LIKE a shining star, a Black Star, I hang up there in the sky not on my own but on the invisible shoulders and hands of those whose guidance and patience have brought me this far. I accept this honour in eternal tribute to them and the moral compass they held aloft.
I accept this honour in tribute to my Aboabo primary school and Adisadel College teachers in Ghana who in the 1950s and 60s gave me this unique facility to read and write. In literal sense, it was these teachers who made me literate and instilled in me the discipline of reading, writing and asking questions. It is this unique gift that has brought me this far.
Growing up therefore, I read every literature that came my way. I loved the sound of what I read in my ears and head. The words spoke to me from the pages and animated me to enquire and discover. My mother, Akyaa, loved to watch me read. However at about the age of nine I asked my mother why she could not read. I held a book before her and told her to concentrate hard on the page and just read. I really wanted Maame to read – and with me. That facility to read and write must not be denied any human being, young or old. To read and write is a human right.
When I enter a library, I land on a magic carpet of intellectual discovery and it is this carpet that has transported me in my enchanting journeys of research and discovery in cities where I find myself. In both Washington, D.C. and London, where I spent most of my adult years in exile, it was the cluster of universities, libraries, museums, research institutions and media and publishing houses that sustained me. I was spoiled for choice. I surfeited myself and was blessed to sit and study at the feet of some the great minds of the 20th Century, like CLR James, Chancellor Williams, Henrik Clarke, Frances Cress-Welsing, Richard Barnet and Myron Woolman.
I accept this Award for our world to respond to the urgency of decolonisation based on history and not on the science and public policy of human classification. Colonialism is a dehumanising construct that has to be deconstructed in all areas of human learning and national life. This is the challenge, I place before SOAS and the university. I appeal to the University through its colleges, faculties, departments and research institutions to lead the way to reconstruct our common humanity; our common humanity free from the ravages of racism. Racism is what tells the non-white person that he or she is expendable.
Decolonisation is humanisation
I am boiling inside me with so much anger and frustration over our world of inequality and our world of environmental degradation. But what stirs me up most is our world of racism. Racism is odious. Racism hurts and it hurts so deep. Racism is dehumanising and so is its handmaiden, colonialism. The colonial construct is dehumanising and so to humanise our world we must consciously decolonise. This is the core message of Black History Month. Black Lives Matter, likewise Black History. Black History Matters, because Black History is the History of humanity. Yes, the history of our common, ONE HUMANITY.
During the month of October, we celebrate Black History. It is a reminder to pay tribute to the rich and sacred diversity of humanity. A humanity which every known religion recognises as created in the image of God. So what gives us the power to snuff the breath out of another? Or take their food away? Or their resources? The ever present menace of Racism calls us to a sober reflection of whatever it is, that enables us to snuff the breath out of any single one of us. Theology provides us with the Golden Rule. Do Unto Others …. or better yet …Do not withhold from others the things that you do not want withheld from you. Do you want to continue breathing? Then do not snuff the breath out of another. Do you want to live to the fulness of your human potential? Then do not withhold the opportunity from another. Do you want to run your country free from interference? Then by all means let others run their affairs in the way they know how. We have that golden rule duty of care to decolonise to humanise because decolonisation is humanisation.
How can I use this Award to benefit SOAS, the University, Africa and the world? There are three issues that are dear to me. All involve the use of the power of global media and communication, academia and the youth to address the trauma of racism by celebrating diversity, the urgency of decolonisation by hosting an international assembly on decolonisation and development and also campaigning for the rights and needs of the world’s most disadvantaged children, especially those who suffer from the scourges of war, exploitation, disease, poverty and natural disaster.
I invite SOAS to consider these humanising projects. I want us to team up to make a difference and yes, we can. If we could mobilise global opinion against apartheid, we have the accumulated skills and the benefit of hindsight to stir the conscience of the world against racism and apartheid in public and private life and especially in international trade and commerce. I believe we can.
Poor leadership
I am disappointed with the leadership of my generation that have ruled Africa from the 1980s to the present. Our stewardship is a disgrace as compared to that of the Nkrumah generation. My generation, with our colonised mind and mixed loyalties, have failed and betrayed the younger generation who risk their life to flee their countries to cross the desert and the Mediterranean Sea in order to reach Europe for a better life. Societies in Africa are on the verge of collapse when you find the vast majority of the youth, wake up in the morning, with nothing to look forward to but misery and hopelessness. And come to think of it, where were most of the ruling elites of my generation educated?
Not here in this university and others across the country and in Europe and the United States and Canada? Why has the education these leaders received rather emboldened them to form alliances with the metropolis and their multi-national corporations, banks and lawyers to extract resources and wealth out of Africa at the expense of their own people? It is only alienated or lobotomised leaders that would sell out their nation for a mess of potage that they hold in offshore accounts in Jersey, British Virgin Islands, Panama and Switzerland.
These leaders are not Africans as they are an alienation (Black Skins, White Mask as taught us by Frantz Fanon and likewise the Blinkards as taught us By Kobina Sekyi, UCL Philosophy graduate in 1914 who lived in Bloomsbury at 33 Bernard Street, off Russell Square). It is this alienation that makes the ruling elites see no value in the gold, cobalt, uranium, lithium, bauxite, oil, gas and the virgin forests and water bodies Mother Africa is blessed with. It is their compromised and disloyal leadership that has impoverished and underdeveloped Africa. I am so ashamed of my generation and what we have done to Africa and the younger generation. We have shredded the integrity of Mother Africa.
Now, you graduands, as you leave the walls of this esteemed university, I encourage you to do everything that brings honour to the university, professors, lecturers, alumni and current students. You owe that to them in your professional, public and private life. You have a duty of care to protect and enhance their hard-earned reputation as they have given you their shoulders to stand on in order to achieve. Never let them down.
This is how I approached my professional life. I would not do anything that could bring disgrace to those who believed in me like Rev. Gordon Cosby, Amara Essy, Rabbi Martin Siegel, Peggy Appiah, Lenora Foerstel, Jewel Mazique, Felix Konotey-Ahulu, Sally Addo, Ama Ata Aidoo, Lord Eric Avebury, Lord Frank Judd, Lord Joel Joffe, Kumar Rupesinghe, and those here with me: Tony Hollingsworth (who used the power of the media and celebrities to mobilise global opinion against apartheid demanding the release of Nelson Mandela), Ansel Wong (former Principal Race Relations Advisor, Greater London Council, who strategised policy and campaigns to humanise local government service provision and delivery), my wife Nana Akua, sisters representing the family and Jon Offei-Ansah representing my literary friends. It is their belief in me that has sustained me through thick and thin.
As you leave this [auditorium] today with your diplomas to enjoy this memorable day with family and friends, I entreat you to go back to campus, and in all your beaming smiles, express gratitude to the cleaners, administration, maintenance and security staff, gardeners, electricians, drivers, whose unstinting service provided you the excellent academic environment and the ladder on which to climb to achieve. And do not forget, for it is through such acts of gratitude and endearment that true leaders are made; for, you lead to humanise.
Lastly, DECOLONISATION IS HUMANISATION and for Africa to develop in its own image and interest, AFRICA MUST DECOLONISE.
