151st birthday of WEB Du Bois

(Born 23 February 1868, Great Barrington, Mass, US)

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

SOCIOLOGIST, historian, African peoples-centred scholar, freedom activist extrordinaire, towering public intellectual – decades before “public intellectual” becomes in vogue albeit problematically

(Marcus Roberts Trio – with expanded ensemble, “Deep in the shed” [Roberts, piano; Roland Guerin, bass; Jason Marsalis, drums; solos from expanded ensemble: Etienne Charles, trumpet; Ron Westray, trombone; Wess Anderson, alto saxophone; recorded: live, Jazz at Lincoln Center, New York, US, 1 February 2008])

*****Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe is author of the recently published The longest genocide – since 29 May 1966 (2019)  (https://re-thinkingafrica.blogspot.com/2019/01/published-longest-genocide-since-29-may.html)

Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe

69th birthday of Thomas Sankara

(Born 21 December 1949, Yako, Burkina Faso)

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

Military commander, historian, and head of state of Burkina Faso, 4 August 1983-15 October 1987, when he leads a transformative government in “post”-(European)conquest Africa which demonstrates, overwhelmingly with indelible successes, just as the resourceful Biafran resistance had breathtakingly inaugurated this breakthrough on the Africa continental scene during the Igbo genocide, 29 May 1966-12 January 1970, phases I-III, that the engine of societal development is located internally, in the people, themselves – not the prevailing and pervasive fraudulent developmentalism unleashed on Africa in the 1960s by the same France, Britain/other lead European World conqueror-states that had for 400 years enslaved, dispersed, occupied and immiserised Africa and its peoples; thus, Thomas Sankara’s and Biafra’s historic liberatory legacies of transformative outreaches emanating internally, not externally, forged so tenaciously, constitute contemporary Africa’s freedom path to the restoration of unfettered independence from continuing European World seizure via the latter’s imposition of local client states and overseers (for instance, the Fulani islamist/jihadist-led notorious Nigeria genocidist and kakistocratic state), enhanced expropriation, and hardly disguised impunity

(Jackie McLean Quintet, “Hootnan” [personnel: McLean, alto saxophone; Charles Tolliver, trumpet; Bobby Hutcherson, vibraphone; Cecil McBee, bass; Billy Higgins, drums; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 16 September 1964])

*****Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe is the author, with Lakeson Okwuonicha, of Why Donald Trump is great for Africa (2018)

(https://www.amazon.co.uk/Why-Donald-Trump-great-Africa-ebook/dp/B07KFQHXKV/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1542585950&sr=8-1)

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

143rd birthday of Carter G Woodson

(Born 19 December 1875, New Canton, Va, United States)

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

Historian, journalist, versatile educator and inaugurator of the “African World History Month”, now a very important fixture in the annual calendar in several regions of the African World, outside Africa, and who, whilst researching the nature of the education of African Americans in the 1930s, concludes on the following consequences on someone, anyone, being controlled and defined by an agency outside their own centre of being, an observation as salient as ever, 80 years on (Woodson, Mis-Education, 2010: 48):

IF YOU can control a [person’s] thinking, you don’t have to worry about [their] action. If you can determine what a [person] thinks you do not have to worry about what [they] will do. If you can make a [person] believe that [they are] inferior, you don’t have to compel [them] to seek an inferior status [for they] will do so without being told and if you can make a [person] believe that [they are] justly an outcast, you don’t have to order [them] to the back door. [They] will go to the back door on [their] own and if there is no back door, the very nature of the [person] will demand that you build one [for them]. (added emphasis)

(Charles Mingus Quartet, “All the things you could be by now if Sigmund Freud’s wife is your mother” [personnel: Mingus, bass; Ted Curson, trumpet; Eric Dolphy, alto saxophone; Dannie Richmond, drums; recorded: Nola Penthouse Sound Studios, New York, US, 20 October 1960]) 

*****Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe is the author, with Lakeson Okwuonicha, of Why Donald Trump is great for Africa (2018)

(https://www.amazon.co.uk/Why-Donald-Trump-great-Africa-ebook/dp/B07KFQHXKV/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1542585950&sr=8-1)

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

101st birthday of Kenneth Onwuka Dike

(Born 17 December 1917, Oka, Biafra)

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

HISTORIAN, okaa amalu, doyen of the Reconstructionary School of African Historical Studies in the aftermath of 400 years of the pan-European enslavement, dispersal, conquest and occupation of the African World: lays the foundation of this restoration of the African as subject and agency in history in the 1956 publication of his classic, Trade and Politics in the Niger Delta, 1830-1885; inaugurates a stretch of an encompassing African peoples’ heritage archive and becomes the first African vice-chancellor (president/rector) of the University of Ibadan, and later, May 1966-January 1970, travels the world as one of the envoys of eminent and resolute Biafra resistance intellectuals who campaigns tirelessly against the Igbo genocide (phases I-III) waged by Fulani islamist/jihadist-led Nigeria and its suzerain state Britain, under the premiership of Harold Wilson, in which 3.1 million Igbo people, 25 per cent of this nation’s population, are murdered between 29 May 1966 and 12 January 1970 in this foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa.

THE Igbo genocide continues unrelentingly (phase-IV, launched on 13 January 1970) and the genocidists have murdered tens of thousands of additional Igbo during this phase – including the 3000 murdered since October 2015 whilst Nigeria has been run by génocidaire Muhammadu Buhari, a fiendish operative in this campaign since July 1966. Buhari was imposed on Nigeria as head of regime in March 2015 by ex-British Prime Minister David Cameron and ex-US President Barack Hussein Obama, the first African-descent president of the United States in 233 years of the founding of the republic. Professor Dike would be most horrified by Obama’s support of the Igbo genocide.

(Eric Dolphy Quartet, “Softly as in a morning sunrise” [personnel: Dolphy, bass clarinet; Herbie Hancock, piano; Eddie Khan, bass; JC Moses, drums; recorded: live, University of Illinoi, 10 March 1963])

*****Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe is the author of African Literature in Defence of History: An essay on Chinua Achebe (2001) and author, with Lakeson Okwuonicha, of Why Donald Trump is great for Africa (2018)

(https://www.amazon.co.uk/Why-Donald-Trump-great-Africa-ebook/dp/B07KFQHXKV/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1542585950&sr=8-1)

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

150th birthday of WEB Du Bois

(Born 23 February 1868, Great Barrington, Mass, US)

Sociologist, historian, African peoples-centred scholar, freedom activist extrordinaire, towering public intellectual – decades before “public intellectual” becomes in vogue

(John Coltrane Quartet,  “Equinox” [personnel: Coltrane, tenor saxophone; McCoy Tyner, piano; Steve Davis, bass; Elvin Jones, drums; recorded: Atlantic Studios, New York, US, 26 October 1960])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

144th birthday of Arthur Schomburg

(Born 24 January 1874, Santurce, Puerto Rico)

Historian, writer, activist archivist on sources and resources on African history in the Americas and Europe, 1900-1938, and seminal contributor to the Harlem Renaissance, beginning in 1919, with New York public library’s Schomburg Center for research in African American culture named in his honour

(Schomburg Center, New York)

(Andrew Hill Sextet, “Spectrum” [personnel: Hill, piano; Kenny Dorham, trumpet; Eric Dolphy, alto saxophone, bass clarinet, flute; Joe Henderson, tenor saxophone;  Richard Davis, bass; Tony Williams, drums; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 21 March 1964])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

68th birthday of Thomas Sankara

(Born 21 December 1949, Yako, Burkina Faso)

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

Military commander, historian, and head of state of Burkina Faso, 4 August 1983-15 October 1987, when he leads a transformative government in “post”-(European)conquest Africa which demonstrates, overwhelmingly with indelible successes, just as the resourceful Biafran resistance had breathtakingly inaugurated this breakthrough on the Africa continental scene during the Igbo genocide, 29 May 1966-12 January 1970, phases I-III, that the engine of societal development is located internally, in the people, themselves – not the prevailing and pervasive fraudulent developmentalism unleashed on Africa in the 1960s by the same France, Britain/other lead European World conqueror-states that had for 400 years enslaved, dispersed, occupied and immiserised Africa and its peoples; thus, Thomas Sankara’s and Biafra’s historic liberatory legacies of transformative outreaches emanating internally, not externally, forged so tenaciously, constitute contemporary Africa’s freedom path to the restoration of unfettered independence from continuing European World seizure via the latter’s imposition of local client states and overseers (for instance, the Hausa-Fulani/islamist-led notorious Nigeria genocidist and kakistocratic state), enhanced expropriation, and hardly disguised impunity

(John Coltrane Duo, “Mars” [personnel: Coltrane, tenor saxophone;  Rashied Ali, drums; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 22 February 1967])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

142nd birthday of Carter G Woodson

(Born 19 December 1875, New Canton, Va, United States)

Historian, journalist, versatile educator and inaugurator of the “African World History Month”, now a very important fixture in the annual calendar in several regions of the African World, outside Africa, and who, whilst researching the nature of the education of African Americans in the 1930s, concludes on the following consequences on someone, anyone, being controlled and defined by an agency outside their own centre of being, an observation as salient as ever, 80 years on (Woodson, 2010: 48):

IF YOU can control a [person’s] thinking, you don’t have to worry about [their] action. If you can determine what a [person] thinks you do not have to worry about what [they] will do. If you can make a [person] believe that [they are] inferior, you don’t have to compel [them] to seek an inferior status [for they] will do so without being told and if you can make a [person] believe that [they are] justly an outcast, you don’t have to order [them] to the back door. [They] will go to the back door on [their] own and if there is no back door, the very nature of the [person] will demand that you build one [for them]. (added emphasis)

