USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Concerning our up-coming lists of greatest Africans

Some of us may not feel comfortable about lists  - it's bad enough being graded by someone who is a Marxist  ( that's what  my  first Swedish  dentist asked me in 1972, a pleasant enough fellow by the name of Varnhed,  his nurse Lillebil was a friend  of my Better Half and it was by that kind of nepotism that  I happened to be sitting in his dentist's  chair with my mouth opened wide as requested -  his hand already  up in the air with his electric drill waiting to descend on one of my cavities and that's also what he thought was the most opportune moment to  pop the question: He wanted honest revelation from me,

"Are you a communist?"

 Did I look like a communist?  A question dangerously close to being a Nkrumahist  -  at a moment when I myself didn't know where he stood about the dark things that were going on in Vietnam, South Africa, the Congo, Mozambique, Angola, Guinea Bissau, Namibia...

" Are you a communist?"

 Is that the sort of question they asked Ahmed Sékou Touré before he was etherised and made all ready and waiting on the operating table in the USA?

In any case, I was not one of those guzzling down the Chinese beer that Osagyefo was sending my buddies, from his house of exile in Guinea, Conakry. Thinking of Chinese beer and thinking of Israel and the would-be academic boycotters,  I'm happy to know that the Chinese foreign minister is on a visit to Israel  right now– hopefully signing up to some intellectual property rights, some  science and technology cooperation between the two great nations...

That same year (1972) another friend – a surgeon, now comfortably retired, assured me that if called upon to operate on the now late president of Sierra Leone, Siaka Probyn Stevens, Hippocratic Oath or not, Pa Shaki would then discover, experientially, the personal meaning of the words that best describe pain.

When it comes to favouritism - we can be sure of the kinds of loving leaders that the Toubabs / Oyibos would like to choose for Africa, if they, instead of Africans, were empowered to elect such leaders, whilst Africans sat on the sidelines and watch – or beg for bread.

Africans are over fascinated by "academics" as a profession the only profession in town - just watch Chiwetel Ejiofor and Steve McQueen win Oscars, just as Dennis Mukegwe has won many awards – charity they say begins at home,  his work acknowledged by the Oyibo....

 There are lists over which we have no control: such as the various categories both quantitative and qualitative  in the Guinness Book of Records– who in the world has most well-earned PhDs and from where – the Bell Curve notwithstanding, who are the most intelligent persons in the world , which persons are most eligible to qualify for membership of the MENSA club,  who has written more books than Jacob Neusner , which of the worlds polyglots knows most languages, who is the world champion in memorisation according to the tests devised to measure that kind of quality , who are the mathematicians who can hold their own when they stand up to the likes of  Grigori Perelman , mathematical Africans – the kind that Patrick Wilmot recommended, who can provide the relevant mathematics  that can be applied, just as the continent of Africa provides the  necessary raw material out of which  to fashion products like the Jas Gripen 39 -  and pilots who can fly one, instead of just running around  beating their chests  and braying,  " I am the greatest" when they should be" pouncing"– as Professor  Soyinka puts it...

As  the USA- Africa dialogue series eventually comes up with our own lists, there are already a good number of lists available, all of which we are free to consult to get a general sense of overview, lists compiled  by various judges, lists such as

100 Great Africans (of  course there are some of our contemporaries who believe that they should be at the top of some of those lists)

100 Great Black Britons

100 Great African Americans

I'm looking forward to compilations of people in the creative arts, the compilation of 100 Great African and African American, Caribbean and South American musicians.

 Bird's Word is just a foretaste of the musical personalities of what Miles called "the Great African music" (Jazz) and all the other genres of African music.

My personal list would feature people like Barack Hussein Obama (of course) and Sheikh Usman Dan Fodio as well as some of the popular others about whom there is sure to be a definitive consensus, even if – no neutrality - all the Yoruba judges (of course) will want to place/ impose AWO over ZIK...

Hopefully, the political will not overshadow  or squeeze out people like Toni Morrison, Duke Ellington, Sidney Bechet, Louis Armstrong, John Coltrane, Fela, Milki Chief Ebenezer Obey, King Sunny Ade, (I guess a quota system will have to be introduced so that the Congo, Mali, Guinea, Senegal, Jahmaica, Ghana, Kenya, South Africa  are not over-represented.

Sincerely,

We Sweden