274th birthday of Olaudah Equiano

(Born c1745, Essaka, Biafra; dies 31 March 1797, London, England)

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

GREAT Biafran!

One of Igbo and African World’s preeminent intellectuals, sailor, expeditionist, entrepreneur, orator, versatile campaigner, active exponent of African freedom (during the 1780s in Britain) from enslavement and other spheres of subjugation waged by an assemblage of European World states and interests (including, especially, Britain, Portugal, Spain, France, the Netherlands, Italian city-states, German princely states, Sweden-Norway, Denmark, the United States) and their “successor states” in the Americas/Caribbean, begun in the 15th century, visionary of eventual African liberation; author of the classic, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African (1789); towering member of the iconic men and women that constitute the freedom pantheon from which the current Biafra freedom movement derives invaluable insight, tenacity, focus, optimism.

(City of Westminster London’s (Britain) commemorative plaque for Olaudah Equiano, the outstanding 18th century Igbo intellectual and irrepressible exponent of freedom, at 73 Riding House Street, Paddington, London, where Equiano lived and worked and published his classic, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African in 1789. This building is now owned by the University College London.)

TODAY, we celebrate Equiano’s transformative life with two compositions from two of African World’s most esteemed composers and instrumentalists – African British Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s Symphonic variations on an African air, Op. 63 (1906) and African American John Coltrane’s “Africa” (1961):

1. (Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, Symphonic variations on an African air, Op. 63 (1906), played here by the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by Grant Llewellyn, BBC Radio 3, London, 28 October 2004)

2. (John Coltrane Quartet – and orchestra, “Africa” [personnel: Coltrane, tenor saxophone; Booker Little, trumpet; Carl Bowman, euphonium; Bob Northern, French horn; Julius Watkins, French horn; Donald Corrodo, French horn; Robert Swisshelm, French horn; Bill Barber, tuba; Britt Woodman, trombone; Gavin Bushell, piccolo; Eric Dolphy, alto saxophone, bass clarinet, flute; McCoy Tyner, piano; Art Davis, bass; Elvin Jones, drums; orchestrated by Eric Dolphy and McCoy Tyner; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 7 June 1961])

*****Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe is the author of The longest genocide – since 29 May 1966 (2019) and co-author, with Lakeson Okwuonicha, of Why #DonaldTrump is #great for #Africa (2018)

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

140th birthday of Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller

(Born 9 June 1877, Philadelphia, US)

ONE OF African America’s preeminent renaissance artists: sculptor, painter, poet

(Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller, Mother and Child, 1914)

(Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller, Ethiopia Awakening, 1914)

(Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller, Mary Turner, 1919)

(John Coltrane Quartet – and orchestra, “Africa” [personnel: Coltrane, tenor saxophone; Booker Little, trumpet; Carl Bowman, euphonium; Bob Northern, French horn; Julius Watkins, French horn; Donald Corrodo, French horn; Robert Swisshelm, French horn; Bill Barber, tuba; Britt Woodman, trombone; Gavin Bushell, piccolo; Eric Dolphy, alto saxophone, bass clarinet, flute; McCoy Tyner, piano; Art Davis, bass; Elvin Jones, drums; orchestrated by Eric Dolphy and McCoy Tyner; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 7 June 1961])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

Africa, Africa, Africa

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

AFRICAN HUMAN and non-human resources have, in the past 500 years, transformed planet earth worldwide but Africa exponentially and uninterruptedly. The European World, principally Britain, France, Portugal, Holland and later on the United States, starting in the 18th century, have, through the conquest, enslavement and occupation of Africa and its peoples during this epoch, reduced Africa to a “backwood” of death, immiseration, desolation and hopelessness for the unprecedentedly phenomenal enrichment of this European World/West as it “showcases” the world presently.

So, when will Africa begin to focus on itself – on its own terms? This is a cardinal goal of the agency of the Biafra freedom movement, born out of the tenacity, resilience and survival of the Igbo people who, for 51 years (29 May 1966-8 June 2017), have been subjected to the most gruesome and expansive genocide of contemporary history by suzerain state Britain and its client-state Nigeria, 2960 miles away in southwestcentral Africa. 3.1 million Igbo people, overwhelmingly children/younger people and older members of the population, 25 per cent of the Igbo population, were murdered in phases I-III of the genocide (29 May 1966-12 January 1970) and tens of thousands of additional Igbo have been murdered subsequently, beginning 13 January 1970 when the Anglo-Nigerian duo-genocidists launched phase-IV of the genocide.

ON THE EVE of the restoration-of-independence of this long-stretched defence of their freedom, the 50 million Biafrans are poised to embark on all possibilities of working for themselves and appropriating the fruits of their labour from their land and on their own terms. They will build and reconstruct a battered heritage of history and they, surely, have the capacity to carry through the goal. The Igbo control one of Africa’s best-developed multidisciplinary humanpower conglomeration of assets which will be invaluable in the mission ahead. 

In the wake of the genocide, the Igbo are primed to deploy their phenomenal resilience from this history to turn their Biafra homeland into a haven of creativity, humanism and progress.

(John Coltrane Quartet – and orchestra, “Africa” [personnel: Coltrane, tenor saxophone; Booker Little, trumpet; Carl Bowman, euphonium; Bob Northern, French horn; Julius Watkins, French horn; Donald Corrodo, French horn; Robert Swisshelm, French horn; Bill Barber, tuba; Britt Woodman, trombone; Gavin Bushell, piccolo; Eric Dolphy, alto saxophone, bass clarinet, flute; McCoy Tyner, piano; Art Davis, bass; Elvin Jones, drums; orchestrated by Eric Dolphy and McCoy Tyner; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 7 June 1961])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe