THE SYSTEMATIC ABUSE OF POWER IN COLONIAL AFRICA

The image of humans used as transport was another abuse of power in the colonial era in Africa.

During the colonial era in Africa, the masters often received the respect accorded by Black people out of fear. Based on this misconception that Black people fear them, they abused their power horrifically and inhumanly without regret or remorse.

However, the myth that a Black man fears a white man is total nonsense. Europeans scrambled over Africa with sheer brutality and aggression, subduing Africans; therefore, they were too vulnerable and powerless to react. 

The same abuse and oppression of Black people exist today in many European countries and the United States of America. If not for the Black Lives Matter demonstration after George Floyd's death, there would still be statues commemorating key figures who committed horrible crimes against humanity during slavery and the colonial era.

The fathers of independence, such as Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana and Patrice Lumumba of Congo, had no fear of the British and Belgian governments. 

They gained independence for their countries, but because Britain and Belgium actually feared them, Nkrumah was removed from power in a coup masterminded by the CIA, and Patrice Lumumba was assassinated in a plot conceived by the Belgian government. 

In apartheid South Africa, Steve Biko, Nelson Mandela, and his colleagues had no fear of the minority apartheid leaders. Despite the force of brutality they unleashed, maiming and opening fire on protesting, defenseless South Africans, they murdered Steve Biko and put other ANC key members, including Nelson Mandela, behind bars for twenty-seven years because they feared them. 

When it comes to crime, there are many white criminals out there, as well as Black criminals, but the Black man is always given a second look because of the color of his skin. Just being Black makes you a suspect. In the United States of America, Black drivers are more often stopped and harassed than white motorists.

In Belgium, being Africans among white workers, all eyes were on us as suspects when sandwiches had been missing every time from the dining hall. The atmosphere becomes tense when, on the fifth day of the week, one of the workers finds his food stolen again.

This time, the management decides to do something about it. They secretly started their investigations, creating an undetected hideout, aiming to catch the person responsible for this theft red-handed.

 

The following week, about a quarter to noonday, a mysterious man emerged into the quiet dining hall, looking for a meal to steal. After tasting some meals, he found a delicious one, and he took it. As he tried to walk out, he was intercepted.  

 

Colonial power in Africa took all that it wanted and destroyed the souls of Africans.

Shockingly, out of hundreds of workers at the company, the mysterious thief appeared to be one of our colleagues from Portugal. The sandwich thief was Portuguese, not African.

The need to respect all races

 

It is absolutely wrong to take the respect someone gives as a reason to treat him very badly. Many enjoy being racist; some people like to discriminate against Black people, calling them degrading names, but the question is, what do racists get from hate? Nothing is more significant than violence and the destruction of property.

Who lives forever, and what makes you think your color is better than someone else's when there is a big difference between the color white and real black? If white people's color is white like white paper, I think everyone who sees them will run to hide somewhere in fear.

Respect doesn’t mean fear; therefore, those who have that sick mentality should begin to dismantle it from their brains because racial problems have caused too much death and violence, and without respect for other races, there will never be peace on earth.

APARTHEID LEADERS MUST FACE PROSECUTION LIKE THE NAZI CRIMINALS

Apartheid South Africa


In the 1990s, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, chaired by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, granted amnesties to some of the perpetrators of violence and human rights abuses in apartheid-era South Africa.


To forgive, in the sight of the Lord, is better than violence and revenge, but regarding the seriousness of the crime the ex-apartheid leaders committed against the South Africans, it should have been a priority that no one should have escaped prosecution, including other world leaders at that time, like the British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, who supported the brutal government.

Crimes against Black people are not given much attention by the advanced countries. Response and solution always come very late when the result is already disastrous. 

But comparing the crime of the Nazi-Germans against the Jews, and that of what was done to the South Africans by apartheid leaders, is almost the same. If investigators are hunting down ex-Nazi criminals to face prosecution, then ex-leaders of apartheid and their dead squad members, too, should face prosecution.