(Charles Mingus Sextet – with Eric Dolphy, Cornell University 1964, “Meditations” [personnel: Mingus, bass; Johnny Coles, trumpet; Dolphy, flute, bass clarinet; Clifford Jordan, tenor saxophone; Jaki Byard, piano; Dannie Richmond, drums; recorded: live, Cornell University, 18 March 1964]) 

Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe

117th birthday of Ras T Makonnen

(Born [?][?]1900, Buxton, Guyana; dies 18 Dec 1983, Nairobi, Kenya)

Geologist, historian and influential Africa World intellectual, co-organiser, with Kwame Nkrumah and others, of the landmark 1945 Manchester (England) conference of leading African-descent intellectuals on African World affirmation and the future 

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

100th birthday of Kenneth Onwuka Dike

(Born 17 December 1917, Oka, Biafra)

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe

HISTORIAN, okaa amalu, doyen of the Reconstructionary School of African Historical Studies in the aftermath of 400 years of the pan-European enslavement, dispersal, conquest and occupation of the African World: lays the foundation of this restoration of the African as subject and agency in history in the 1956 publication of his classic, Trade and Politics in the Niger Delta, 1830-1885, inaugurates a stretch of an encompassing African heritage archive and becomes the first African vice-chancellor (president/rector) of the University of Ibadan, and later, 1966-1970, travels the world as one of the envoys of eminent and resolute Biafran intellectuals who campaigns tirelessly against the Igbo genocide (phases I-III) waged by Hausa-Fulani/islamist-led Nigeria and its suzerain state Britain, under the premiership of Harold Wilson, in which 3.1 million Igbo people (25 per cent of this nation’s population) are murdered between 29 May 1966 and 12 January 1970 in this foundational genocide of post-(European)conquest Africa

(Eric Dolphy Quartet, “Softly as in a morning sunrise” [personnel: Dolphy, bass clarinet; Herbie Hancock, piano; Eddie Khan, bass; JC Moses, drums; recorded: live, University of Illinoi, 10 March 1963])

Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe

115th birthday of Arna Bontemps

(Born 13 October 1902, Alexandria, Louisiana, US)

AWARD-WINNING prolific poet, novelist, children’s writer, editor, biographer, historian, and librarian, whose work plays a cardinal role in the emergence of contemporary African American letters

(Andrew Hill Quartet, “Cantarnos” [personnel: Hill, piano; Joe Henderson, tenor saxophone;  Richard Davis, bass; Roy Haynes, drums; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 8 November 1963])

Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe

62nd birthday of Hilary Beckles

(Born 11 August 1955, Bridgetown, Barbados)

DISTINGUISHED historian on African peoples’ enslavement in the Caribbean by Britain/pan-European World and advocate of programmed reparations to African peoples worldwide by the European perpetrators of this crime against humanity; Britain emerges as lead beneficiary of African enslavement across the Americas during this 400 year-epoch, beginning in the 17th century soon after it takes over the statuses of the Iberian states of Spain and Portugal exercised hitherto since the 1490s

(Professor Beckles delivers his landmark lecture on African reparations from Britain/pan-Europe on the latter’s centuries of the enslavement of African peoples in the Caribbean and elsewhere in the Americas; venue: Methodist Church Hall, Kingstown, St Vincent and the Grenadines, 20 August 2013)

(Peter Tosh: ... “400 years”, 1975)

400 YEARS (400 years, 400 years. Wo-o-o-o)

And it’s the same –
The same (wo-o-o-o) philosophy
I’ve said it’s four hundred years;
(400 years, 400 years. Wo-o-o-o, wo-o-o-o)
Look, how long (wo-o-o-o)
And the people they (wo-o-o-o) still can’t see
Why do they fight against the poor youth of today?
And without these youths, they would be gone –
All gone astray

Come on, let’s make a move:
(make a move, make a move. Wo-o-o-o, wo-o-o-o)
I can (wo-o-o-o) see time (wo-o-o-o) - time has come
And if-a fools don’t see
(fools don’t see, fools don’t see. Wo-o-o-o)
I can’t save the youth:
The youth (wo-o-o-o) is gonna be strong
So, won’t you come with me;
I’ll take you to a land of liberty
Where we can live – live a good, good life
And be free

Look how long: 400 years, (400 years, 400 years) – 
Way too long! (wo-o-o-o)
That’s the reason my people (wo-o-o-o) - my people can’t see
Said, it’s four hundred long years – (400 years, 400 years. Wo-o-o-o)
Give me patience (wo-o-o-o) – same philosophy
It’s been 400 years, (400 years, 400 years)
Wait so long! Wo-o-o-o, wo-o-o-o
How long? 400 long, long years

