Africa’s masses had to be mobilised for a revolution to improve the continent’s political, economic and social situation, President Thabo Mbeki said on Friday.
Writing in his weekly online column, ANC Today, Mbeki said that duty would fall on the Pan African Parliament (PAP) and the African Union’s (AU) Economic, Social and Cultural Council (Ecosocc).
”The call to achieve Africa’s renaissance is therefore necessarily a call to the African masses to rise up in struggle to defeat poverty and underdevelopment, to end Africa’s marginalisation and to restore the dignity of Africans everywhere,” wrote Mbeki.
There was a need for a ”veritable revolution that must lead to the eradication of poverty and underdevelopment on our continent, the restoration of the dignity of the African people and victory in the struggle to end the global marginalisation of Africa and Africans”.
However, to achieve this Africans must fully understand the impact that slavery, colonialism and racism has had on them.
”There are some in our country and the rest of the world who demand that we should view and treat these phenomena merely as a matter of historical record, with no relevance to our contemporary struggles for Africa’s rebirth.
”We see this clearly in our own country, where some insist that apartheid is a thing of the past, and that all references to the continuing impact of that past constitute an attempt to ‘play the race card”’.
He said it was important the impact of that past was understood so that Africans were empowered to deal with the present.
”Our purposes are not informed by any desire to blame those historically responsible for the most terrible crimes against humanity, but to design the policies and programmes that must help us to achieve Africa’s renaissance.”
Mbeki said the genuine democratisation of African politics and the empowerment of Africans to be their own liberators was critical.
”It is our responsibility, acting together with all other patriotic forces in Africa and the African Diaspora, to ensure that we mobilise the masses of the people to act as their own liberators.”
He called on African academics to inform people about the consequences of slavery on the continent.
”It has a duty to educate us about the emergence and impact of racism on the societies that were the victims of slavery, colonialism and neo-colonialism.”
Mbeki said the establishment of PAP emphasised the need for the empowerment of Africans to play a role in changing their lives. ‒ Sapa