Alibi wishes to share this with you. That Alibi is on a mission.  Enjoy.
 
In a message dated 11/1/2007 7:23:45 A.M. Mountain Daylight Time,  
cafeafricana1 writes:

Idang Alibi on thursday: I  agree with Dr Watson(2)   
(http://dailytrust.com/index2.php?option=com_content&do_pdf=1&id=3962)   
(http://dailytrust.com/index2.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3962&pop=1&page=0)   
(http://dailytrust.com/index2.php?option=com_content&task=emailform&id=3962&itemid=99999999)      
Written by Idang Alibi, ([log in to unmask]);  08036938729      
Thursday, 01 November  2007    
I was simply overwhelmed by the torrents of positive responses I got  to the 
first part of this two-part series on Dr James Watson’s comment  that the 
Blacks are less intelligent than the Whites. I have never had  any experience 
quite like this since I started writing on this page some  five years ago. I 
received over a hundred phone calls commending me for  speaking the mind of the 
average African man who is genuinely concerned  about the way we are. I received 
over 400 text messages.  
Even as I was writing this yesterday for today’s publication, the  phones 
never stopped ringing and only one thing was on every caller’s  call or text 
message: "I agree with you completely. Continue to tell us  the home truth. That 
is what we need to hear to be able to grow".  
I must confess that I am pleasantly surprised because it is  completely 
contrary to what I had expected. It is not what I had dreamt  of at all. I was 
waiting for a storm of very angry reactions from  pseudo- intellectuals, and ‘
patriotic’ black men who are usually very  touchy when they think the dignity and 
pride of the black race have been  assaulted. I expected that there will be 
many of such who will accuse me  of being a sell-out or a self-hater. We are not 
a people given to deep  introspection. We take things as they come and have 
an incredible  capacity to endure wrong things for so long and not get angry 
with  ourselves or with anybody else with a view to changing things for the  
better.  
Readers’ objective, and not necessarily positive, reactions to a  writer’s 
piece, is to the writer what spectators are to a football  player on the field. 
It helps to urge you on even if some do not agree  with you. But when, as in 
this case, every single person who read the  piece calls to congratulate you 
and say some nice things to you, you  feel good and want to do more. I wish to 
announce to all who reached me  to say that they too are worried about the 
unpleasant state of the  Blackman that I am immeasurably heartened by their 
disposition.  
When a people begin to worry about the unsavoury state of their  existence, 
it is a clear indication that sooner or later, something  positive will happen 
to those people. This is because every revolution  begins first in the minds 
of a people long before the actual revolution  comes to take place. The fact 
that we who ought to have regarded  Watson’s testimony about our inferiority as 
an insult on the basis of  pure emotion are saying that what he is saying is a 
painful truth gives  me confidence that our mindset is changing for good. 
Immediately after most of our African nations achieved their  independence, 
it would have been pure heresy punishable by a fatwa if a  white man said we 
were inferior and a Blackman said he agreed with him.  Late Senegalese president 
and poet Leopold Sedar Senghor and his fellow  Negritude poets who loved to 
romanticise our so-called glorious past  would have asked that Watson be 
roasted alive. It is a good thing that  even at that time, our own Wole Soyinka who 
was not a part of that  groovy train of romanticists told the Negritudists 
that "a tiger does  not proclaim his tigritude". He acts. He pounces on his prey. 
Soyinka’s  tigritude jibe is still relevant today for those who are branding 
Watson  as a racist. A man who is said to be inferior does not proclaim that 
he  is not inferior. He acts it. He shows it. That is the challenge facing  
every African man or woman today. 
Because last week’s piece struck such a responsive chord as seen from  the 
positive reactions to it, I have now decided to write a book on this  subject. 
When a people begin to admit some honest but painful truths  about themselves 
and their failings the way we have started doing now,  that is a cheering 
indication that they are poised for a positive  change. I may not have the gift of 
prophecy but I can see now that even  if the Blackman is suffering a curse, 
that curse has run its course and  he would soon be delivered of every veil that 
seems to be covering his  eyes and every spell that has benumbed him and made 
him incapable of  self-help. 
Last week, at Alesi in Obubra Local Government of Cross River State,  the 
Katsina-Ala Ogoja-Ikom-Calabar Highway, a major trunk A road that  links the 
North with over 12 states in the South-South and South-East  zones of the country 
was about to cut into two. Maybe as I write, the  road may have effectively 
given way, cutting off the South from the  North of our country. A TV crew got 
to that spot and interviewed some  commuters whose cars, lorries and trucks got 
stuck in the mud of the  deep crater on that portion of the road. One man 
told them in faltering  English that there is too much "sufferness’ in this 
country. In like  manner, I want to say that there is too much "sufferness" in 
being black  in this world today. 
This is because being black means you will live in the rundown part  of 
neighbourhoods even in your own country and have the worst possible  deal from your 
own government and the governments of other countries.  Right here in 
Nigeria, white oil workers in the Niger Delta areas live  in quarters that are simply 
heavens on earth while the natives who share  fences with them live in 
squalor. What sort of life is this? Without  even dying, a black man suffers hell or 
has a foretaste of it while  still here on this planet. Too many things are 
wrong with the black man.  Any black man who does not take steps to make heaven 
has automatically  decreed for himself double hell because right now he is in 
hell. 
We live in hell-holes called houses and have a hell lot of time with  all 
manner of hellish predators. We must suspend a sense of righteous  indignation 
and really focus on the fate of the black man. We are not  pathfinders of any 
route to anywhere. We are not pacesetters in  anything. We are not discoverers 
of any hidden truths. We are not  inventors of any useful tools. We hardly make 
insightful statements. Our  leaders cannot lead. They cannot follow. They do 
not learn from recent  or past history. They do not listen to anybody. They do 
not lean on  anyone for support and wise counsel. They are just like that. We 
the  followers are no better. We do not initiate anything for the world to  
copy from us.  
We cannot even copy any worthwhile thing from anybody. If we copy  democracy, 
we will debase and give it an idiotic name called "home-grown  democracy". 
What is that? It is a kind of democracy in which a goat  stands for an election, 
his name is substituted with that of a sheep and  after the vote is cast, a 
dog is declared the winner. It is also the  kind in which a candidate who 
emerged number 14 in his party’s  governorship primary is manoeuvred to be number 
one, the number one is  manipulated out of the race, confusion ensues and to 
get out of the  quagmire, a candidate is conjured from nowhere and manipulated 
to become  governor to superintend the affairs of millions of people! 
Home-grown democracy is pure crap. Democracy is democracy anywhere in  the 
world if you are honest, my friend. It may not be the same as the  brand 
practised in the UK, America or Arabia, but any reasonable man  will recognise the 
spirit and principle of democracy when he sees it.  Our home-grown variant of 
democracy is pure euphemism for thuggery,  rigging, violence, manipulation, 
falsehood, injustice, unfairness and  our apparent inability to govern ourselves. 
Anytime an African country  approaches a transition, citizens and foreigners 
who have business in  that country are filled with trepidation. Some citizens 
living in  volatile areas begin to run back to the relative safety of their 
tribal  enclaves. 
To be concluded next  week.


 



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