The United States of America is unarguably the most celebrated component of the global village. This necessarily makes anybody that presides over it worthy of being lionised in positive ways. But unfortunately, the case of Donald Trump, the 45th president of the US, is a world away from this, based on his huge lack of understanding of the complex character of humanity within the context of cultural diversity. Trump consistently demonstrates this gross lack of good anthropological education through his numerous unwarranted racial, hate speeches at every given opportunity.
The US president is famous for scolding or lambasting Africans particularly Nigerians and Haitians in public since he assumed office in January 2017. If an ordinary American had been found to suffer from ‘diarrhoea of the mouth’ like that, I’m sure the world would not be all that bothered because of the little impact such an appalling behavioural trait from a non-public person, would have on the US vis-à-vis its relations with more than 50 African nations and Haiti. But for Trump, to be throwing caution to the winds (so blatantly), in this regard, is highly condemnable, because such an attitude, is capable of creating a disequilibrium across temporal scales and geographies.
As a world leader, he needs to learn from biological and cultural anthropology in order to remain afloat the stream of modern education and development. In this respect, the statement by Peebles James in the “Original African Heritage Study Bible”, published in 1996 is very relevant: “Whether black or white, those who feel that skin pigmentation is to be ridiculed are doing nothing other than calling God a fool and saying that He did not know what He was doing when He caused people to adapt to environmental changes and develop different colour hues”
Trump must have swallowed hook, line and sinker some aspects of the Hegelian philosophy which gained in popularity in the 1830s. According to this philosophy, history is completely located in the domain of written records. Therefore, Africans especially Nigerians (without the knowledge of reading and writing until the advent of Europe) could not have had history, except the history of Europeans in the continent. It is most probable that G.H.F. Hegel – a German philosopher would have modified his position, if he was alive today, given the rapidity with which the knowledge of African history and civilisation is spreading around the globe. The same thing applies to that famous British professor of history called Hugh Trevor-Roper in the early 1960s. He gave many public lectures and argued that Africa has no history to be studied. According to Trevor-Roper, everything about Africa was/is darkness and darkness is not a subject for history. Many people believed him and his predecessor – G.H.F. Hegel, not knowing that these members of the European intellectual elite were merely spreading their virus of ignorance about history and its ontology. This is one example of how scholarship can be abused for political and even racial purposes.
No matter the robustness of African human capital, many members of the Western world would continue to be disdainful of Africans and Africa. This hatred for Africans was responsible for the creation of the Middle East, a region carved out of mega Africa during the Second World War, by our cousins from the other side of the divide. But these racial tendencies and arrogance notwithstanding, Africa remains the biological and technological womb of humanity. The different skin colours and shapes of the nose as well as geographical locations are just superficial. Again, Africa had from prehistoric times onwards, developed its own modes of thought or philosophy, otherwise called indigenous epistemologies. These were/are used for cultural information management among other things. They (indigenous epistemologies) are primarily an exercise in historical re-enactment and cultural education, as opposed to mere entertainment. These include cultural festivals, Ifa divination system and art forms. It is therefore, very myopic and misleading to reduce human methods of knowing and taming the environment only to the sphere of Western historiography.
Thus, for example, Nigeria was once ahead of most parts of the Western world in iron metallurgical productions and raffia textile manufactures. Iron metallurgy started in the Nok Valley region of Nigeria, around 500 B.C. Many parts of the world were still at the Stone Age level of civilisation by this time. The African archaeological record of this cultural sophistication is our witness. Even in the field of agriculture, Nigeria and several regions of Africa were ahead, as far back in time as 5000 years ago. Therefore, the idea of saviourhood of Africa by Europe and America is a ruse and a denial of history due to racial intolerance and arrogance. Africans and Nigerians in particular never complained to the Euro-American world that they had a burden they could not carry. Europeans came to Africa to exploit and plunder the rich, abundant natural resources as well as the human capital, in order to develop their home economies, which had become industrialised at a much higher rate than Africa. But Africa was not stagnated in several respects – from stone technology to iron productions, based on local creativity and/or science. Africa was on a mission!
It was Europe who halted this progression for selfish reasons. International politics is to a large degree, rooted in hypocrisy and dishonesty. Contemporary Africa must be very vigilant! The Euro-American world is heavily indebted to Africa including Haiti. Slaves of African extraction, numbering about 400, willy-nilly took part in the construction of the White House and Capitol in Washington D.C. The unwarranted racial attacks on Africans and Haitians by President Trump are an attempt to colonise and destroy the nucleus of the continent’s intellectual tastes and preferences, as a basis for greater economic exploitation of our resources. Today’s Africans must not allow themselves to be demoralised by their neo-colonial tormentors or abusers.
The main challenge here is Africa’s leadership failure, which is not insurmountable after all. Articulate, courageous followership is critical for good governance. Such a followership is to serve as checks and balances. Good governance anywhere in the world has to derive from both the leadership and followership. This is because man is a corrupt animal. Nigerians pray more than those saints in the heavenly kingdoms only to fold their arms when their leaders are defecating on the collective cultural landscape, thinking that God will relocate to Nigeria to rescue them from bad leaders. Africans must ask good quality questions from their leaders about how they are managing the available resources, otherwise the Trumps of this world, would continue to insult us. Africans do not need to begin to wallow in self-pity.
The people of Haiti were the ex-slaves that worked in the French plantations and private homes of their masters, under harsh conditions, until they successfully staged a revolution against cultural domination including economic exploitation in January 1804. They were the first set of African slaves to get independence in the Caribbean world. But despite this freedom, the French government demanded some heavy reparations from Haiti, for losing their slaves and plantations. How sickening! Haiti paid these reparations between 1825 (when they became independent) and 1947. The reparations were huge – 90 million gold francs. This is the root cause of the Haitian material poverty today.
In 1915, the U.S. invaded Haiti and ruled it for 20 years. Haiti was serially raped! Even after they stopped direct rule, huge investments were still made there. US corporations grew from 13 in 1966 to 154 in 1981, at the expense of the indigenes. Trade surpluses were/are made with Haiti. For example, in 2014, it (US) made $356.4 million while the figures were $190.5 million and $191.9 million in 2015, and 2016 respectively. On the other hand, the surplus for 2017 was $385 million, all at the expense of the toiling Haitian masses numbering 10.4 million. The US continues to exploit cheaply the Haitian resources while only about 500,000 of the total population (10.4 million) have permanent jobs. Despite this, President Trump does not think that he should let sleeping dogs lie, because of the superior technologies of America coupled with his (Trump’s) unfettered, unprecedented racial arrogance and rascality.
It is a double tragedy that despite the fact, that about 60 percent of world natural resources are located in Africa, only one percent can be accessed or tapped by Africans. The West takes what Africa has, and still caricatures the continent as a universe for a bunch of imbeciles, and sub-humans ruled by cannibal kings masquerading as presidents. Therefore, Africa including Haiti has to begin to chart a new course for the future-defined and ruled by seriousness in all its ramifications. Nigeria as a microcosm of Africa must set its own standards. The geo-polity has to rescue itself from the swamp of focuslessness, maximum corruption, nepotism, unbridled, primitive ethnic solidarity, religious bigotry and other stone age-like crudities, into which it has been sinking fast.
- Professor Ogundele is of Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Ibadan.