Samia Nkrumah reignites the African Unification Debate.

When he died in 1972, many commentators and policy makers remarked that Kwame Nkrumah’s death marks the end of his cherished dream of continental African unity. One western commentator stated, “Nkrumah’s death comes not only the end of Pan Africanism, but also one of the most enduring and cherished African myths”. Many thought his passing would put to an end to the “unity debate” that he help lit while studying in United States of America and at the 1945 Pan Africa conference in Manchester, England.

During the early 1960s, the continental unity myth was so powerful that it transcends generations. Nkrumah’s name at the period in question became a household name among his compatriots on the continent. Unlike many allusions to the 1960s, Kwame Nkrumah’s continental African unity needs no explanation to those who do not remember that era. Nkrumah (Kwame) was and still is (Samia Yaba Christina) the defender of the African people (workers, students, women, children, jobless youth and the vulnerable).

In 2007, during the golden jubilee of Ghana’s independence and African Union 9th Session in Accra, the whole world press descended on the continent to witness the rekindle of the “Nkrumah’s African unity summit”. Nkrumah dominated the African Union summit even in death. If the decision reached at the Accra summit is imperfect (The Accra Declaration), it is only because of the myth to which the African unity dream is attached to Dr Kwame Nkrumah’s name. Decades after his death, Kwame Nkrumah remains a symbol of movement for continental African unity, which is what makes the myth so powerful. Apart from his intellect, his good looks and “showmanship” he was also a leading philosopher of Pan-Africanism. Nkrumah attained cult figure status, in life and after death. His daughter, Yaba Christina, is seen as the next messiah of Pan Africanism. The “African Show boy never dies”!!!! Nkrumah still lives on!!

In the same year many witnessed the rebirth of Nkrumah, Samia Yaba Christina Nkrumah made a bold move to enter public life and serve. As was in 1945 in Manchester, England, in 2007 at the African Union summit in the Ghanaian capital of Accra, the “African unity” dream baton was passed on to the next generation of politicians. Samia Yaba Christina Nkrumah has now become the face of the New African. The renaissance of Nkrumaism and African unity has become a reality and Samia is seen across continental Africa as the only hope of achieving a lasting unity.

In 2008 (the little girl that many continental Africans remember holding Nkrumah’s hand just before he left the continent for the last time in 1966) Samia Yaba became the only member of her father’s party – Convention Peoples Party (CPP) to be elected as a member of parliament for Jomorro.

The election of Samia has rekindled the continental unity debate, especially among many Pan Africanists in Diaspora and in continental Africa. The suffering and hunger of many continental Africans in the 21st century were all prophecies Nkrumah predicted some 53 years ago. Samia undoubtedly understood that and has embraced the dream. She is emerging as the new face of the current crop of selfless continental African leaders who think more about the development and prosperity of sub-Saharan Africa, first and foremost than looting from the continent.

An interview she gave soon after her election as Member of Parliament in Ghana, Samia Yaba Nkrumah noted that today Neo-Colonialism has taken more entrenched form. Through globalisation, economic “independence” of many continental African countries has been made redundant and irrelevant as far as the world superpowers are concerned. She noted that Africa’s share of world trade is just over 2%, with Union of South Africa having a share of 80% of this two percent trade. Yaba further stated that “we must not delude ourselves in thinking that these facts are of no significance for the future of sub-Saharan Africa”. She said “the next battle is to unite our economies to alter this blatant imbalance and injustice”. Although Samia Yaba gave an answer to a specific question, her target audience were her compatriots in continental Africa.

The School of Oriental and African Studies graduate formal political activity began in earnest when she enrolled to study for her post-graduate degree at the same university. According to one of her peers, Yaba exhibited the same radicalism as her legendary father by resenting deeply the exploitative aspects of the 1990s Structural Adjustment policies of the Bretton Woods institutions in sub-Saharan Africa.

