Steve Hayes
2015-05-01 06:00:45 UTC
Ubuntu is dead and greed killed it
Botho is dead.
There, I said it. And quite frankly, it is about time somebody did.
It’s about time we walked to the funeral of our most beloved product
and allowed ourselves a few moments to come to terms with the reality
that it is gone.
Botho or Ubuntu or African socialism or whatever name is now
fashionable has always been a corner stone of African societies or, to
be more accurate, Bantu societies.
But now it is 2015. And in Botswana, Botho is a word so strong and
loaded, that it has become the greatest political tool in the arsenal
of the ambitious leader. A national address is incomplete without the
speaker finding a way to praise us for upholding this core tenet of
our civilisation and simultaneously admonish us for letting it slip
away. It is the multi-purpose screwdriver in the toolbox of the mass
manipulator.
Leaders in power shame us for having “lost” it, while leaders with
ambitions to gain even more power praise us for upholding it. And this
is not only a Botswana phenomenon, for South African leaders are also
known to admonish wayward followers for losing their “Africanness”.
All over Africa, our culture, painted in the fantastic light of
glamourised pasts, is waved in the faces of the ordinary Africans as
some reminder that a different behaviour than that natural to all
humans is expected from us.
Politically active youths demanding opportunity are said to be
behaving without Botho, without respect for elders. Women asking for
equal rights are said to be acting in their own interests and
dismissing the needs of the community. Economically ambitious people
are said to be thinking selfishly when they should be using their
wealth to make the lives of their people better.
Well, I’m here to say that all of that is [expletive] .
It is time we faced facts. We cannot foster societies that enable the
greed of our leaders to be the driving force of our economies, and at
the same time be expected to behave without that very same selfishness
that is supposed to be at odds with our supposedly perfect
pre-colonial societies.
At some point we have to choose between fulfilling the destiny Steve
Biko believed was Africa’s responsibility (to bring a human face to
civilisation) and following the rest of the world in letting
capitalist aspirations shape our societies. And I’m afraid we have
made that choice.
If the recent bouts of xenophobic attacks in certain parts of the
continent are any indication, we, as African people, have chosen greed
over Botho. We have chosen greed over idealism, over what Biko claimed
was our special place in history. And we’ve done it without even
knowing it.
At what point will we realise that our present acceptance of leaders
who will do whatever it takes to gain as much personal wealth as
possible at the expense of their people, is the very cause of the
erosion of our belief systems? When will we realise these very same
leaders are in no position to manipulate us with shame?
It is when we realise that greed is what is stripping our societies of
their core beliefs, that we will see that the only way to move forward
is to reject it.
We, Africans, have to ask ourselves everyday if this is what our
ancestors fought for. Is this the freedom they died for? The freedom
to steal? The freedom to kill? The freedom to die poor and without
dignity? Is the right for politicians to steal without consequence,
what Lumumba, Sankara, et al., died for? Is the right for the poor to
murder each other over the crumbs of our GDPs what Nkrumah, Nyerere,
et al. dreamed of?
Are the lives of the first Africans who died at the hands of
colonialists to be honoured by our own individual obsessions with
material wealth? Are their lives to be carried forward by ancestors
who care more about emulating their warped view of western life than
upholding the principles of societies that were alive for centuries
before western interference?
Did we go through all of this for this? We have to ask ourselves these
types of questions everyday if we are to arrive at the correct
conclusion: Africa has to fight greed harder than we have ever fought
anything else. We have to fight it like we fought off cruel
colonialists, we have to fight it like we fought for freedom, we have
to fight it harder than we have ever fought anything, because greed is
Africa’s greatest problem.
And it begins today, by refusing to accept corruption. By demanding
harsher anti-corruption laws, by seriously thinking about what role
mindless consumerism has played in the decaying of our cultural
principles, by a number of ways we have yet to discuss.
We have to fight because Botho is dead, and only our actions can bring
it back.
Siyanda Mohutsiwa is a 21-year-old mathematics major at the University
of Botswana. She is currently slumming it in Finland. Follow her on
Twitter: @SiyandaWrites
http://voicesofafrica.co.za/ubuntu-is-dead-greed-killed-it/
Botho is dead.
There, I said it. And quite frankly, it is about time somebody did.