(lyrics: “400 years”)

Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe

149th birthday of WEB Du Bois

(Born 23 February 1868, Great Barrington, Mass, US)

Sociologist, historian, African-centred scholar and freedom activist, towering public intellectual – decades before “public intellectual” becomes in vogue

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

143rd birthday of Arthur Schomburg

(Born 24 January 1874, Santurce, Puerto Rico)

Historian, writer, activist archivist on sources and resources on African history in the Americas and Europe, 1900-1938, and seminal contributor to the Harlem Renaissance, beginning in 1919, with New York public library’s Schomburg Center for research in African American culture named in his honour

(Schomburg Center, New York)

(Andrew Hill Sextet, “Spectrum” [personnel: Hill, piano; Kenny Dorham, trumpet; Eric Dolphy, alto saxophone, bass clarinet, flute; Joe Henderson, tenor saxophone;  Richard Davis, bass; Tony Williams, drums; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, US, 21 March 1964])

Twitter @HerbertEkweEkwe

FWD: Teresa R Kemp, African American historian, traces her origin to Oka, Biafra

(Teresa Kemp)

By Biafra Diboh (slightly edited from the original)

Teresa R Kemp, one of African Americans involved in the free medical care trip to the Anambra region, northwest Biafra, has traced the ancestral home of her father to Oka, Biafra.

Kemp, a military historian, who has in the past organised an Igbo arts and cultural festival in South Carolina, United States, said that her great grandfather, named Osinachi, was enslaved and trafficked over 187 years ago as a metalsmith from Oka to the United States, as confirmed by DNA.

With an interest in the works of African peoples, Kemp told The Nation that she had written a book, Keeper of the Fire (CreateSpace Independent Publishing Plaatform, 2014),  of an Igbo metalsmith from Awka, detailing the story of her ancestor. She describes Igbo people as hardworking, intelligent, unassuming, and entrepreneurial in nature: “I am proud to be linked to Ndiigbo, the world has prospered because of Ndiigbo”.

Kemp went to Anambra with an organisation called ASA-World (which has membership in 27 countries), made up of the region’s indigenes resident overseas whose mission is to provide free medical care for the people, costing US$ 800,000.

The team brought diagnostic equipment and medicine to be left behind for resident doctors and other health officials to continue using in Oko, in Orumba north local government, Abagana, Njikoka local government, Obosi, Idemili north local government, Ihembosi and Ozubulu, both Ekwusigo local government, and Oba, Idemili south local government district.

The medical mission treated and provided medicine to people suffering from different ailments. Total treated are: 1,100 in Oko, 8,500 in Abagana, 1,200 in Ihembosi, 1,300 in Obosi, and 1,200 in Ozubulu.

(Sonny Rollins Quintet, “Decision” [personnel: Rollins, tenor saxophone, Donald Byrd, trumpet; Wynton Kelly, piano; Gene Ramey, bass; Max Roach, drums; recorded: Van Gelder Studio, Hackensack, NJ, US, 16 December 1956])

Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe 

FWD: Teresa R Kemp, African American historian, traces her origin to Oka, Igboland

BY Biafra Diboh (slightly edited from the original)

(Teresa Kemp)

Teresa R Kemp, one of African Americans involved in the free medical care trip to the Anambra region, northwest Igboland, has traced the ancestral home of her father to Oka, Igboland.

Kemp, a military historian, who recently organised an Igbo arts and cultural festival in South Carolina, United States, said that her great grandfather, named Osinachi, was enslaved and trafficked over 187 years ago as a metalsmith from Oka to the United States, as confirmed by DNA.

With an interest in the works of African peoples, Kemp told The Nation that she had written a book, Keeper of the Fire, of an Igbo metalsmith from Awka, detailing the story of her ancestor. She describes Igbo people as hardworking, intelligent, unassuming, and entrepreneurial in nature: “I am proud to be linked to Ndiigbo, the world has prospered because of Ndiigbo”.

Kemp went to Anambra with an organisation called ASA-World (which has membership in 27 countries), made up of the region’s indigenes resident overseas whose mission is to provide free medical care for the people, costing US$ 800,000.

The team brought diagnostic equipment and medicine to be left behind for resident doctors and other health officials to continue using in Oko, in Orumba north local government, Abagana, Njikoka local government, Obosi, Idemili north local government, Ihembosi and Ozubulu, both Ekwusigo local government, and Oba, Idemili south local government district.

The medical mission treated and provided medicine to people suffering from different ailments. Total treated are: 1,100 in Oko, 8,500 in Abagana, 1,200 in Ihembosi, 1,300 in Obosi, and 1,200 in Ozubulu.

Twitter@HerbertEkweEkwe