Like her father, Ms Nkrumah has become the official mouth piece of the African Unification movement. In a speech she gave in Abuja, Nigeria in 2009, she said “we must transform our aspirations into reality by transforming the socio-economic patterns of the various regional economic blocks before eventual unification”. She further states “my father’s generation spoke in the past of some of the measures to be taken, and this is relevant today”. Samia said in order to reduce our economic dependence on developed nations; we must expand intra-African trade, expand and improve intra-African transportation and telecommunications, develop a system where Africa can utilises to the fullest resources, citing the West African gas pipeline as a classic example of regional cooperation. Samia said what is holding most small African countries back is the selfish ambitions and narrow self-interests of corrupt leaders and stated, “Unless we find the requisite courage to rise above our petty selves, sub-Saharan Africa will always lag behind the rest of the world”. She said, “The spirit of Africa which propelled Kwame Nkrumah, Jomo Kenyatta, William Du Bois, Kenneth Kaunda, Patrice Lumumba, Oliver Tambo, Robert Sobukwe and others to courageously stand up to the colonialists can never be defeated”.

Citing the 2007 Africa Union Accra Declaration, Samia Yaba Nkrumah said the notion behind choosing Morehouse College, Atlanta, Georgia, to set out her role in the African Unity agenda is to remind not only continental Africans, but people of African descent, the importance of involving the Diaspora in the process of the formation of Union of African States, a project that was started by her father, Africa’s most illustrious post war leader and father of the independence movement, Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah – Africa’s first Patriot.

Since her return to the continent and mainstream politics, Samia Yaba Christina Nkrumah has taken on the task of fighting for social justice and poverty alleviation among women and children continent wide. Samia said, “Africans still believe in the dream of unification (a united continent)”, and stated, “The cause of my father and many independence leaders was and has always been consistent in that they want social justice for every African, continent wide. She said prior to 1957, many Africans couldn’t get education nor access to better health care. Samia Yaba said, “Our unification, like the Germans, would be a negotiated union of all countries in Africa. The days of fighting to resolve our differences are over”. She said Africa is the only region still fighting to contain the HIV/AIDS pandemic. It is only in Africa where majority of the people do not have basic services like clean drinking water, electricity, housing and employment.

Samia Yaba Christina Nkrumah said Africa is beset with difficulties rooted in its inability to unite territorially and economically. Samia said, “The only protection against children dying before their 5th birthday, mothers dying at child birth, girls not being educated, street children being abuse and murdered everyday and children going to bed hungry, is to unite our economies for the benefit, upliftment and development of African people”.

Samia went on to say that, “The underdevelopment, poverty, hunger and inter-intra border wars are not acceptable”. She said the dragging of feet by some African leaders on the implementation of common economic block is not only holding Africa back, but has made Africa a perpetual beggar of foreign handouts and cited globalisation as a new form of recolonising the African continent.

Samia said being Nkrumah’s daughter has taught her a great deal of humility. She also acknowledged that she is not only the daughter of Nkrumah, but of Ghana and Africa, which comes with great responsibility to the whole continent. In 2000, her father was voted African of the millennium, a great Pan-Africanist and Africa’s first patriot.

Many Africans, including many born years after his death, remembers Kwame Nkrumah’s greatest speech at the old polo grounds in Accra on 6th March, 1957 when he link Ghana’s independence to the total liberation and unification of continental Africa.

Samia Yaba Christina Nkrumah knows she must carry on with her father’s struggle to unite the continent. Kwame Nkrumah said, “For unless we attain economic freedom, our struggle for independence would be in vain, our plans for social and cultural advancement frustrated”. Today sub-Saharan Africans are seen as the poorest of the poor where many children go to bed without food. In the 21st century many children in sub-Saharan Africa still study under trees and are exposed to the elements.

At the historic OAU meeting in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in 1963, Kwame Nkrumah prophetically stated “There is no time to waste. We must unite now or perish”.

March 6, 1957, was a defining day in Africa’s history. Almost 53 years later, now there is hope and Africa is moving forward, though slowly, to realise meaningful independence as another Nkrumah (Samia Yaba Christina) come to the fore to take the unification fight to the next stage of Africa’s long and painful journey to total emancipation and unification. The Pan Africanist dream of Union of African States is on course. Nkrumah Never Dies!!! Nkosi sikelel’ iAfrika, God Bless Africa.