5 replies to this topic

[Mogho Naaba]

Why do We Always Betray those of Us that Fight for Afrika's Freedom?

Who killed the lion king?

There is actually no murder mystery:

When Thomas Sankara was killed after four years as President of Burkina Faso, it was at the orders – if not at the hands – of one of his oldest friends, now President Blaise Compaoré. Echoes of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar as much as Disney’s The Lion King. Why should we care about this particular African tragedy?

We should care because the revolution Sankara led between 1983 and 1987 was one of the most creative and radical that Africa has produced in the decades since independence. He started to blaze a trail that other African countries might follow, a genuine alternative to Western-style modernization – and, like other radical African leaders such as Patrice Lumumba and Amilcar Cabral, was shot down as a result. Whereas his murderer, still in power eight years later, has pursued self-enrichment and politics as usual – and has been fêted by the West for his compliance.

An incorruptible man

*A major anti-corruption drive began in 1987. The tribunal showed Captain Thomas Sankara to have a salary of only $450 a month and his most valuable possessions to be a car, four bikes, three guitars, a fridge and a broken freezer. He was the world’s poorest president.

*Sankara refused to use the air conditioning in his office on the grounds that such luxury was not available to anyone but a handful of Burkinabes.

*When asked why he had let it be known that he did not want his portrait hung in public places, as is the norm for other African leaders (and as Blaise Compaoré does now), Sankara said ‘There are seven million Thomas Sankaras’.

Chronicle of a revolution

Feb 1984 Tribute payments to and obligatory labour for the traditional village chiefs are outlawed.

4 Aug 1984 All land and mineral wealth are nationalized. The country’s name is changed from the colonial Upper Volta to Burkina Faso, words from two different local languages meaning ‘Land of the Incorruptible’.

22 Sept 1984 A day of solidarity: men are encouraged to go to market and prepare meals to experience for themselves the conditions faced by women.

Oct 1984 The rural poll tax is abolished.

Nov 1984 ‘Vaccination Commando’. In 15 days 2.5 million children are immunized against meningitis, yellow fever and measles.

3 Dec 1984 Top civil servants and military officers are required to give one month’s pay and other civil servants to give half a month to help fund social development projects.

31 Dec 1984 All domestic rents are suspended for 1985 and a massive public housing construction program begins.

1 Jan 1985 Launch of a campaign to plant 10 million trees to slow the Sahara’s advance.

4 Aug 1985 An all-women parade marks the anniversary of the Revolution.

10 Sep 1985 The mounting hostility of the region’s conservative regimes is revealed at a meeting in Yamoussoukro, Côte d’Ivoire.

Feb-Apr 1986 ‘Alpha Commando’. A literacy campaign in nine indigenous languages involves 35,000 people.

End of 1986 A UN-assisted program brings river blindness under control.

15 Oct 1987 Sankara is assassinated in a coup d’état along with 12 aides. His body is unceremoniously dumped in a makeshift grave which quickly becomes a shrine as for days thousands of people file past it to pay their respects. Popular feeling forces the new regime to give Sankara a decent grave.

A villager’s assessment of Sankara

‘I wasn’t surprised when he was killed – the Revolution took me by surprise but that didn’t. He had bad men around him, people who just wanted to get fat and drive around in big cars. Many things changed in the Revolution. Not always in the best way. But because of the Revolution we know a little more about the type of politicians we need. It taught us to work by ourselves for ourselves. But Sankara wanted everything to happen too quickly – he expected too much.

‘If I were President myself I would do just as Sankara did and send my ministers out to the villages to learn what it’s like there and give the peasants help. Sankara’s very best idea was to teach us that it wasn’t enough to live with what we get in wages each month – we should get by with the minimum and give the rest to the development of the country instead of always asking for aid from overseas.’

