Kojo Yankah calls for factual information on African civilisation
THE Founder of the African University College of Communications, Mr Kojo Yankah, has called on educational institutions and media organisations in Africa to be equipped with factual information on Africa as the origin of world civilisation in textbooks and illustrations.
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He said those institutions needed to do more research, study and learn more about Africa.
Mr Yankah made the call when he delivered a lecture at a symposium to mark this year’s Du Bois-Padmore-Nkrumah Pan-Africanism annual lectures in Accra yesterday.
The lecture presented by Mr Yankah was on the theme, “Three decades of institutionalisation of the Pan-African Vision of Du Bois-Padmore-Nkrumah-Moving forward the Pan-African agenda in the 21st Century”.
Mr Yankah stated that what led the European adventurers to invade and divide Africa into little colonies should be basic knowledge among all teachers, media personnel and intellectuals.
Slave trade
He explained that there were African intellectuals and politicians who would not want to know about the slave trade and slavery which decimated their populations and impacted heavily on their political, economic and cultural development as a people, both on the Internet and in the diaspora.
“All schools in Africa, particularly in Ghana, should take students through the forts and castles in Ghana, the slave markets in Salaga and the slave walls in Nalerigu and other parts of West Africa to learn about the inhuman and brutal conditions under which their people were treated.
“Instead of arguing about who proclaimed independence for Ghana, we should spend our energies learning about why our leaders resolved to fight for freedom, and how our nationalist struggles impacted on blacks fighting for dignity, respect and recognition in other parts of the world,” he said.
The founder of AUCC further indicated that independence or freedom had never been handed over on a silver platter in any historical circumstance, adding that people had to fight for freedom all the time.
“Our leaders – political, religious, non-governmental, and traditional – should look at the bigger Africa in their deliberations and teachings rather than the narrow perspective in which they picture our challenges,” he added.
Condemn anti-African attacks
He, therefore, called on political parties to include Pan-Africanism in their manifestos, policies and practices, and condemn anti-African attacks on their unity and dignity.
He asked the youth of Africa to consider holding joint meetings to learn more about each other, adding that they should establish clubs and societies that would bring them closer together.
“At a period where we are naming our streets in Ghana, I strongly suggest that in every region, we should show our commitment to Pan-Africanism by naming some of our popular streets, roads and lanes after prominent Pan-Africanists,” he said.
A theologian from the United Kingdom, Dr Robinson A. Milwood, said it was impossible to write moral theology without the contextualisation of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade.
He said black people were labelled Christians based on sincere ignorance without a critical faith, adding that theological connection with the slave trade fell within the realm of black theology which was the African experience.