AFRICA LITERATE CLONES OF WESTERN AND EUROPE

EDUCATION
Education is what everybody needs to place him or her in a better position to advance him or herself and impact such acquired knowledge in transforming their environment to a better one. Education can be acquired in many forms including interaction with others, through an organized classroom activities or interaction with nature around us. Gone were the days people thought education was confined only to the four walls of a classroom.

Bringing down education in the perspective of an African and what Africans have achieved so far in terms of using their knowledge acquired both locally and foreign to impact on Africa.

We live in a continent where we have all kinds of learned persons ranging from technology, to social and humanities and yet Africa still face most of the problems education can solve, to talk about few we have Scientists some Professors and Doctors in:

Medicine yet we don't have proper research into medicine to prepare a vaccines basically tested in Africa to suit our environment but always use imported ones that end up killing children or causing other effects on people.

Engineers ranging from building to civil, Auto mechanics to Mining, Agricultural to Petroleum etc yet we cannot build our own roads, construct our own vehicles, Mine our own minerals, produce enough to feed ourselves and import some, drill our own oils but we shamefully boast of our qualification or is it the 'paper type' and not the practical type.

With all these technical know-how deficiencies why won't our 'Masters' do the job for us and give us meager share? Government must strengthen our technical education units and if he feels there must be a change of the educational procedures why not? Walk in town and see the kind of creative work people (Non PHD and Non Doctorate holders) are doing with metals, wood, canes, clothes, sand etc though they are not seen on the lime light all because nobody careless of their works, since our 'masters' will export some to us, with this mindset how to we grow our economy through technology? Government must create a platform that will sponsor their works on a large scale if the professors and Doctors are not producing practically.

Where are the historians and Philosophers who will write African history for African children? Kids and the youth of today are so abreast with alien-cultures which is all good to be current with the globe, but the question is are they current on their own, kids and the youth don't know about works and impacts of great Africans such as Marcus Garvey , Martin Luther King, Malcolm X , Shaka Zulu, Haile Selassie, Kwame Nkrumah, Nelson Mandela, Nnamdi Azikiwe, Mansa Musa, Bob Marley, Patrice Lumumba etc and parents don't care to teach them.

Lets narrow down to Ghana most of the public universities, Senior High School, Polytechnics, Dams, roads etc were done by Kwame Nkrumah and over 56years on many governments have come and gone but yet we don't even have at least 5 each added public universities or Senior High schools or polytechnics.

MANAGEMENT
Our leaders have now kowtow to anything suggested by imperialists, we have lost control of our affairs, our resources are been siphoned day in day out by imperialists leaving us with peanuts and yet we feel proud of it simply because some opinion leaders aid them or probably get involved in their activities, So nobody is ready to say no to all these happenings and we even feel proud of it, our children will be the sufferers of its consequences in time to come.

We are failing as a people to create industries that will process our raw materials to add value to it. All we care for are loans that will continue to cripple us in the hands of imperialists, whiles we can properly manage and strengthen public sectors to generate revenues for the nation, corruption is what we still battling as a nation because nobody care for the betterment of the nation, yet we call ourselves patriots. Leaders prefer making properties and savings in western and Europe rather than doing so in their homelands. Do we have foreign governments saving in Ghanaian banks?

Educated persons feel to escape the system to western and Europe to seek greener pastures and yet expect the nation to develop, whatever is good about western and Europe was developed by their people so Africans must do same.

TRADITION AND CULTURE
A country of our own we prefer dressing in colonial suit and ties to work and only wear our own African prints to work on Fridays which is a shame to us, our culture and traditions are all been displaced with alien ones and we call it 'modernization', our names are started with imperialist names, another form of projecting imperialists instead of our image, come to think of it have you ever heard an imperialist with some of your names mixed in his/hers?

Parents now prefer their children to rattle the 'queens' language and don't you think it will be a fine blend to combine it with your local dialect?

We also cry of wishing to rub shoulders with imperialists but practically we are doing nothing to achieve that goal. Pan African groups are now silent may be one way or the other they have been paid to shut up or a weak on the cause.

When you try to champion pan-Africanism you are seen by same literates who are suppose to know better as a backward person or labeled as a 'racist', I don't think promoting your traditions and culture makes one a racist.

Fortunately or unfortunately learned people who are opinion leaders have failed us in realizing the African projection

Is long overdue Africans write its own history, writes its own education, manage its own affairs, and manage its own resources because we have learnt a lot from imperialists. Greeks, Jews, Americans, Asians, Arabs, Europeans all learnt from others, wrote their own history, managed their own affairs and here they are today.

How long will Africans be dependent on other continents for everything, including how to steer its Affairs.

I don't think we want to stay as 'Literate clones of western and imperialists' since we are failing to use our acquired education to manage our own affairs and create our own brands, rather than promoting imperialists interests and ideologies in our own mother land.

LONG LIVE AFRICA!! LONG LIVE GHANA!!
Kwaku A Darpah (a.k.a Jah son)
Black African conscious writer
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