Maafa Legacy: Pt 2 – Truth Lives Forever is the follow-up to a documentary released in 2007 with many of the same contributors. These films were released to counter the British state propaganda around their role in ending African enslavement and their promotion of William Wilberforce as a central figure in Afrikans’ emancipation.
The film opens with a libation where it is pointed out that water is not the enemy of women or men as it is where children spend the first nine months of their life. There is then a two hour in-depth exploration of the issues around the misrepresentation of history, the marginalisation of Afrikans’ role in their own emancipation and the ongoing belittling and infantilisation of Afrikans and Afrikan cultures.
Slavery continued in British colonies such as Nigeria and Sierra Leone well into the 1920’s and 30’s so it is not some historical wrong far off in the distant past but a lived reality for people today. Even after the brutalities of enslavement colonisation, neo-colonialism and imperialism have left a legacy that can be seen in the current slaughter in DR Congo, Somalia, and Ivory Coast as European horrors left the indigenous population trying to eke out marginal livings on ever-decreasing plots of land. Enclosure and resource exploitation meant wealth was exported to serve the needs and greed of metropolitan colonial powers, the US and the lackeys they put in place to manage the ‘post-independence’ nation states in their interest.
The 20th century, seen by many as a period of ‘civilisation’, was for many Afrikans reflected through the experiences of apartheid, lynching, the Land and Freedom army insurrection in Kenya, Ghana’s independence, Herero genocide in Namibia and the growth of ‘coloured’ strata in southern Afrika as a result of sexual coercion. Congo / Kongo has always loomed large in western nightmares from the days of the heroic resistance of Queen Nzingha through the slaughter of 10-30 million Afrikans by King Leopold’s Belgian fascist forces to the UN betrayal of Patrice Lumumba in the same Congo that today people pretend is a problem that has just arrived rather than as a result of centuries of globally exploitative policies and ideologies.
Afrikans have been used for all manner of medical, social and political experiments as many Europeans sought to seek a ‘scientific’ justification for their belief in their innate superiority and manifest destiny to rule, exploit, murder, rape and divide with impunity. The pain and trauma of these experiences are passed down through the generations and across the geographies. This leads to ‘Afriphobia’, the cultural attack on Afrikan beauty and culture. This manifests itself in ‘dating-out’, skin bleaching, hair-straightening and general self-hate. Coupled with unemployment and poverty the results can only be a high level of mental instability the more Afrikans are forced to relinquish their cultural pillars. Postcode wars and contempt by Afrikan people for the life and livelihoods of other Afrikans then ensues. Any positive or uplifting work done by Afrikans for the benefit of Afrikans or general humanity are invariably downplayed or ridiculed.
Written by Kubara Zamani
External Links
Order a copy of Maafa Legacy DVDMaafa Truths during Wilberfest at Westminster Abbey 27.03.07Maafa Legacy on IMDB
DVD: Maafa Legacy
Slavery continued in British colonies such as Nigeria and Sierra Leone well into the 1920’s and 30’s so it is not some historical wrong far off in the distant past but a lived reality for people today. Even after the brutalities of enslavement colonisation, neo-colonialism and imperialism have left a legacy that can be seen in the current slaughter in DR Congo, Somalia, and Ivory Coast as European horrors left the indigenous population trying to eke out marginal livings on ever-decreasing plots of land. Enclosure and resource exploitation meant wealth was exported to serve the needs and greed of metropolitan colonial powers, the US and the lackeys they put in place to manage the ‘post-independence’ nation states in their interest.
The 20th century, seen by many as a period of ‘civilisation’, was for many Afrikans reflected through the experiences of apartheid, lynching, the Land and Freedom army insurrection in Kenya, Ghana’s independence, Herero genocide in Namibia and the growth of ‘coloured’ strata in southern Afrika as a result of sexual coercion. Congo / Kongo has always loomed large in western nightmares from the days of the heroic resistance of Queen Nzingha through the slaughter of 10-30 million Afrikans by King Leopold’s Belgian fascist forces to the UN betrayal of Patrice Lumumba in the same Congo that today people pretend is a problem that has just arrived rather than as a result of centuries of globally exploitative policies and ideologies.
Afrikans have been used for all manner of medical, social and political experiments as many Europeans sought to seek a ‘scientific’ justification for their belief in their innate superiority and manifest destiny to rule, exploit, murder, rape and divide with impunity. The pain and trauma of these experiences are passed down through the generations and across the geographies. This leads to ‘Afriphobia’, the cultural attack on Afrikan beauty and culture. This manifests itself in ‘dating-out’, skin bleaching, hair-straightening and general self-hate. Coupled with unemployment and poverty the results can only be a high level of mental instability the more Afrikans are forced to relinquish their cultural pillars. Postcode wars and contempt by Afrikan people for the life and livelihoods of other Afrikans then ensues. Any positive or uplifting work done by Afrikans for the benefit of Afrikans or general humanity are invariably downplayed or ridiculed.
Written by Kubara Zamani
London Premiere of Maafa Truth 2007 at London South Bank University
External Links
Order a copy of Maafa Legacy DVDMaafa Truths during Wilberfest at Westminster Abbey 27.03.07Maafa Legacy on IMDB
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