African Renaissance: The Regeneration of Africa
“…The African people, although not a strictly homogeneous race, possess a common fundamental sentiment which is everywhere manifest, crystallizing itself into one common controlling idea… Agencies of a social, economic and religious advance tell of a new spirit which, acting as a leavening ferment, shall raise the anxious and aspiring mass to the level of their ancient glory. The ancestral greatness, the unimpaired genius, and the recuperative power of the race, its irrepressibility, which assures its permanence, constitute the African`s greatest source of inspiration… I hold that his industrial and educational initiative, and his untiring devotion to these activities, must be regarded as positive evidences of this process of his regeneration…”
Pixley ka Isaka Seme, Columbia University speech, 1906
Everywhere we look there are people, events, ideas that light a flame inside us and inspire purpose and action. Every generation gets the opportunity to use events that shake us to our core as opportunities to reflect, deconstruct intergenerational liabilities, and design a better future. Such a time is upon us now. A few years ago, I read a ground-breaking speech titled “The Regeneration of Africa” made by Pixley ka Isaka Seme in 1906. This speech ignited a flame of inspiration in me in a way I could not articulate at the time, until now. When I founded The African Dream Foundation in 2009, like many, the conviction was to invest in the future generation of Africa through education and leadership development, and to contribute to broader socio-economic progress. As I reflected on the journey 12 years on, the obvious become more glaringly obvious. African’s all over the world need collective vision and action to accelerate this progress, and at multiple levels. Without sounding cliché and too predictable, we also desperately need to invest more of our efforts in an energetic and refreshing pedigree of young leaders.
At just 27 years old, Pixley Seme’s speech in 1906 at Colombia University in New York where he studied, won him the Columbia University’s highest oratorical honour, the George William Curtis medal. His speech was refreshing, inspiring and revolutionary at the time, and earned him a stunning review in the New York Times. However sadly, fast forward more than a century later, it is still relevant today more than ever.
The three years preceding his ground-breaking speech, this young Zulu man from Natal in South Africa would continue to make history and would:
complete a law degree at Oxford University and be admitted to the bar in London;
be admitted as the second African barrister in South Africa;
establish the Native South African Farmers Association;
establish Africa’s first and oldest African political party, the African National Congress (ANC), that Nelson Mandela would later lead almost a century later to end apartheid in South Africa;
become the first Treasurer General of the ANC; and
establish a newspaper ‘Abantu-Batho’ which became the most widely read newspaper for Africans in South Africa.
By the age of 30 years old in 1912, Pixley had achieved in a short period, what most struggle to achieve in their lifetime. What an inspiring legacy!
After reading his speech, I could not stop thinking about how well he articulated that Africa and Africans must now take their rightful place in the world through the notion of “regeneration”. He was speaking to us all. Intellectuals of all races, Africans in the diaspora, and Africans on the continent. The symbol of “regeneration” is the title and a central theme of his speech, and is a term traditionally associated with biology. As Richard Goss put it so succinctly, "If there were no regeneration there would be no life if everything regenerated there would be no death”[1]. Regeneration is an important aspect of the general process of growth in all living systems. Without the ability for organisms to regenerate, there would be no life, for the continuation of an organism is profoundly dependent on the incessant turnover by which all tissues and organs persistently renew themselves. However, not all organisms regenerate equally. Some grow an entirely new structure and replace significant portions of the old structure such as an entire limb or ear; this type of regeneration is referred to by scientists as epimorphic regeneration. Tissue regeneration on the other hand, which involves the healing over of wounds, is ever-present in all living organisms. In any case, regeneration, in whatever form it comes, represents an organism’s ability to survive and be resilient. In Pixley’s speech, one can assume with a degree of certainty he was referring to epimorphic regeneration. It is this type of regeneration process we find a phenomenon that can be metaphorically comparable to the type of regeneration that is needed for Africans and by Africans. A sort of incomplete half staged metamorphosis. But unlike metamorphosis, regeneration is the kind of change that, at its core, honours the inherent qualities of the subject, and restores them to their former glory. If Pixley had used the metaphor of metamorphosis, he would be suggesting that Africa and Africans transform into a completely new type of being. But this type of transformation would fail to honour the rich inherit history and legacy that Africans have but has been forgotten over centuries. A legacy that has been decapitated through genocides (physical liquidation of colonised people), epistemicides (subjugation of indigenous knowledge systems), linguicides (displacement of indigenous African languages and imposition of colonial languages), culturecides (exiling African people from their languages, cultures, knowledge, and even from themselves), as well as material dispossessions[2]. A legacy that must be woken, reincarnated, restored… or simply, regenerated.
