"
"The capitalist imperialist states face serious economic and social difficulties. Rising prices, balance of payments problems, widespread and repeated strikes are only a few of the symptoms of the general malaise. In the United States, the grave domestic situation is aggravated by the massive counter-attacks of the African-American revolutionaries. Almost everywhere, behind the smoke screens, the social and economic situation is unhealthy, and particularly in the second class capitalist states. And these mounting economic crises mean heavier dependence on the exploitation of the peoples of Africa, Asia and Latin America."
"The need for self-critical objective diagnosis."
"If imperialists are faced with so many external and domestic difficulties, how then can they afford to step up their aggression in Africa? To answer this question, it is necessary to examine the internal factors which make our continent so vulnerable to attack, and particularly to look closely at the whole question of African unity. For this lies at the core of our problem. There are three conflicting conceptions of African unity which explain to a large extent, the present critical situation in Africa:"
"1. The mutual protection theory: that the OAU serves as a kind of insurance against any change in the status quo, membership providing a protection for heads of state and government against all forms of political action aimed at their overthrow. Since most of the leaders who adhere to this idea owe their position to imperialists and their agents, it is not surprising that this is the viewpoint which really serves the interests of imperialism. For the puppet states are being used both for short-term purposes of exploitation and as springboards of subversion against progressive African states."
"2. The functional conception: that African unity should be purely a matter of economic co-operation. Those who hold this view overlook the vital fact that African regional economic organizations will remain weak and subject to the same neo-colonialist pressures and domination, as long as they lack overall political cohesion. Without political unity, African states can never commit themselves to full economic integration, which is the only productive form of integration able to develop our great resources fully for the well-being of the African people as a whole. Furthermore, the lack of political unity places inter-African economic institutions at the mercy of powerful, foreign commercial interests, and sooner or later these will use such institutions as funnels through which to pour money for the continued exploitation of Africa."
"3. The political union conception: that a union government should be in charge of economic development, defence and foreign policy, while other government functions would continue to be discharged by the existing states grouped, in federal fashion, within a gigantic central political organization. Clearly, this is the strongest position Africa could adopt in its struggle against modern imperialism."
"However, any sincere critical appraisal of past activities and achievements of the OAU would tend to show that, as it is now constituted, the OAU is not likely to be able to achieve the political unification of Africa."
"This is obviously why imperialists, although against the idea of political union, will do nothing to break the OAU. It serves their purpose in slowing down revolutionary progress in Africa. This state of affairs is mirrored both in the discouragement of freedom fighters in the remaining colonial territories and South Africa, and in the growing perplexity amongst freedom fighters from neo-colonized territories."
"The struggle for African continental union and socialism may be hampered by the enemy WITHIN, - those who declare their support for the revolution and at the same time, by devious means, serve and promote the interests of imperialists and neo-colonialists."
"Examination of recent events in our history, and of our present condition, reveals the urgent need for a new strategy to combat imperialist aggression, and this must be devised on a continental scale."
"Either we concentrate our forces for a decisive armed struggle to achieve our objectives, or we will each fall one by one to the blows of imperialism in its present stage of open and desperate offensive."
In Handbook of Revolutionary Warfare He dissects the manner in which our enemy proceed against our interests:
"Psychological attacks are made through the agency of broadcasting stations like the BBC, Voice of Germany, and above all, Voice of America, which pursues its brainwashing mission through newsreels, interviews and other "informative" programmes at all hours of the day and night, on all wavelengths and in many languages, including special English. The war of words is supplemented by written propaganda using a wide range of political devices such as embassy bulletins, pseudo revolutionary publications, studies on nationalism and on African socialism, the literature spread by the so-called independent and liberal publishers, cultural and civic education centres, and other imperialist subversive organisations.
"The paper war penetrates into every town and village, and into the remotest parts of the bush. It spreads in the form of free distributions of propaganda films praising the qualities of western civilisation and culture. These are some of the ways in which the psychological terrain is prepared. When the target, a certain country or continent, is sufficiently softened, then the invasion of evangelist brigades begins, thus perpetuating the centuries old tactic whereby missionaries prepare the way for guns. Peace Corps divisions stream in and Moral Rearmament units, Jehovah witnesses, information agencies and international financial aid organisations. In this way, a territory or even an entire continent is besieged without a single marine in sight. A sprinkling of political and little-publicised murders, like that of Pio Pinto in Kenya, and Moumie in Geneva, are used to assist the process.
"A recent development in the psychological war is the campaign to convince us that we cannot govern ourselves, that we are unworthy of genuine independence, and that foreign tutelage is the only remedy for our wild, warlike and primitive ways. Imperialism has done its utmost to brainwash Africans into thinking that they need the strait-jackets of colonialism and neocolonialism if they are to be saved from their retrogressive instincts. Such is the age-old racialist justification for the economic exploitation of our continent.
"And now, the recent military coups engineered throughout Africa by foreign reactionaries are also being used to corroborate imperialism's pet theory that the Africans have shamelessly squandered the golden opportunities of independence, and that they have plunged their political kingdoms into blood and barbarism. Therefore the imperialist mission: we must save them anew; and they hail the western-trained and western-bought army puppets as saviours. The press, films and radio are last spreading the myth of post-independence violence and chaos.
"Everywhere, the more or less covert implication is: Africa needs to be recolonised. The fact that Africa has advanced politically more quickly than any other continent in the world is ignored. In 1957 when Ghana became independent and the political renaissance began in Africa, there were only eight independent states. Now, in just over ten years, there are over forty and the final liberation of the continent is in sight. Imperialists are not content with trying to convince us that we are politically immature. They are telling us, now that we are realising that armed revolution is the only way to defeat neocolonialism, that we are inherently incapable of fighting a successful revolutionary war. "
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Mahmoud Siddiqi
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