“A people without a precise purpose, will have no history to mirror her image”_ David O. Olusanya
A writer once submitted a fact this way: “we preserve nature, but kill babies. We build solid houses but cannot construct lasting homes. We are smarter but not wiser, bigger but not stronger. We know more but understand less. We live longer but enjoy life less fully. We write more books but fail to take the time to read them. We go faster but get no where. We protect dogs but abuse our children”. Is this the legacy we want to leave behind?
I have always relished a major spot of attraction in the African nature. Which is the colorful cultural diversities and the ultimate uniqueness of the same. These cultural eminences of the blacks have always brought us to the center podium of human history. And to say the fact, we have unintentionally and unknowingly influenced the westerners with the same cultural make up; that explicitly narrates our nature and our nourishing nutrient of living in history.
This outstanding natural gift is headed to becoming some other people’s lifestyle and standard of living, and it’s currently changing and modifying their sense of value, morality and amazingly transforming their mindset towards humanity. Whenever I think of this, a saying always creep into my thinking procession; “a prophet is not always welcome at his own threshold”. A question thus always strike at me: “aren’t we gradually dissolving into extinction willfully?” We have always been a cynosure to the whole of humanity, the contemporary civilization adopted in the world today, according to history, is the creativity of our own culture, we have always been the spice of the world; yet we are treating with spite the fundamental elements that concreted and solidified our unique nature. A palm tree will always live longer than its planter; most times, the planter does not even live to taste its fruit- our culture is our ancestral planting, and today, its fruits are ripe, but are falling and decaying. Are we the pride of our own purpose, or the ride to other people’s stardom?
Is a living vulture not better than a decaying eagle? It is an apparent fact, without twisting tongues that we (AFRICANS) are ebbing away with this tyrant contemporary tide- a product of our own history. We are given to gleefully giving away of our own golden gifts, return to relational rifts and decomposing in self-dug ditches. A tragedy is not a curse, when it is a self-cause. Blame is a resolution of weaklings who are strong and stubborn at casting their cares on the shoulders of their own tyrants. What will become of Africa in the next century? Will it be an exchange of destiny or change to hold unto destiny? Every river has its own root, its own source. Any river that detests its threshold will surely run dry- it’s not negotiable. Is a living vulture not worthy than a decaying eagle?
An individual, who loses his connection among his own people, will be addressed in the perspective of an alien. It is so saddening that Africans conveniently buy into any foreigner’s ideology without beckoning on their own cultural and morality logic, and deem it conducive to concur to barbaric attitudinal mutations; in so doing, throwing themselves into impending extinction from existence and living. Taking for instance, the African fashion; our dressing culture do not permit us, or cajole us with reasons why we should walk naked in public. Obscenity might be a healthy living standard in some other places, aside Africa, but insanity is a cage-worthy disease here in Africa. It is not a crime to incorporate creativity in fashion, but when modesty is out of context, insanity is always prevalent.
Another ebbing virtue is African languages. The English language was first an imposed communication language for the reason of effective subjugation. But later on, became a commodity to be purchased in schools and foreign educational institutions. Today, English language in Africa is headed to not only be an official language- which is understandable for the reason of effective international relations; but superseding the local languages and being adopted as a cultural language. Most times, it’s a shame on the African employees to judge a prospective employee’s intelligent by his/her eloquence and fluency in the English language. Is the initial indirect rule administration that was first introduced to us, not coming to play again in the African System?- this time willfully.
Is this the legacy we plan to leave? To be smarter but not wiser, bigger but not stronger, going faster but heading no where, knowing more, but understanding less. Isn’t it dishonor for a decaying eagle to be fed upon, by a living vulture? Are the African people so blind to see that we are steadily closing behind the blinds? If the African culture is a killer disease, shouldn’t we have gone into extinction before now? Why do foreigners come to sojourn in our “out-dated” values and see reasons why they should buy into them? Failure is not a fabrication of fate. Fate is the fabrication of our own hands. I have a nightmare that one day, an African will name his son “stone”, and a foreign woman will name her daughter “catapult”. A word is enough for the wise.
GLORY TO AFRICA!!
David O. Olusanya
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