More than a century after his speech, it has become obvious even to those in the peripheral that this regeneration has been slow and somewhat overdue. Action needs to be strategic, targeted and specific. These actions are born from great answers to our most urgent and important challenges. Good answers can only be found if the right questions are asked by the right people. The appropriateness of the question depends on the perspective that they are formulated. Pixley's provocative, yet palate-cleansing speech is a renaissance of thought, inspiration, ideas and action. A provocative speech that dances in the mind with the hopes of seducing its reader into action. Action that is bound by a common vision and unity for all Africans in the diaspora and on the continent. But when we say “regeneration” in the conceptual sense of socio-economic progress, what does this mean? How does this translate in terms of action? In my view, the regeneration of Africans and Africa must have 6 components:
1. Dismantle old structures, regenerate new ones: Many African countries were established and governed by Europeans as businesses to be exploited for profit. During political decolonisation efforts in the mid-century, African nationalists globally rushed to take over these poorly designed exploitative systems of government that were masquerading as democracies and they did not deconstruct and regenerate new and more humanistic States. The regeneration of Africa will not be sustained unless it is firmly grounded on strong humanistic governance/political structures, and principles.
2. Geo-Political partnerships: A rethinking of partnerships at a geopolitical level is needed. Mutually beneficial partnerships must build Africa’s industrial capabilities and leverage her competitive advantages; and most importantly, lift her people.
3. Intra-regional and inter-regional alignment and integration: Dismantling fragmented markets and regenerating both inter-regional and intra-regional integration through value chain alignments and trade.
4. Re-engagement and mobilisation of the African diaspora: The regeneration of Africa must be a based-on partnerships between Africans on the African continent and those dispersed in other continents, for they are forever bound by a common history and a common destiny.
5. Self-confident, active and productive women and youth: The role of young people and women cannot be understated. Young people’s energy must be harnessed and developed through intergenerational knowledge transfer, formal skills development and economic/political opportunities.
6. Unity and trust among all Africans: Common goals and the corresponding actions which are emancipatory will not be possible unless trust and unity are built among all Africans in the diaspora and within the African continent.
The regeneration of Africa has no single bullet. However, as a philanthropic organization, The African Dream Foundation will continue to focus on building the capacity of women and youth through various initiatives, coupled with working towards lowering the inherent barriers of creating and sustaining gainful employment. The active inclusion of women and youth in all political and economic spheres is key to sustaining broad-based progress.
If we are to meet the ever-evolving challenges of our time, it must go beyond re-pollinating century-old ideologies and structures. What is needed is a potent and direct vision of collective action for Africa’s regeneration that favours her emancipation. This regeneration must be ‘epimorphic’ in nature and not just tissue regeneration. In other words, band-aid solutions will not suffice. What is needed is a renaissance that does not build on fragile and weak structures[3], because like an architectural masterpiece built on weak foundations, it will crumble. Furthermore, renaissance cannot be built by the African ‘elite’ who have lost their self-confidence to deconstruct the inept post-colonial systems we are enslaved to. Women and youth must rise. Only then can we regenerate an Africa that is built from mutual respect at a global stage. As the Greek storyteller Aesop once said, “Divided we fall, united we stand.”
[1] Richard J. Goss, “Principles of Regeneration”, (Academic Press, 1969), 1-2.
[2] Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni, “Revisiting the African Renaissance”, (University of South Africa, 2019) https://oxfordre.com/politics/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190228637.001.0001/acrefore-9780190228637-e-720
[3] Dani W. Nabudere, “The African Renaissance in the Age of Globalization”. African Journal of Political Science, Vol. 6, No. 2 (December 2001), pp. 11-28.