The release of Dumo and others is good news, indeed...

Below is a piece on citizenship that might be of interest to some of you.

Regards,

Ebrima.

THURSDAY POSTCARD JUNE 26-06-2003

      By Tajudeen Andul Raheem,
      Secretary General of the Pan African Movement


Two weeks ago I was in Addis for a Ford Foundation
workshop on Citizenship and Identity in Africa. It was
the third in a series of workshops under the
Foundation's Special Initiative for Africa (S.I.A).
Two previous workshops have been held in the past
one-year. The first, held in Maputo, Mozambique, was
on the theme of Peace, Security and Conflict. The
Second, held in Addis, was on Regional Integration.

In all the three areas ' the initiative seeks to
stimulate new ideas and approaches for strengthening
African solutions that will have practical and lasting
impact'.   A number of principles have been adhered to
in identifying the participants. Core ones include, of
course, interest and working experience in the
particular area, geographical representation, gender
balance, balance between fairly well known
organisations and yet to be known and developing
individuals and organisations, intergenerational and
potential for collaboration. These days, political
correctness, means that many will not deny these
principles but their implementation in practice, is a
different matter. As one of a few other participants
who have been present at all the three meetings I have
been amazed  at the broad selection of the
participants and the scrupulousness in meeting the
demands of the  principles particularly striving for
Gender balance.

All these are down to the collective vision of the SIA
people and Ford but owe a lot to the leadership of
Akwasi Aidoo, a veteran Pan Africanist himself and a
consummate team player. He has the gift of being able
to lead you while you believe he is following you.
Every meeting has been like a reunion for many people
who have shared vision but lost contact over the years
or bat on the same side but only knew each other by
reputation.  You cannot be at any of these meetings
and come back saying Africa's future is bleak. There
are just too many talents (known and unquantifiable,
veterans and  spring chickens roaring to go)  in all
fields and from all corners of the continent and in
all corners of the world for us not to be able to
reverse the trend of  Africa being regarded as 'the
problem continent', poor cousins of other peoples of
the world.
> >
Inspite of the open agenda some cynics are still not sure
what Ford Foundation is up to. This is partly because
we are not used to being asked what we want . People
are used to responding to Donor -driven agendas that
have made too many of our NGOs in particular to become
project mercenaries. Also there are too many painful
experience well-meaning  do-gooder  experimentation
across the continent.  But an emerging distinguishing
feature of SIA is that it is limiting itself to
supporting the agenda and strategies as they are being
developed in the meetings. It is a new form of
partnership that is  both a challenge and an
opportunity  to all involved. To succeed it needs to
be business in an unusual way. The responsibilities rest on
all sides. Personally I do not worry too much anymore about other
people's agenda. That should be taken for granted. But what our agenda  is
concerns me more. If you do not have your own well articulated agenda then it
is easier for you to be led by the nose witiingly and unwittingly.
>>
This last workshop on Citizenship and Identity was
probably the most sensitive of all three and for me it
is the foundation without which the other two cannot
deliver effectively. For instance how can we foster
regional integration if we do not accept all peoples
of the region as equal stakeholders in regionalism?
How can you talk of integration if Tanzania can expel
Ugandans, Uganda can deport Kenyans and Kenya does
like wise and all of them are supposed to be building
a common East African Community? How can we talk of an
end to conflict if the rights of citizens are not
respected in the face of rampant Xenophobia in many of
our countries?  Majority of African refugees live in
Africa in other African countries and also many
Africans today live, work and settle in other African
countries but no matter how long they may have been
there they are denied basic citizen rights, regarded
as 'alien' and often treated as such. The ease with
which whole communities and many prominent individuals
are declared 'foreigners' politically betray one basic
assumption: foreigners do not have rights. If they do
we will not be in a hurry to 'foreignise' our
political opponents. In many African countries today
you have all kinds of violent conflicts between
'citizens' of the same country with some claiming they
are 'indigenous' and others 'settlers'. The message is
clear 'indigenous' claims should supersede 'settler'
rights. In a continent built on voluntary and
involuntary migration and displacement of peoples how
far do we have to go to proof indigeniety or
settlerism? Did everybody not come by legend or
otherwise from somewhere else? As I have always argued
the most ridiculous claim of all is the one that is
even  common among us:  'I am an indigenous Nigerian'
'I am indigenous Congolese' or indigenous to any of
the other artificially created states across this
continent.

These are the most recent deformations in
the identities of the people trapped by colonialism in
these states therefore to claim them indigenous is to
accept that our history began with colonialism. When
did Gambia or  Zambia  become indigenous to Africa?
Who and where were all the peoples before Britain
renamed the territory thus?
> >
The DRC illustrates how really artificial these
colonial identities are. For three decades Mobutu
called it Zaire and When Kabila Senior came he
rebaptised it Congo but added the obvious thing
lacking in the country, Democracy, to the name! Could
any leader change the ethnic identities of any of our
thousands of nationalities at will? Imagine if some
president decides that Baganda are no longer Baganda
but Basaveni and Yoruba are now to be known as
Obasanjowa or Xhosa people to be renamed Thaboland!
> >
The issue of citizenship and identity politics across
Africa exposes the lack of inclusiveness in our
social, economic and political systems. They are
constructed in the negative terms of who does not
belong and also identities are used as prison. And
unless we free ourselves from this exclusion and allow
our diversities to flow and enrich one another all
efforts to create stable democracies, sustainable
economy with steady growth that can lead to over all
development may be doomed. We cannot remain relative
strangers on our own continent and at the same time bemoan
 what outsiders do to us
> >
> >[log in to unmask] or [log in to unmask]
> >
> >



---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
To Search in the Gambia-L archives, go to: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/CGI/wa.exe?S1=gambia-l
To contact the List Management, please send an e-mail to:
[log in to unmask]

To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface
at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~