Abstract
This essaic-article goes against established conventions that there is anything ethno-cultural (and hence national) about the so-called African tribes. Drawing largely from the culture history of precolonial/prepolitical Africans—that is, the Bantu/Cushitic-Ethiopians (Azanians)—the author has demonstrated vividly that far from being distinct ethno-culture national communities, the so-called tribes of African states are better considered subculture groups, whose regional culture practices erstwhile paid tribute to their nation’s main culture center in Karnak. For example, using the culture symbols and practices of some local groups and linking them to the predynastic and dynastic Pharaonic periods, I argued that there is compelling evidence against qualifying Africa’s tribes as distinct ethno-culture national entities. In genuine culture context, I stressed that the Ritual of Resurrection and its twin culture process of the mummification of deceased indigenous Pharaohs tend to suggest that the object of the Bantu/Cushitic-Ethiopians national culture was life (in its eternal manifestation) and then resurrection later, and that there are recurring (culturally sanctioned) ethical examples among the culture custodians of these subculture groups that generally pay tribute to the overarching culture norm. Furthermore, the fact that the Ritual of Resurrection began in the Delta region and ended at the Sources of the Nile, where the spirit of the deceased indigenous Pharaohs was introduced into the spiritual world of their ancestors, contradicts conventional perceptions that ancient Egypt was a distinct national community isolated from precolonial/prepolitical Africa/Azania.
Introduction
In Azanism: A Critical Analysis of the Mytho-Reality Complexity of the Azanian Nation (Guevara, 2009/2011), I took considerable pains to reintegrate the subcultures of the indigenous population of colonial Africa into the main culture school of the Bantu/Cushitic-Ethiopians kingdom (henceforth Azania) situated then in Karnak/Thebes. Hence, ethno-culturally, I discussed the concept of “Pan-ism” in relation to precolonial/prepolitical African—that is, the Azanian (or later ancient Egyptian) pan-deity Min. 1 Moreover, although I discussed the importance of the “Ritual of Resurrection” (see Guevara, 2009/2011, pp. 183-200, esp. pp.189-192) and its twin culture process of the “mummification of the indigenous Pharaohs” to the objective of the Azanian national culture, I stressed that such symbolic culture practices are supplementary to that nation’s culture commitment to the eternal essence of life, Manfou[i]r/Menefre (the Greco-European Memphis). 2 It is in light of such culture commitment and the fact that the whole Nile Valley region was an inextricable part of these culture processes that I questioned the national essence of the pan-African Movement(s)/PAMs and/or the numerous irredentist movements on Africa’s political plain, especially given most African leaders subscription to the colonial ideal (the African states) through which a United States of Africa or Africa’s newly emerging tribal entities (e.g., the Biafras, Hutustan, Eritrea, Somali-land, etc.) could be forged.
Put simply, ethnic and culture reasons prompted my critique of both Pan-Africanism and Africa’s tribal (pseudoethnic) irredentism. For instance, after meticulously scrutinizing the process by which Eritrea forged its national identity, and on the basis of which it eventually achieved statehood, and Somaliland’s apparent route to secession, the scholar Dominique Jacquin-Berdal (2002) came to the conclusion that in both cases it was the “colonial self” rather than ethnicity that provided the basis for secession, while it was “war” that proved to be the catalyst of nation formation. Three key events are important in her analysis of the formation of Eritrea in particular: The first was the creation of Eritrea as a colonial state, an event which not only provided Eritrea with its name and geographical identity, but with a history distinct from that of Ethiopia. The second was the period of Federation (1952-1962) during which Eritrea acquired the institutions and symbols of autonomy, and finally the liberation war itself, during which the nationalist struggle gradually spread from a small elite to encompass the Eritrean masses. It was also during this period that Eritrea’s identity was cemented and given its present characteristic by the “dominant Movement,” the Eritrean People’s Liberation Front (EPLF). In other words, while Dominique’s position seems close to sharing the ethno-symbolist perception that one cannot make bricks without straw (Anthony, 1991/1986), however, in her analysis of Africa’s state-nations that straw was not ethnic. Thus, in her critique of the ethnic interpretation of the origins and spread of nationalism, her argument is simply that in much of Africa, ethnicity as much as nationalism is a modern creation. She maintains accurately that, the colonial administration’s need to “map” the population under its control led to the establishment of categories whose contours were in many cases substantially different from those that had previously prevailed (Jacquin-Berdal, 2002).
Dominique’s lucid analysis, among others, has proven critical to the novel concept of pseudoethnicity and pseudonationalism developed in Azanism with specific reference to contemporary African politics. This is particularly true of Muamar Gaddafi’s recent (preassassination) approval of the partitioning of Nigeria into Christians and Islamist dominated states. Subsequently, this essaic-article which is meant to strengthen the ethno-culture paradigm of real nations shall thus expand on the concept of genuine-/pseudonationalism so as to elaborate on that position. Because this article is generally meant to expose the culture deficit of postcolonial African politics, it will thus be reasonable to critically review the major inconsistencies characterizing the political mandate of some key PAM(s) figures (e.g., the late Kwame Nkrumah, Julius Nyerere, and Muammar Gaddafi). This should demonstrate how PAMs’ political mandate continues to adversely affect the indigenous people’s culture quest for genuine freedom (see “Questioning the Pan-Africanist Unionist Paradigm” section).
Indeed Gaddafi’s approval of pseudoethnic entities/identities on Africa’s political plain accords with early colonialist attempts to create tribal states in colonial Africa. Such a divisive heritage, which doubtlessly has become synonymous with contemporary African politics, can rightly be contrasted with the urge in Azanism to rediscover the ethno-culture origin of the Azanian nation. Following this ethno-culture emphasis in Azanism, I will thus seek to explore the ethnic affinities spanning across the subculture groups of Nŋhana (ancient Ghana) with the view to reintegrating them in the culture fold/school of the Azanian nation (see “Are We at the Verge of a Genuine Ethno-Cultural National Reawakening?” section).
Questioning the Pan-Africanist Unionist Paradigm
A Review of Muammar Gaddafi’s Approval of Pseudoethnic Identities in Colonial Africa
Prior to his assassination in August 2011, Muammar Gaddafi was generally heralded by advocates of pan-Africanism as a great unionist leader—despite obvious facts to the contrary. In fact, some even considered him then to be the rightful heir to Nkrumah’s pan-Africanism (and hence the champion of African Unity [AU]). Such fortuitous approval of Gaddafi unionist credentials had—mirabile dictu—been made in blatant disregard to his divisive stance vis-à-vis Nigeria’s politico-religious crisis, which could easily be replicated across the whole of colonial Africa. In any event, the prevailing idolum that the culture values of the indigenous peoples of colonial Africa are inferior to the dominant politico-religious cultures imposed on them by agents of colonialism is widely approved by local politicians. It should therefore not come as surprise that the main beneficiaries of Gaddafi’s financial intrigue among the satraps (leaders?) of the African states (and leaders of African communities in the diaspora) had in the past overlooked the divisive statements of that erratic character, who until his demise disguised himself for a staunch defender of the AU.
For example, speaking to the mammoth crowd that braved the afternoon heat in Nakivubo War Memorial Stadium after leading the Thuhur (afternoon) prayers, Muammar Gaddafi (on the occasion to open Africa’s largest Mosque in Kampala) stated that “any Bible or Tora (Old Testament) that does not mention prophet Mohamed was written by mankind and therefore a fraud.” 3
Despite his Islamic bias, Professor Ali A. Mazrui—on the occasion of Kwame Nkrumah’s 100th Anniversary—postulated Gaddafi as the timely heir to Nkrumah’s legacy of pan-Africanism (Mazrui, 2009). Even Gaddafi’s app- roval of the partitioning of Nigeria into Christians- and Moslems-dominated pseudoethnic state-nations had also been largely overlooked by most local commentators. In fact, the official condemnation issued by the foreign ministry in Nigeria (after Gaddafi’s divisive remarks) amounts to such nugatory statement as “Colonel Gaddafi’s irresponsible utterances” or “his theatrics and grandstanding at every auspicious occasion have become too numerous to recount.” Astonishingly, that was the official response to Gaddafi’s overt approval of the partition of India in 1947 as the kind of historic solution that could benefit Nigeria. 4 If anything, such a divisive statement does not seem to have come from someone who in 2009-2010 was the chairperson the AU.
True, prior to becoming the AU chairperson in 2009, Gaddafi was factitiously outspoken
about the urgent need for a United States of Africa,
5
And had once stated that “I shall continue
to insist that our sovereign countries work to achieve the United States of
Africa.”
6
He even
went as far “envisaging a single military force, a single currency, and a single passport
for the Africans to move freely around the continent.”
7
Probably attracted by the Bantu-Ethiopian
Pharaonic title, the then Libyan strongman had earlier a group of 200 traditional African
chiefs named him the “King of kings,” thus signaling his disdain for the prevailing
democratic nostrum being imposed on the African states by Western powers. Speaking at the
AU summit in Addis Ababa in 2009, Gaddafi was aplomb and perhaps atarvistic about the
shortcomings of democracy in Africa. As he puts it, Africa was essentially tribal; and multiparty democracy only worsens the situation as
most political parties draw their core support base along tribal lines. Thus, his
radical solution for Africa’s tribal political allegiances was the Libyan example
where opposition parties were outlawed.
8
His Arabo-Islamic bias became more apparent when he insisted on the inclusion of the Islamic code of practice in AU decision-making process in which “silence on important policy issues is considered a tacit approval.” 9
Gaddafi’s Arabo-Islamic bias notwithstanding, his cunning admiration of the indigenous Pharaonic model 10 doubtlessly earned him then the allegiance and support of some traditional chiefs, which, in the event of genuine national revival, would have weighed significantly on the conscience of the Azanians. This notwithstanding, it should be emphasized that not all pan-Africanists were comfortable with Gaddafi’s grand political ambitions. For instance, Yao Graham, who is critical of the AU’s choice of Gaddafi as the Union chairperson in 2009, argued vehemently against confusing Gaddafi’s political opportunism with Nkrumah’s pan-African dreams. Citing the much quoted phrase of David Rooney’s Critical Biography on Kwame Nkrumah, “His hopes were encapsulated in his ultimate goal of a united Africa in which its rich natural resources would benefit its people and not the capitalist system and other exploiters,” he cautioned against accrediting Gaddafi with Nkrumah’s grand unionist credentials (Yao, 2009).
Indeed, whether or not Gaddafi merits the credit of a genuine unionist leader is ineluctably pivotal in that while he would have imposed the Arabic language and the Islamic faith on the indigenous people of a United States of Africa; and had in the past also used the pelf of Libya to finance the destabilization of African states south of the Nubian Desert (e.g., Liberia, Sierra Leone, Ivory Coast, Somalia, Ethiopia, Nigeria, and Uganda); and had even implicitly sponsored the displacement and misappropriation of indigenous land in Mali, Niger and Mauritania, and so on to make more “Lebensraum for the ‘Second-Phase’ of Arabs colonial expansion” (Chinweizu, 2006); there is no doubt that most pan-Africanists would rather shy away from Nkrumah’s political shortcomings vis-à-vis his people’s culture quest for real freedom and national unity.