It’s about time we walked to the funeral of our most beloved product
and allowed ourselves a few moments to come to terms with the reality
that it is gone.
Botho or Ubuntu or African socialism or whatever name is now
fashionable has always been a corner stone of African societies or, to
be more accurate, Bantu societies.
But now it is 2015. And in Botswana, Botho is a word so strong and
loaded, that it has become the greatest political tool in the arsenal
of the ambitious leader. A national address is incomplete without the
speaker finding a way to praise us for upholding this core tenet of
our civilisation and simultaneously admonish us for letting it slip
away. It is the multi-purpose screwdriver in the toolbox of the mass
manipulator.
Leaders in power shame us for having “lost” it, while leaders with
ambitions to gain even more power praise us for upholding it. And this
is not only a Botswana phenomenon, for South African leaders are also
known to admonish wayward followers for losing their “Africanness”.
All over Africa, our culture, painted in the fantastic light of
glamourised pasts, is waved in the faces of the ordinary Africans as
some reminder that a different behaviour than that natural to all
humans is expected from us.
Politically active youths demanding opportunity are said to be
behaving without Botho, without respect for elders. Women asking for
equal rights are said to be acting in their own interests and
dismissing the needs of the community. Economically ambitious people
are said to be thinking selfishly when they should be using their
wealth to make the lives of their people better.
Well, I’m here to say that all of that is [expletive] .
It is time we faced facts. We cannot foster societies that enable the
greed of our leaders to be the driving force of our economies, and at
the same time be expected to behave without that very same selfishness
that is supposed to be at odds with our supposedly perfect
pre-colonial societies.
At some point we have to choose between fulfilling the destiny Steve
Biko believed was Africa’s responsibility (to bring a human face to
civilisation) and following the rest of the world in letting
capitalist aspirations shape our societies. And I’m afraid we have
made that choice.
If the recent bouts of xenophobic attacks in certain parts of the
continent are any indication, we, as African people, have chosen greed
over Botho. We have chosen greed over idealism, over what Biko claimed
was our special place in history. And we’ve done it without even
knowing it.
At what point will we realise that our present acceptance of leaders
who will do whatever it takes to gain as much personal wealth as
possible at the expense of their people, is the very cause of the
erosion of our belief systems? When will we realise these very same
leaders are in no position to manipulate us with shame?
It is when we realise that greed is what is stripping our societies of
their core beliefs, that we will see that the only way to move forward
is to reject it.
We, Africans, have to ask ourselves everyday if this is what our
ancestors fought for. Is this the freedom they died for? The freedom
to steal? The freedom to kill? The freedom to die poor and without
dignity? Is the right for politicians to steal without consequence,
what Lumumba, Sankara, et al., died for? Is the right for the poor to
murder each other over the crumbs of our GDPs what Nkrumah, Nyerere,
et al. dreamed of?
Are the lives of the first Africans who died at the hands of
colonialists to be honoured by our own individual obsessions with
material wealth? Are their lives to be carried forward by ancestors
who care more about emulating their warped view of western life than
upholding the principles of societies that were alive for centuries
before western interference?
Did we go through all of this for this? We have to ask ourselves these
types of questions everyday if we are to arrive at the correct
conclusion: Africa has to fight greed harder than we have ever fought
anything else. We have to fight it like we fought off cruel
colonialists, we have to fight it like we fought for freedom, we have
to fight it harder than we have ever fought anything, because greed is
Africa’s greatest problem.
And it begins today, by refusing to accept corruption. By demanding
harsher anti-corruption laws, by seriously thinking about what role
mindless consumerism has played in the decaying of our cultural
principles, by a number of ways we have yet to discuss.
We have to fight because Botho is dead, and only our actions can bring
it back.
Siyanda Mohutsiwa is a 21-year-old mathematics major at the University
of Botswana. She is currently slumming it in Finland. Follow her on
Twitter: @SiyandaWrites
http://voicesofafrica.co.za/ubuntu-is-dead-greed-killed-it/
--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
Web: http://www.khanya.org.za/stevesig.htm
Blog: http://khanya.wordpress.com
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
Web: http://www.khanya.org.za/stevesig.htm
Blog: http://khanya.wordpress.com
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk