Reparations for Africa?

We heard that Ghana is set to file a resolution at the United Nations on March 25, 2026, to have the transatlantic slave trade declared as one of the greatest crimes against humanity. President John Mahama has led the African Union's call for reparations, demanding that former colonial powers provide compensation for the injustices of slavery and colonialism. So, will the African slave raiders who captured and sold their fellow humans also be held to account? Or are we to ignore this part of the story?

Approximately 90% of Africans captured for the transatlantic slave trade were enslaved by fellow Africans—including rival states, kings, and traders—and sold to European buyers. Major powers driving this internal trade included the Kingdom of Dahomey, the Ashanti Empire, and the Oyo Empire, who often raided smaller societies for captives. These actions were frequently fuelled by the European demand for labour, which encouraged kingdoms to secure goods like guns, textiles, and alcohol by providing captives. Coastal groups like the Efik and Ijaw in the Bight of Bonny, as well as individuals like Nwaubani Ogogo Oriaku, acted as middlemen, purchasing captives from the interior and selling them to Europeans at ports.

My own ancestors in the Niger Delta engaged in selling captives from the hinterland to the Europeans, acting as middlemen. Why do we not include this part of the story in our conversations about this subject? Should Africans not also be taking responsibility for their complicity and for their own role in this trade? Why is "victim" the role we always want to enthusiastically embrace?

Manillas were a form of commodity money widely used as the principal currency by European traders to purchase enslaved Africans and other goods in West Africa from the 15th century onward. They were a crucial element of the transatlantic slave trade's economic system.

Manillas served as a traditional currency and metal bracelet in West Africa from the 15th to the 20th century and were primarily cast from copper, brass, and bronze. These open-ring, horseshoe-shaped items were often produced in Europe, notably in Birmingham, England, and traded for commodities and enslaved people.

Scientific analysis confirms that many of the famous Benin Bronzes were crafted by melting down millions of brass manillas. The artefacts are, arguably, the proceeds of the trade in human beings. There is a culpability for this heinous crime against humanity that we Africans have failed to acknowledge, choosing instead always to play the victim. The real victims of this crime were those who were enslaved, not those who captured them, enslaved them, and sold them.

Yes it is true that the Europeans themselves captured slaves. In the 15th century, Portuguese explorers often kidnapped West Africans directly from the coast to take back to Europe. European sailors and traders occasionally engaged in kidnapping individuals or conducted small raids along the coastline, as documented by formerly enslaved people like Olaudah Equiano, but high mortality rates from tropical diseases in the interior limited the ability of Europeans to travel inland to capture people themselves. Most enslaved people were captured by other Africans, particularly during wars, and sold at coastal forts operated by European nations like Britain, France, and Portugal.

While direct European raids happened, they were a smaller part of the overall, systematic, and brutal trade that saw 12–15 million Africans transported to the Americas. We Africans must face up to what actually happened and stop portraying ourselves wholly as victims. As a matter of fact, it is we Africans who now owe an apology to the descendants of those whom our ancestors so grievously harmed. This, I'm afraid, is the opposite of saying that 'reparations' are due to Africa, in particular, for the transatlantic slave trade, when many Africans were themselves enriched by it.

Reparations for colonialism is a different matter altogether, and with this I am in full agreement with its proponents; for the crimes against humanity committed during colonialism.

A Brass Manilla from West Africa

Journey Journal

To Travel

I enjoy the process of travelling quite a bit more and separate and distinct from enjoying being at the destination I am travelling to. I find the journey itself to be one of the more interesting aspects of it all, and it is among the most exciting things that I get to do in my life. If I go on a certain journey ten times, I know that I am going to have a different experience of the same journey each time. It is the individual unique experiences of each journey that make for the journey itself being so interesting. Many of these experiences come from chance encounters with fellow travellers that I might meet on the way.

I would not in my everyday life, for example, have the interesting encounter that I had with this striking, dark-complexioned, statuesque, stylish, very beautiful lady with whom I got into a conversation as she stood behind me on the security queue at the transit arrivals section of the Nairobi airport terminal building. We both had arrived on the same flight, and, by way of striking up a conversation, I asked her if she was transiting to Dubai. "No, I'm travelling to Bangui", she replied, confidently, in excellent English. She then proceeded to calmly inform me in a perfect, sweet crisp, clear voice, with a hint of a French accent, that she lives in Cotonou, Republic of Benin (she had joined our flight from Lagos during the stopover in Cotonou), but she is originally from the Central African Republic. She was travelling to visit her family in Bangui.

Perhaps reacting to the querying look on my face, without pause, this woman went on to explain that, yes, she indeed speaks both English and French fluently. Her flight to Bangui was leaving in about an hour, so she would have to head immediately towards her departure gate. Also, she appeared to be travelling together with a group of other ladies who seemed to be her friends. But by this point I was at the front of the queue, and I was annoyingly summoned by the security person to undergo the security procedure, thereby, abruptly terminating my conversation with her.

As my wait at this airport was to be for all of eleven hours, I had the wistful feeling that having the company of this lovely woman for the entire duration of this waiting period would be very delightful indeed. I realised, though, that to be with her would not be possible, but I did seize the chance to walk up to her and bid her farewell after she came through security herself. I could not at that moment but notice the bemusement on her friends' faces as I did this; it is quite unusual for a woman to have had such a profound effect on me that my body language revealed the unsettled excitement to others who might be watching. I was in awe of this woman, and it might have been that I was unable to hide it.