I observed in Azanism that Kwame Nkrumah was also forthrightly outspoken
about his internationalist ambitions and, above all, his commitment to scientific
socialism. Thus, in genuine national context (in which the freedom of a people is the
inspiration behind nationalist movements), that Kwame Nkrumah—in light of his fortuitous
conviction to the lineal/progressive economic ideal of scientific socialism—would have
exonerated Karl Marx
11
(from his ambivalent approval of British colonial rule in India or the superior Germanics
colonization of Peasant Slavs in Europe) is bound to taint Nkrumah’s national credentials
significantly. Nkrumah’s generous political (and not cultural) commitment to AU until his
death in 1972 could be summed up in his linking of Gold Coast or modern Ghana’s
independence to that of the rest of colonial Africa, as in this statement die Freiheit und Unhängigkeit Ghanas ist bedeutunglos, wenn sie nicht mit den totalen
Befreiung Afrikas verknüft wird [The Independence of Ghana is meaningless unless it is
linked up with that of the total liberation of the African continent]. (Hannah, 1967, p. 203)
However, his ambivalent approval of the atrocities associated with scientific socialism raises more questions about his genuine commitment to the freedom of his people. If anything, it should thus be emphasized that Kwame Nkrumah, like Yao Graham who today (like most pan-African cadres) lauds his democratic bias, was equally enthusiastic about his contemporary “Scientific Socialism.” 12
Inevitably, Nkrumah’s myopic political obligation to the lineal economic ideal of his contemporary scientific socialism made him, like some of his predecessors, 13 yet another victim of similar political marriages that was to later cement the incremental infiltration and destruction of the Bantu/Cushitic-Ethiopians culture institutions by economically inspired political influx mainly from the north and northeastern fringes of the Azanian nation. Lamentably, that such political influx then and now has the intent of seizing control of the culture centers of the Azanian nation and her vast natural resources also found mention in Diop’s (1974) African Origin of Civilization: Myth or Reality.
The Persistence of the Indigenous Culture and Its Importance to National Revival
In light of the fact that, prior to being a committed pan- Africanist, Nkrumah was first
an advocate of West Azania’s (Africa’s?) independence and unity via scientific socialism
(as this is evidenced by his invocation of the concept of Nŋhana/ancient
Ghana for his supposedly newly independent Gold Coast), let’s critically review the
culture essence of Nŋhana so as to demonstrate why national emancipation process that
fails to embrace the institutions of indigenous culture(s) is bound to be superficial and
tenuous. For instance, Diop
(1959), who had researched the social history of the Bantu-Ethiopians
extensively, traces the concept of Nŋhana back to the demise of Meroe
14
—one of the last refuges of
the retreating custodians of the Azanian national culture. Although there is still no
academic consensus about the origin of Nŋhana per se, most scholars now agree that that
kingdom was a genuine indigenous communal or social endeavor; and that most of the
indigenous subculture groups of (what is formally) the Economic Community of West
African States (ECOWAS) region played a pivotal role in its foundation (Hannah, 1967). Importantly, in its
over thousand years history (which began around the 1st century
Even if one would contest the Azanian nationalists proclamation that the foundation stone of Nŋhana was laid by descendants of the Bantu-Ethiopian Pharaohs, who, in that critical period of their nation’s social history, were busily relocating that nation’s invaluable culture heritage to a secure location, the convincing parallels drawn in Azanism between the Moabas Sun-God Hyen-Nu (One Hand) and the dynastic Ethiopian (and later Egyptian) Heru/Horus (or Amon and Aton 15 ), and the similarities also shown in that work between the kingship title of the Moab[a]s, Bét (messenger, announcer, teller, etc.) and Bes-Ptah of the early Pharaonic culture undeniably tilts in favor of culture contiguity. In fact, according to the mythological stipulation of the Moabas origin, especially the group which identifies itself as “Luok-Niib” (inhabitants of the Underworld 16 ), their early male ancestor (Nyaan), like Bes-Ptah (and his seven deified-assistants), who founded the first earthly Order (after the perfect/prehuman World Order founded by Hyen-Nu), had four wives—each representing probably the geographical axis of mainland Azania or the quadrant angles the matriarchal foundation of the Pyramids—who bore him seven sons. These became the seven extant ethnic extensions of that Bantu-Ethiopian subculture group, which could not only be rightly paralleled with the assistants of Bes-Ptah, but also made up the 12 astronomical figures represented in the so-called ancient Egyptian Calendar. Also, in his Signs and Symbols of Primordial Man: The Evolution of Religious Doctrines from the Eschatology of Ancient Egyptians, Albert Churchward (1994), who researched the traditional customs of the local population, observed that that symbolic culture figure “Seven” is in widespread use across the whole of Azania. Thus, if anything, it is culturally impelling that the elderly of the Moabas are morally constrained from eating the flesh of the predynastic Crocodile deity Subk/Sebek. And the same is true of the culture custodians of the Bawulés (in Ivory Coast), who until today refrain from eating the flesh of rams—the culture symbol of Amon. By similar analytical token, a critical review of that mysterious culture animus, Bamaka-Koo (Crocodile of water), from whence Bamako (Mali’s capital) is derived, would confirm that Bamaka-Koo has indeed conceptual affinity with the Sebek deity of the dynastic period. And the same could be argued of the mysterious eternal giant black Serpent of the Dogon Pantheon.