‘I would like to leave behind me the conviction that if we maintain a certain amount of caution and organization we deserve victory... You cannot carry out fundamental change without a certain amount of madness. In this case, it comes from nonconformity, the courage to turn your back on the old formulas, the courage to invent the future. It took the madmen of yesterday for us to be able to act with extreme clarity today. I want to be one of those madmen. We must dare to invent the future.’

Thomas Sankara, 1985


See also this information on Thomas Sankara from the Wikipedia

Edited by Mogho Naaba, 01 July 2007 - 09:40 PM.

[Tafari Shabazz]

"Donors have not always had the sincere aim of helping Upper Volta, they used aid as a means of gaining control over our country...." Thomas Sankara

[Mogho Naaba]

The many traitors in our midst have a hell of a lot to answer for....

[BlackMatta]

Why do We Always Betray those of Us that Fight for Afrika's Freedom?

A villager’s assessment of Sankara

‘I wasn’t surprised when he was killed – the Revolution took me by surprise but that didn’t. He had bad men around him, people who just wanted to get fat and drive around in big cars. Many things changed in the Revolution. Not always in the best way. But because of the Revolution we know a little more about the type of politicians we need. It taught us to work by ourselves for ourselves. But Sankara wanted everything to happen too quickly – he expected too much.

This is why I say that strength is unity is more meaningful to me than unity is strength.

When weak people unite all you get is a weak unit. Weak people seek strength by exploiting those around them.

A strong unit needs each member to be already strong.

That is why it all starts with self-improvement, and that takes time.

If we continue to dismiss such ideas as "intellectualisation" we will continue to see this cycle of "betrayal".

[Voo]

Perhaps we need to clarify what 'strength' is?

You can be 'strong' in character for example, doesn't mean that you are an effective revolutionary. What about someone who has strong ideals and belief in those ideals but not necessarily the strength of character to carry them through effectively. Of course, the ideal must be both. But I fear, there are many who will not conform to this 'ideal' of 'strength'.

I would like to agree with the notion of blind unity being something that we must NOT promote. I have heard people say we must unify but surely, we do not want to unify with every African person/ organisation etc otherwise we will be creating the kind of chaotic unity that will be our own downfall.

Perhaps we need to clarify what 'strength' is?

You can be 'strong' in character for example, doesn't mean that you are an effective revolutionary. What about someone who has strong ideals and belief in those ideals but not necessarily the strength of character to carry them through effectively. Of course, the ideal must be both. But I fear, there are many who will not conform to this 'ideal' of 'strength'.

I would like to agree with the notion of blind unity being something that we must NOT promote. I have heard people say we must unify but surely, we do not want to unify with every African person/ organisation etc otherwise we will be creating the kind of chaotic unity that will be our own downfall.

From Ligali's January 2007 newsletter:

AFRIcons of African History

Thomas Sankara

‘You cannot free a slave who is not even conscious of being a slave’.

Assassinated in a 'counterrevolutionary' coup on the 15th October 1987, Captain Thomas Isidore Noël Sankara had already left a powerful legacy of fighting imperialism and emancipating the minds of African people. Before his death at the hands of the soldiers led by former friend Captain Blaise Compaoré, Sankara was the leader of the Pan-Africanist Burkinabé Revolution. This was a movement which aimed “to accept the responsibility of its reality and its destiny with human dignity”. This group of revolutionaries wanted to galvanise support for a socio-political progressive change that would transcend African people from positions of individual weakness to a self-determined and self-empowered force of nations.

Born 21 December 1949 in Yako in Burkina Faso (formerly known as the Upper Volta) Thomas Sankara’s short but notable career as a revolutionary began as a military officer, quickly moving on to prime minister under President Jean-Baptisté Ouédrago. His radical-minded statements urged the Burkinabé people to defend themselves against economic and domestic imperialism. This led him to be deposed as prime minister and imprisoned by the military government. It did not take long for thousands of young people to organise themselves under the command of Captain Blaise Compaoré, free Sankara from house arrest and overthrow Ouédrago.

