Brief Verifiable Facts about Colonialism and Nigeria/Black Africa.

Brief Verifiable Facts about Colonialism and Nigeria/Black Africa. First, it is necessary not to mix up colonialism with Slavery. We must strive to pursue the truth about our past, despite the numerous distortions and false historical narratives being promoted by the mainstream media. Slavery and colonialism are two separate events. The colonialists first banned slavery, went out of their way to enforce the ban, began a period of legitimate trade with African kingdoms and traders and later decided out of greed of course, to conquere us because we were largely spectacularly backward, weak and incapable of defending ourselves and to make it much easier, savagely fighting ourselves. If Europeans had not come to colonise us when they did, the various Islamic Jihads raging across Black Africa would have taken all of us without much resistance as the Arabs/Islamic empires and states were the most civilised and militarily organised groups. When the British formerly conquered Lagos in 1861, they met and quelled not only the very ferocious Yoruba civil war which was selling people to slavery with reckless abandon, but also quelled the equally ferocious Sokoto Jihad of Uthman Dan Fodio which had already exploited the civil war in Yoruba land and was set to reach deeper into today’s Southern Nigeria. Similar Islamic Jihads were also spreading across West Africa. The Christian Missionaries were operating independently from the colonialists. If the fallacies such as “the White man forcing us to become Christians” or “ the White man holding a gun with one had and a bible with the other” had any iota of truth, North Africa would have been all or mainly catholic and Nigeria would not have had much Islam or more Catholic than Anglican as it is today. Slavery and other barbaric practices such as killing of twins were in full operation in Black Africa (example present day, Eastern Nigeria where I come from) when the Colonialists and the missionaries came to Black Africa. I must state here that I have recently learnt about something very disturbing about my own ancestors in relation to slavery. I learnt from an uncle that when my great- great grandfather died, his slaves had their legs broken and buried alive with him. I wish it did not happen but sadly, it appears it did happen as people know every detail of it and have actually done some ceremonies to recognise that something very bad happened. And who did my people enslave? Mainly fellow Igbos and others. There was even a Slave market not far away, according to my uncle and this was happening just about 120 years ago. Britain abolished slavery over 200 years ago Christian Missionaries campaigned to ban slavery and the killing of twins in Nigeria. When the Europeans arrived, most people in Igbo land, Eastern Nigeria were half naked and we lived largely in chiefdoms and had not evolved to the level of kingdoms or to the level of developing any solid civilisation. Hence, we did not even know ourselves and had no way of defending ourselves against any external aggression. It may be plausible to argue that we would have evolved to great Nations if the Europeans had not arrived, but we must also note that if the Europeans had not arrived, our Islamic brothers would have taken us quite easily. Thus, we should really be arguing of whether we would have been better off under Islamic theocracy or not. Yes, our societies at the arrival of colonialism had not evolved to a reasonable level and as such too inferior and weak to withstand external aggressions, but our people were not totally primitive. They were in fact, smarter than us today despite the fact that millions of us are University professors and PhD holders. My discoveries from visiting over 25 European countries and some national museums show that all racial groups share the same human instincts and that precolonial Black African people where evolving just like the most successful European societies evolved, before the advent of colonialism. I first thought about this in Stockholm in December 2003 when I first saw in a European museum, historical artefacts that anyone in precolonial Eastern Nigeria would have easily identified with. And I later saw a UK TV History documentary that showed Blacksmiths doing exactly what my people developed on their own (and still do today) to produce steel. Every human society evolved from a small group to hamlets or villages or chiefdoms to become Nations and Countries. Black African societies where undergoing that natural process before the events of colonialism. I must also say that slavery, both the trans-Atlantic slave trade and the internal slave system was unfortunately, part of that process. For example, an Igbo sub-group Izhi (or Izzi) people in quest for their societal survival were aggressively conquering and grabbing lands from others. Only the arrival of British rule stopped my people from totally wiping out their non-Igbo neighbours. European Colonialism largely empowered ex slaves and other disadvantaged individuals and groups in places like Eastern Nigeria and Igboland in particular. European colonialism fast-forwarded our evolution and development and built successful organised societies and economies out of nothing. The Europeans particularly the British were genuine enough to build solid infrastructures and cities and in organising us just like their own societies. For example, Britain recognised the different groups that make up Nigeria and organised Nigeria in a structure that replicated the United Kingdom. It is grossly dishonest to claim that Britain set us up to fail. Further, contrary to the hogwash we have been long fed that Europeans gave people in the colonies inferior education, Britain and the missionaries actually offered Black people in their African colonies far better opportunities than ordinary White British people had in Britain. For example, many Black Africans attended the best Universities in Britain including Oxford and Cambridge even when ordinary White British people were systematically denied access to higher Education. Britain and the Missionaries also went to a great extent to take quality basic education to many places where there are no longer schools or anything worth calling a school today in Nigeria. For example, most people in Iseke (Ishieke), particularly, the part in Benue State and much of Izhi land stopped having access to quality basic education in the 1960s. Colonisation happened to us because we were weaker and if you like, inferior. What is disgusting and most disgraceful is the failure of people of Black African ancestry to manifest reasonable awareness of the critical need for us to build successful Black societies. It is ignorance and /or Laziness to cry racism over mere words or gestures in the White man’s land when Black Africans are taking ridiculous risks just to come to Europe. Those of us privileged to be adopted into the White man’s society have a huge moral and natural duty to talk more about building successful Black societies out of Black Africa and the Caribbean. John Alexander Nwenu Iteshi London. 21 December 2018

How do you define inferiority in your language?

How do you define inferiority in your language? Black Africa, my people, has fertile lands but we cannot feed ourselves. We also cannot process any cash crop or Natural resources we have and we have plentiful. We do not do well enough in any aspect of societal survival. We cannot construct good modern roads or edifices and have almost zero technological prowess. We depend on the White man to provide us with food, clean water, basic healthcare and even need Oxfam and other White Messianic charities to teach us how and where to poo. Though, we have produced global heroes (e.g. Nelson Mandela, Barack Obama and others), we have not a single society of people of our kind doing reasonably well today or likely to be as successful as any Western society in the next 100 years, even if handed all the monies in the world to do so. Black African countries, arguably, have the highest number of people with PhD in leadership and policy-making positions in the world but for some mysterious reasons, appear unable to think out smart ways to catch up with the rest of the world. Black individuals are incredibly smart, but most of our smartest PhD holders would accuse me of doing something very wrong for this write-up. Most of us will take this post about us as a personal attack on themselves. John Iteshi London, 15 Feb. 2019.