Not surprisingly, the wealth and demise of ancient Ghana unavoidably found mythological elaboration in a ritualistic practice in honor of a giant black Serpent, Bida. However, unlike the giant black serpent which, in a genuine culture context, symbolizes the eternal Spirit of the Bantu-Ethiopians common ancestry (placed on an Island at the sources of the White Nile in Azanism), Bida had—by the time of Nŋhana’s demise—inherited the cannibalistic psychology associated with the political cultures of the incoming barbarians (from the north and northeastern fringes bordering the Azanian nation), who, as noted earlier, were largely responsible for the incremental destruction of the institutions of the Azanian culture. 17 Thus, whether or not such interrelated and symbolic culture practices and/or norms, especially the moral refrain from cannibalism, reflect the true objective of the Azanian culture, 18 it can be stressed without erring that the Moabas played a central role in the foundation of Nghana. In fact, in Azanism, I derived the concept of Nghana (am I good?) from Moar/Molé—the language of the Moabas. This culturally pivotal Bantu-Ethiopian group is referred to in William’s (1989) work as Patan-Grumah (a federation of the former Mossi Kingdom). He described them as a sedentary folk, who (in Azanism) are still found in present day Chad, Guinea, modern Nŋhana (Ghana?), Mali, Niger, Sudan, To[n]go, and probably beyond. Accordingly, despite the fact that the social psychology of those who still associate themselves with the concept of colonial Africa is being influenced by external political ideas, the Azanians could forestall the pan-Africanists political preference of pseudoethnic entities (e.g., Biafra, Hutustans, Eritrea, etc. in Africa) by adversely opting for the total liberation of Azania (and with it the reinstitutionalization of her culture institutions).
Alas, Kwame Nkrumah was not alone in his readiness to relinquish northern Azania to Arabs colonial occupation. In a privately circulated article titled, “Nyerere’s Last Advice to Black Africa—Retreat From Continentalist to Sub-Saharan pan-Africanism,” Chinweizu (1987), the author of Decolonizing the African Mind, hinted to the fact that the late Julius Nyerere, who in 1963 considered colonial Africa to be single geopolitical unit (with its present inhabitants representing one geopolitical constituency), was apt to declare in 1997 that Africa South of the Sahara should henceforth be considered a distinct political unit which is quite separate in its identity and destiny from the Arabs-occupied part of Africa (see Godfrey, n.d.). While Chinweizu is doubtlessly vocal about the resurgence of Arab colonialism in Africa since the 1960s—after the “First Phase” was interrupted by the political development of the Ottoman Empire—and later West Europeans colonial inroads into Africa between the 17 and 20th centuries, and tends to share Nyerere’s proposition to unify the indigenous population of colonial Africa South of the Nubian (Sahara?) desert, it seems rather unclear whether such a political union would imply relinquishing the “Sacred Land” of the Bantu-Ethiopians national culture to Arab colonialism. This notwithstanding, Chinweizu’s lament about the erosion of traditional culture norms amid the continuing colonial pressures and his urge on the need for the indigenous people of colonial Africa to resuscitate the culture institutions of their forebears as guidance for the future—in many of his privately circulated writings—merits nationalists attention.