Like the Jews, including children killed in gas chambers, the same "They opened fire. They didn't give any warning. They simply opened fire, and small children, small defenseless children, dropped down like swatted flies. This is murder, cold-blooded murder".

A man like F. W. Klerk, South Africa's last apartheid head of state, doesn't deserve to win a Nobel Peace Prize for ending Apartheid. He escalated the violence against the majority of black South Africans. 

When he realized that the world was changing rapidly and there wouldn't be any room for that type of government, he decided to give up. Who is fooling whom?

The Nobel Peace Prize should be handed to people who deserve it, not De Klerk, he was the worst criminal than Adolf Hitler of Germany. 

STEVE BIKO: LEGEND OF A POLITICAL HERO

The great Steve Biko: He sacrificed his life to make what South Africa is today.

 

In the political history of South Africa, many are those who fought against the evil apartheid, oppression, mass arrests, detention without trial, etc. 

Along the line with Nelson Mandela, Oliver Tambo, Chief Buthelezi, etc, in the struggle to emancipate blacks from hardships was Steve Bantu Biko, who died in detention before he could see the fall of apartheid years ago, in South Africa.

Although Steve Biko is gone, his great achievement and his part in the struggle to free South Africa, under the previous white minority rule, will always be remembered. 

Steve Biko, the man popularly known as the "Father of Black Consciousness Movement," was born in King William's Town, Cape Province in South Africa, on December 18, 1946. He lost his father at the tender age of four.

After his primary and secondary school education in South Africa, he left for the Lovedale institution in Alice. He received his higher education at the Roman Catholic Marianhill in Natal and entered the medical school of the University of Natal in 1965. 

As an active member of the National Union of South African Students (NUSAS), his heart was increasingly in politics. He left NUSAS and formed the South African Students Organization (SASO).

Regarded as one of the fearless critics in South Africa, along the line with Nelson Mandela, despite both having different views and options, Biko faced the white regime squarely. 

Not by violence, but through his writings, which he named "I write what I like." The white regime found his writings as nothing but the simple truth and thought his letters posed a threat to national security. He writes:

Black consciousness seeks to talk to the Black man in a language of his own. It is only by making familiar the basic setup in the Black world that one will be aware of the urgent need for the reawakening of the sleeping masses. 

He stressed, "It urges black people to judge themselves as human beings and not to be fooled by the white society, which has white-washed itself to enjoy privileges at the expense of blacks; Biko pointed out that the logic behind white domination is to prepare the Blackman to serve and give him respect. 

Even in sports, Whitman wants to do everything for themselves, all by themselves, by keeping Blacks to stand at touchlines to witness the game they are playing.

In his writings, he always stressed and talked openly against whites, saying that "there is no doubt that the color question in South African politics was originally introduced for economic reasons. 

Because the selfish white leaders installed a barrier between blacks and whites so that they could enjoy what belonged to Blacks. 

To avoid influencing the various Black groups in South Africa, which gave him much support and recognition, Steve Biko was arrested and detained many times under Section 6 of the Terrorism Act in South Africa.

In many cases, he was always released. But on August 18, 1977, when Steve Biko was arrested and detained under the same offense of terrorism, little did everybody know that he would not be seen again. 

He was taken to Port Elizabeth, stripped naked, and tortured to death. His autopsy stated that he died of brain damage. Those responsible for his death lied that he died on a hunger strike in detention.

Unfortunately, Steve Biko wasn't alive to see what he sacrificed his life for: the fall of apartheid. However, on the eve of the 33rd anniversary of his death, it is worthwhile to say that "September 12 of every year should be declared as a public holiday in the Republic of South Africa, in honor of that great man.

If a day in America is observed as a holiday for the civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., then the late Steve Biko should be given that recognition, too, in South Africa. Steve Biko died at the age of 31. He left behind a widow and two boys aged seven and three.