Armed with the new presidency, Sankara changed the name of his country from what was known as the Upper Volta to Burkina Faso ‘the Land of Upstanding Men’, after joining two words from the widely spoken Jula and Mooré languages. In five short years, he led one of the most radical revolutions Africa has seen since the general period of Independence. Between 1983 and 1987, Sankara’s government outlawed obligatory payments to local chiefs, nationalised all the mineral wealth and land, two and a half million children were vaccinated against meningitis, yellow fever and measles, as well as suspending residential rents, there began a massive housing construction programme. A reforestation campaign was also initiated to plant ten million trees to slow down the advancing Sahara wasteland and the major problem of river blindness was brought under control.

The Burkinabé Revolutionary importantly recognised the vital role of women in this great movement. The 22nd September was to become the Day of Solidarity. This was where men were to do the chores of women so they could gain an understanding of the conditions their wives faced and it was an all-women parade that marked the anniversary of the revolution in August 1984. Sankara felt passionately about Burkinabé women undertaking strategic and pivotal roles in creating their own destiny therefore playing a major part in the revolution and designed programmes and policies that would enable and support that.

As well as making popular decisions like abolishing rural taxes, Sankara’s government also radically ordered top civil servants and high ranking military officers to put back one month’s pay of their wages into building social and community projects such as a People’s Development Programme and Alpha Commando. This was a huge literacy campaign that involved 35,000 people and over six indigenous languages.

A staunch advocate of African unity, Sankara formed a formidable alliance with Ghana. He built bridges with Benin, Togo and even the Ivory Coast who there was some animosity with. After a five day battle with close neighbours Mali, Sankara delivered a speech in the capital of Burkina Faso, Ouagadougou, announcing the releasing of all the prisoners of war allowing them to return home. He implored the Burkinabé people to extend the hand of love to their Malian brothers and sisters, saying in reference to France’s involvement in supplying arms to Mali, “…Let us avoid being diverted and dragged into fights that are not the peoples’ fights”.

In the face of european supremacy and colonial-minded individuals, Thomas Sankara always strived for the liberation of the minds of Africa’s people through practical and achievable means. He had a pittance of a salary and possessed nothing but a fridge, three guitars, one car, four bikes and a broken freezer. Going against the norm for an African president, he refused to hang his portrait up famously saying, ‘There are seven million Thomas Sankaras’. Typically leading by example, he refused air conditioning in his office saying that other Burkinabés could not afford such a luxury. Thomas Sankara fought against the enemies of African unity until he was ultimately killed by them. It was these incredible achievements captured in so short a time that probably accelerated his murder creating a true martyr for our time.

‘We maintain the serenity, calm, and tranquility of a people that has confidence in its strength and knows that the limits of its struggle will be determined not by the enemy, but by the people itself.’

[BlackMatta]

Perhaps we need to clarify what 'strength' is?

It surely is different things to different people. For me it is a free will.

You can be 'strong' in character for example, doesn't mean that you are an effective revolutionary. What about someone who has strong ideals and belief in those ideals but not necessarily the strength of character to carry them through effectively. Of course, the ideal must be both. But I fear, there are many who will not conform to this 'ideal' of 'strength'.

I think of values as those things I actually do, live and "swear by". They are gained through live experiences.

Ideals, on the other hand, may be things I would like to do, or I imagine may be good, but when the moment of truth comes I may find I am not so sure about them.

Also, it is possible for a person to hold conflicting values and ideals. It is not enough just to find strong values. One has to demolish the weak ones and see, through clarity of vision, exactly how they obstruct the free will.

I would like to agree with the notion of blind unity being something that we must NOT promote. I have heard people say we must unify but surely, we do not want to unify with every African person/ organisation etc otherwise we will be creating the kind of chaotic unity that will be our own downfall.

Yes. I do not think it is wise to lean on others for what we lack.
Some people will do only what it takes to see them into a position to exploit others. And if that means double crossing those who trust them on the way, they are happy to exploit that blind faith.