This except from a letter attributed to Cheikh Ahmadu Bamba shows that the
enlightened and true Sufist leaders were against tyranny and dictatorship.  The
Cheikh was always concerned about the welfare of the ordinary and weak and
reminded the holders of power to serve the people and avoid being corrupted
by power.  Thus it may be that Africans may not have seen rulers as
eternally divine.  They were aware of the temporality of power.  The recent
politics of the Big Man rule *a la J Bayart (Politics of the Belly)* is an
invention of the post-colonial state which was just a continuing of the
system of colonialism which was based on only maintaining the power of the
colonialists through coercion, lies, falsehood, subterfuge and
mystification.
Mboge

_________________________________________________________________________________



“And that day will come when the same power you [have] will be taken from…
[your] hands to be transferred to other kings who succeed you. So if it
happens some days when life seems favorable to you and assist you against
your enemies, know [there] will be others where it will promote your
opponents against you. And if sometimes it made ​​you laugh, sometimes it
also will make you cry. So what joy it inspires [in] you [let it] not
deceive you … because this world is inherently misleading and disingenuous.
Often it [can] turn … sharply against you to lure you and make you fall
into his trap. Also, I recommend to [you to] always *continue to assist the
weaker, poor and needy, and never fall into tyranny and injustice because
"any unjust man will regret it one day" and "any tyrant ensure his own
destruction."* Never forget that you hold the power and all favors flowing
from it …, indeed,  [it] reached [you] only through the death of other
people who owned it before you… . Therefore, expect that these same
privileges [could]… forsake [you] one day …. Do therefore persevere in acts
that will be useful in both worlds, here and in the Hereafter, before that
one day you turn … [your] back on these benefits or that they turn away
from you forever. Here ends the recommendations I give thee, if thou wilt
…, this will be to your advantage, otherwise [thou assume the consequences]
because "We all belong to God and to Him we shall return"  ”.  * Cheikh
Ahmadu  Bamba-( Founder of the Mouridism Sect in Senegal ) to the last
DAMEL Samba Loabe Fall (King of Cayor) *


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