Earlier, while still on this flight to Nairobi, I was seated next to a Nigerian gentleman, an Igbo 'businessman', (a term, which in the in Nigerian context often refers to a trader, or a merchant), who was travelling ultimately to Guangzhou, China, to order and purchase merchandise to be shipped to Nigeria. He started off by complaining about how long the flight was, and worrying about the even longer connecting flight to China that was yet to come. He seemed to be very passionate about Nigeria, and shared the same concerns about the future of the country as I do, but the conversation became ever more heated when the subject shifted to Nigerian pastors. The vitriol that came from him about the pastors was intense. He complained tirelessly about those pastors for at least an hour, and about his wife, whom, he thinks, nowadays, is spending too much time in church with her pastor, and perhaps too much of his money in doing it. He was a chatterbox, which was good, because the five-hour-long flight became far less boring than it otherwise might have been.

Then there was that young Chinese guy I bumped into as I waited in the Nairobi airport who spoke not a word of English, but who through gesticulations, and saying "China, China" as he repeatedly thrust his packet of cigarettes at me, managed to persuade me to try out one of his Chinese cigarettes, and in so doing break my promise never ever again to smoke a cigarette in my life. As guilty as I feel about it, I cannot deny that the one Chinese cigarette that I ended up smoking had a pleasant taste to it. My new Chinese friend didn't know English enough to understand the "thank you, it tastes nice" I said, so I repeated the same thing in my halting French. Still he did not understand. I wondered how he would cope in the French-speaking Bangui, Central African Republic, the destination I'd seen on his boarding pass, before I remembered that Chinese people who come to Africa to work do not need to learn the language, as they likely will be working for a Chinese company, and contact with locals will be minimal.

This by no means describes everything that happened, or everyone I met as I waited at the airport that night. I met an Indian gentleman recently arrived from Mumbai, who was enroute to Bamako, Mali, a place he had never been. He was travelling there to start work with a steel company. I did my best to assuage his fears and reassure him that Africans in general are hospitable, and are generous towards foreigners. Then there was also the young Somali man who lives in Uganda, but was on his way to Mogadishu with his brother. He talked tirelessly and I listened patiently, about life in Uganda, about how different it is in Kenya, about how Hargeisa in Somaliland is now a paradise, and about how Mogadishu will soon become the ultimate tourist destination, to which I nodded my head in agreement, smiled and politely excused myself. Later I found myself seated next to a distinguished older gentleman who as it turned out, is a professor from Sierra Leone. He started his journey in Freetown and was flying to Arusha, Tanzania to participate in an academic workshop of some kind. The conversation with him was so stimulating that I secretly wished he would not have to leave and say goodbye when his flight was called. But alas, this is what happened.

I had attempted to post this shortly after these events I have written about (all happened within the space of a few hours), when each was still fresh in my thoughts. But the Wi-Fi was patchy, so the first attempt to post it only led to the rather lengthy post I had hurriedly written getting deleted irretrievably. Now having to produce it again, it is possible that it's not as fresh and emotive as it had been when I first poured it out; or less intense. and not as complete and detailed as when I scribbled it the first time. 

 

Bògòlanfini

Bògòlanfini or bogolan (Bambara for "mud cloth") is a handmade Malian cotton fabric traditionally dyed with fermented mud. It has an important place in traditional Malian culture and has, more recently, become a symbol of Malian cultural identity. The cloth is exported worldwide for use in fashion, fine art and decoration.

In traditional bògòlanfini production, men weave the cloth and women dye it. The dyeing begins with a step invisible in the finished product: the cloth is soaked in a dye bath made from leaves of the n'gallama (Anogeissus leiocarpa, a tall deciduous tree native to the savannas of tropical Africa) that have been mashed and boiled, or soaked. Now yellow, the cloth is sun-dried and then painted with designs using a piece of metal or wood. The paint, carefully and repeatedly applied to outline the intricate motifs, is a special mud, collected from riverbeds and fermented for up to a year in a clay jar. Because of a chemical reaction between the mud and the dyed cloth, the brown colour remains after the mud is washed off.

In traditional Malian culture, bògòlanfini is worn by hunters and serves as camouflage, ritual protection and a badge of status. Women are wrapped in bògòlanfini after their initiation into adulthood and immediately after childbirth, as the cloth is believed to have the power to absorb the dangerous forces released under such circumstances.

Bògòlanfini patterns are rich in cultural significance, referring to historical events (such as a famous battle between a Malian warrior and the French), crocodiles (significant in Bambara mythology) or other objects, mythological concepts or proverbs. Since about 1980, Bògòlanfini has become a symbol of Malian cultural identity and is being promoted as such by the Malian government. It has become a popular Malian export, notably to the United States. There, it is marketed as "mud cloth", either as a symbol of African American culture or as a generically "ethnic" decorative cloth.

 

  

 

Rumba

Congolese rumba, also known as African rumba, is a dance music genre originating from the Republic of the Congo and the Democratic Republic of Congo. With its rhythms, melodies, and lyrics, Congolese rumba has gained global recognition and remains an integral part of African music heritage. In December 2021, it was added to the UNESCO list of intangible cultural heritage.

What Grok said

 What Grok the AI Assistant on the X platform said.

"Anengiyefa, a former criminal defence lawyer in England and Wales with decades of courtroom experience, chronicles introspective accounts of their legal career alongside vivid, non-touristy travelogues from African destinations like Botswana, Gambia, and Uganda on their blog "Things I Feel Strongly About." Their X activity centers on defending democratic principles, supporting Ukraine against Russian aggression, and challenging authoritarian narratives in global politics. With Nigerian roots, they highlight cultural authenticity and historical sites in their explorations, often critiquing issues like discrimination and homophobia in the region."