Also, despite most pan-Africanists capitulation to the pending Arab colonialism, there is no doubt that Kwame Nkrumah’s invocation of such culture terms as Nŋhana (1957) and Azania (1958) for the former Gold Coast and South Africa, respectively, and/or Nyerere’s perception of a people’s identity and destiny would resonate ethno-culturally among revivalist intellectuals. Furthermore, Professor Ali A. Mazrui’s distinction between “Africans of the Blood and Africans of the Soil” is contemporaneous with national reproduction ideas in that he rightly includes the Azanians (Africans?) of the Diaspora (i.e., the Azanian Americans) in his list of the indigenous Azanians (or his Africans of the Blood and Soil). Notably, he defined this original group in racial and genealogical terms; and hence identifies them with the Blackness of Cham/Kemit. However, most Algerians, Libyans, Egyptians, Tunisians, and Moroccans are those of the soil and not necessarily of Blood (see Mazrui, 2009).
In genuine national context, revivalists could reasonably argue that in addition to the irreducibility of the Nile Valley region to the culture custodians of the Azanian nation (because of the process of the “Ritual of Resurrection”), the fact that among the citizens of Arabs-occupied part of colonial Africa there are indigenous Azanians (e.g., the Nubians, the assimilated or aboriginal Arabs such as the black Arabs in Sudan or the so-called Semitic Ethiopians or Somalians) is bound to have serious ethno-culture and national implications for those Pan-Africanists who (in their blind service of the colonial ideal [Africa’s 53 states]) would rather forego the sacred land of the Azanians to Arab colonialism. Despite their subordinate economic and political status under the pending Arab colonial occupation, these marginalized and neglected indigenous Azanians must be encouraged to resist the colonial pillage of their ancestral (Cham’s) land.
Are We at the Verge of a Genuine Ethno-Cultural National Reawakening?
Even provided we eschew Gaddafi’s plaudit of pseudoethnic entities in Africa because of the political reality in Libya today, the fact that key members of the AU overtly condoned the NATO Air Strikes which led to overthrow of the Gaddafi’s regime (and his consequent assassination) shows how futile the AU really is. Already, Gaddafi’s early emphatic approval of the creation of pseudoethnic entities in Nigeria amounts to declaring the whole pan-African project moribund. So, even if the pan-Africanists would forgive the late Gaddafi for his direct role in the destabilization of other African states (e.g., Chad, Mali, Niger, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Uganda, etc.) in the recent past, the universal indifference of Arab leaders to the systematic genocide and ethnic cleansing in Sudan (e.g., in Dafur, South Kordofan, the Nuba Mountains, etc.), and/or their silence on the deportation of hundreds of thousands of indigenous Azanians from Mauritania in the late 1970s and 1080s indicate that Arab leaders have an entirely different agenda for participating in the political process of the AU. For instance, I noted in Azanism that revivalist intellectuals do not necessarily have to invoke the decline of the culture institutions of Uruk (Sumer/Sumeria), which at the onset was founded and controlled by Anu (and his daughter Ishtar/Isis), 19 and/or the directly related historic occupation of the Delta region by the Hyksos, to grasp the geographical reach of their nation’s culture institutions. In fact, Amélineau Abbé Emile (1916), who had mistaken the Anu for an ethnic group, is also quoted in Diop’s (1974) African Origin of Civilization: Myth or Reality (see Guevara, 2009/2011) as stating that the Anu people were the original inhabitants of Egypt and Arabia Patraea. So, the fact that some of these occupied territories are now considered indigenous to Arab colonialists suffices as a warning to revivalist intellectuals who still see the Great Nile Valley region as an irreducible part of their nation’s culture practices.
