By WAMPEMBE LUKONDE –

In our conversation last week we took time to examine the reasons for Africa’s social dilemma through our two Zambian poets, namely, Mulalami and Muntemba.
One would easily notice the intertwining nature of the political spectacle and the socio-economic dimensions of African states enlisting a heavy burden on the survival of the less privileged citizens.
History would attest to the fact that the emergence of poverty during the post- independence era had a lot to do with the influx of the rural segment of a less privileged population to cities and towns in search of job opportunities; where, as fate would have it, the fragile economies of African states soon faltered and the bright lights of the cities grew dimmer and fainter, pushing the immigrants gradually on to the periphery of cities and towns in the emerging sprawling slums.
Mulalami’s and Muntemba’s verse, the two Zambian poets, writing in the early 70s unravel this unfortunate situation in an artistic fashion as readers would remember from last week’s column.
But  despite all that one would also state that at the core of it, is the inward-looking attitude of some political figures who assumed power at independence and the plans they had (or hadn’t) for their nation states.  Some of the most startling statements of intent came from two Nigerian politicians as early as the 30s.
History holds that Nigeria’s Azikiwe, making a solemn pledge for his people said he was going to earn income to secure his enjoyment ‘of a high standard of living and also to give a helping hand to the needy.’
Obafemi Awolowo was even more candid when he pledged to make himself formidable intellectually—he went on to state that morally he was going to be invulnerable but ended rather pompously by asserting his  desire to make ‘money that is possible for a man’ of his ‘brains and brawn’ in a country like Nigeria.  So, dear reader it all started there, at least in our argument and as it seems to be, it has continued unabatedly to the present.
In the minds of the two founding fathers of the great nation of Nigeria self came first before the people they purported to serve.  In a sort of intuition for the later African leaders, Soyinka, in one of his early works of poetry that began to set him apart as one of Africa’s future great writers and would-be Literature Novel laureate, put it rather crudely:
My dignity is sewn
Into the lining of a three-piece suit,
Stiff, and with a whiteness which
Out-Europes Europe,
My crisp Van Heusen collar
Cradles an All-Wool Tootal tie,
Turning respectfully eyes towards
I, Me resplendent in my three- piece suit …
My mouth is shaped perpetually
Upon the word ‘riff-raff’.

The persona in the poem asserts his position quite clearly and makes self-aggrandizement a priority. What is at stake is not anything else but the material possessions of the sort one would live for such as a three-piece suit and a tie despite its crispness.
There is also a burning desire to be like others elsewhere rather than the environment of their home land; and that desire is to live like a European, a kind of imitation, of course. Even more, there is a yearning for wanting to have to stand out and out- shine Europe itself, beating the white man at his own game, as it were.
It does not matter what it takes, even if the three-piece suit makes one stiff, after all, this is the embodiment of all that is white, dignified and, therefore, admirable. The persona is bound up in materialism and all its trappings of comfort and power as is strongly suggested in his dignity being sewn in the three-piece suit.
Consider also the image of eyes turning inwards for an attraction to self, to ‘I, Me resplendent in a three-piece suit,’ in a sort of expression that would not impress my friend Mukanaka because the grammar is terribly broken.
This verse paints a good picture for the egocentric Owolowo’s and the Azkiwe’s of Africa whose sole aim is to make as much money as possible for only their comfort and leave the rest of their national counterparts wallow in poverty and squalor. It is this attitude that breeds corruption in Africa.
It is also this type of attitude that divorces African leaders from their people who can only eke out a living through disgraceful acts. Our next poet, Vonali Bila, in a poem called ‘The Dance’ focuses on these outrageous antics. To wit:

You dancers with painted faces—
Bury your heads in shame,
Silence those roaring bongo drums
Around the blazing fires of burning incense,
Remove leopard hides, horns, grass & reeds on your backs
Throw away your porcupine thorn hats, masks, cowrie shells
Bangles, bells & beads,
For all these years you are but a catalogue image of starvation,
Your slavers say your naked dance is exotic.

There is a distinct voice of an Ocol of Okot p’Btek in this verse whose view of anything traditional representing his embattled Lawino is repugnant.
The style has also a strong echo from the Negritude poets. Yet, the tone and mood of the poem is different. In this verse one is at pains to see the nationals engage in acts that reduce the dignity of a people occasioned by the poor standard of living.
The dancers can only provide for themselves through dances of an exotic nature before flashing cameras of tourists. Apparently, the poet’s appeal for abandoning the dance and the paraphernalia of animal artifacts is hard to conceive because this is their only means of survival. But the poet’s caution to the dancers continues:
You dance
Because your bellies are empty…
That’s how you fight boredom & the biting economic meltdown…
You men with villages of wives
You say spinning in circles, clapping & stamping the ground
For the cunning selfish folk wielding cameras
Is a way out of shame
Before your army of famished children…

The poet’s lashing tongue seems unfair to the men with villages of wives and armies of children. Theirs is an unfortunate situation which is not their making but a result of a social milieu so badly dislocated. In fact, there is an admission of this when the poet concedes rather subtly the drive for these antics borne out of empty bellies.
It is not even a cure for boredom but a feat for survival for the marginalized. After all, is not the economy so run down as to make life too difficult for the people, armies of children alluding to a lack of family planning not withstanding? In a simple but descriptive verse, the poet bares it all:

Just for a dollar
A pound sterling
A slice of bread & a bowl of soup
You dance until your feet are bloodied…
Dreams muffled by despair
Selling your heritage too cheaply

The answer for all this is given by the poet when he mentions despair as the source for the people’s muffled dreams; if they have had any dreams at all. A survival strategy for the marginalized is mooted regardless of how meagre the payment could be: a slice of bread, soup or what else? And as the poet states the future is compromised for the people. There is no heritage worth the name. The heritage is sold not because the dancers want to but because the society allows it. And, therefore, there is no freedom for the poor; it has been sacrificed at the altar of the rich and might:

Your dance in hotels & airports
This dance in beeches & curio shops
This dance in gala nights & banquets
This futile tom-tom dance wearies my bones
I ask, dear African child, is that the meaning of your freedom?

Well, whose bones are more wearied dear African poet? Certainly, not your bones, it is the dancers who stomp the hard earth to earn a living. The society denies him a life of sanity because of selfish leaders who want to make as much money as they can at the expense of the marginalized.  Awolowo and Azikiwe bear the testimony to a people’s suffering borne out of self-centered behavior.

Dear reader here is some food for thought this week.  In Africa, selflessness has been thrown out of the window in pursuit of individual materialism for the privileged few. For the three-piece suited men of Soyinka’s verse, Taban has the last word of triumphant grandeur:

Nationalise everything for possessions come from the west
A functionary reported done
The file man laughed again and said
Nationalize even that which has not been nationalized
For it also comes from the west
A functionary reported
We have at least nationalised POVERTY
–poetspoems@gmil.com–