Rethinking Africa is a forward looking blog dedicated to the exchange of innovative thinking on issues affecting the advancement of African peoples wherever they are. We provide rigorous and insightful analyses on the issues affecting Africans and their vision of the world.
Showing posts with label “Speak Brother Speak!”. Show all posts
Showing posts with label “Speak Brother Speak!”. Show all posts
Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe ONE of Africa’s preeminent historians whose A History of the Upper Guinea Coast, 1545-1800 (1970) and How Europe Underdeveloped Africa (1972) are compulsory references in the study of Africa and African peoples worldwide of the past 500 years
(Max Roach Quartet, “Speak, Brother, Speak!” [sides I and II; personnel: Roach, drums; Clifford Jordan, tenor saxophone; Mal Waldron, piano; Eddie Khan, bass; recorded live, The Jazz Workshop, San Francisco, US, 27 October 1962])
*****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)
APPOSITELY, a reference here to Germany’s
Martin Niemöller’s historic reminiscences, “First they came…” (1946): First they came for the
communists and I did not speak out because I was not a communist. Then they came for the trade
unionists and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews and I
did not speak out because I was not a Jew. Finally, they came for me and
there was no one left to speak out.
(Max Roach Quartet, “Speak, Brother, Speak!” [sides I and II; personnel: Roach, drums; Clifford Jordan, tenor saxophone; Mal Waldron, piano; Eddie Khan, bass; recorded live, The Jazz Workshop, San Francisco, US, 27 October 1962])
(Max Roach Quartet, “Speak, Brother, Speak!” [sides I and II; personnel: Roach, drums; Clifford Jordan, tenor saxophone; Mal Waldron, piano; Eddie Khan, bass; recorded live, The Jazz Workshop, San Francisco, US, 27 October 1962])
(Born 10 January 1924, Newland, North Carolina, US)
Drummer, one of the influential innovators of the be-bop jazz revolution of the 1940s-1950swith fellow-drummer Kenny Clarke and lead proponents Charlie Parker (alto saxophone), Dizzy Gillespie (trumpet), Thelonious Monk (piano) and Bud Powell (piano) and later Charles Mingus (bass) and Miles Davis (trumpet), influential band leader, composer, academic
(Max Roach Quartet, “Speak, Brother, Speak!” [sides I and II; personnel: Roach, drums; Clifford Jordan, tenor saxophone; Mal Waldron, piano; Eddie Khan, bass; recorded live, The Jazz Workshop, San Francisco, US, 27 October 1962])
(Onyeka Onwenu: ...songwriter,
journalist and actress, and graduate of Wellesley College and New School for
Social Research)
Onyeka Onwenu(Eaglewatchnews,
Saturday 3 December 2016)
ON THE Python or crocodile dance
operation in the southeast, a peaceful region, on a Christmas season and
criminal silence of all southeastern governors, states assemblies, senators and
house reps. I say this to you, you may hide under the altar of cowardice and
hypocritical silence, be assured we know why you are silent.
When we voted for you guys, we
entrusted our collective welfare into your hands. In matters like this, we look
up to no one put you. Silence speaks one language betrayal. Yes you betrayed
our trust. We feel abandoned. We will wait for you during election time.
FROM the slaughter of our old men, children and rape of our women by Fulani
herdsmen, to the beheading of Bridget and the acquittal of the murderers, to
the slaughter of pro Biafra agitators praying, those celebrating memorial of
our fallen heroes to this final occupation of our land, we tell you Biafra
shall arise.
Biafra is our destination. The
youthful spirit of our ancestors. The eternal city of all who desire to live in
freedom for self actualization. That day will come when the oja will sound, the gong shall herald
the rising of the Sun, the victory of the wise men from the east. That day as
Martin Luther King Jr said, “we will remember not the words of our enemies, but
the silence of our friends”.
And for Nigeria, the grave of Biafra
ingenuity, keep your evil intent on the people of Biafra. You must know that it
is your hatred, marginalization through policy of exclusion and your murderous
policies and impunity to our people that fuels our energy.
We will not give up.
BIAFRA is all we
ask and only that we shall accept. No presidency. No restructuring.
(Max Roach Quartet, “Speak, Brother, Speak!” [sides I and II; personnel: Roach, drums; Clifford Jordan, tenor saxophone; Mal Waldron, piano; Eddie Khan, bass; recorded live, The Jazz Workshop, San Francisco, US, 27 October 1962])
Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe is specialist on the state and on genocide & wars in Africa in the post-1966 epoch – beginning with the Igbo genocide, 29 May 1966-present day, the foundational and most gruesome genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa. 3.1 million Igbo or 25 per cent of this nation’s population were murdered by Nigeria and its allies, principally Britain. Africa and the rest of the world largely stood by and watched as the perpetrators enacted this horror most ruthlessly. The world could have stopped this genocide; the world should have stopped this genocide. This genocide inaugurated Africa’s current age of pestilence. During the period, 12 million additional Africans have been murdered in further genocide in Rwanda (1994), Zaïre/DRCongo (variously, since the late 1990s) and Darfur – west of the Sudan – (since 2004) and in other wars in Africa. African peoples have, presently, no other choice but exit/dismantle the extant genocide-state (the bane of their existence & progress) & construct own nation-centred states that serve their interests. He is author of several books & papers on the subject and his new book is entitled The longest genocide – since 29 May 1966 (2019).