In essence, this analytical discernment which, as mentioned earlier, is meant to
reintegrate the subcultures of the indigenous Azanians into the main culture school in
Karnak/Luxor does not necessarily imply that Karnak is the birth place of the
Bantu/Cushitic-Ethiopians national culture. Thus, in referring to the celestial orientation
of the Bantu-Ethiopians national culture, I argued in Azanism that the
placement of the green Nile goddess Hapi on the Mountain of the Moon (mountain Kilimanjaro),
the Highest peak in Azania, prior to the construction of the miniature Pyramids in Meroe and
then later the Great Pyramids of Giza—built during the period of the Solar Mythos (as by
then the culture custodians of the Azanian nation would have probably established the
precise location from which they could communicate proficiently with the celestial
bodies)—suggests that the origin of that particular national culture lies further South, as
in this Neferti’s optimism about the eventual restoration of the Maat: A king will come from the South; Ameni, the justified, is his name, The son of a woman of Nubia, and a child of Upper Egypt, He shall receive the white crown and wear the red crown. (Neferti, 57-59, quoted in
Karenga, 2006, pp.
73-74ff)
This perception is further strengthened by the fact that the popular “Ritual [of Ausar/Osiris] Resurrection,” which at its peak, began with the introduction of the Sektit/Seher (also called Hennu’s) Boat through the tale of the Great Nile in the Delta region ended at the source of the great Nile River in the Congo-belt, where the eternal Spirit of the Bantu-Ethiopians ancestors (in the form of a giant black Serpent) was originally located. Eventually, whether or not one equates the symbolic culture act of having to travel upstream against the waves of the great Nile River with the idea of traveling through the culture symbol of the eternal Spirit of the Azaninans’ common ancestry, it remains to be said that (from the perspective of the Azanian national culture) the quest for eternity was never meant to be entrusted to the profane or the vulgar demoi. Hence, neither the wheel of the Hennu’s Boat nor the presentation of the Maat was confided to the profane/demoi. In other words, that all Azanians are in line with the moral objective of their nation’s culture entitled to the right kind of knowledge about eternal life does not necessarily reduce the gerontocratic constitution of the Bantu/Cushitic-Ethiopians pharaonic culture. In this sense, the embracement of the market-led liberal democratic institutions by both the founding fathers and current leaders of PAMs and/or the AU not only shows how disingenuous these really are on the subject of the emancipation of the Azanians but also how irreconcilable their political objectives are in juxtaposition to that of the Azanian culture.
The eternal essence of that nation’s culture practice has found its convincing elaboration
in Doctrina Azanica (Azanism). This position is also shared in Maulana Karenga’s Maatian
ethics. For instance, drawing on King Kheti’s justification for the practice of Maat, Karenga (2006) observed that “the
stress on justification is not simply in the sense of being just but also in a sense of
living Maat that would justify immortality” (p. 60). Maat is described as “nourishment for
Ra (the perfect embodiment of life); Ra lives by it, it is offered to him and it is also his
daughter” (Karenga, 2006, p. 64).
Maat is also a nourishment for all the divinities as well as humans who strive for eternity,
as stressed in Coffin Text (CT) IV, 62, 170. Accordingly, the Maatian ethics which
originated from the cultural history of the Old Kingdom was, first, established as a moral order with divine, natural and social dimensions. Secondly, Maat
is counter-posed with isfet (evil, chaos, wrong-doing) as well as with
. . . grg (falsehood) and wrong-doing. Thirdly, Maat is a standard and
measure of both moral life on the personal and social level. Fourthly, Maat is tied to
the concept of moral and social excellence . . . and the resultant worthiness. Finally,
the ground of Maat is that it’s God’s will, and thus the King’s will and that it is
good, effective and life-giving. (Karenga, 2006, pp. 54-55)
Economic Agents’ Political Role in the Demise of the Azanian Culture
If from the onset of their nation’s social history, the Azanians had the moral obligation
to endure such an indispensable culture journey that is likened to the traversing of the
inner part of a black Serpent (as in the Ritual of Resurrection), one could reasonably
foresee why the alliance of external and internal political agents—inspired by myopic
economic objectives—have until today proven so detrimental to that nation’s culture
institutions. Notably, “the divine inspiration to cultivate a perfect humanity capable of
inhabiting both the terrestrial and celestial provinces”
20
(as illustrated in the celestial
orientation of the Azanian culture earlier) is doubtlessly irreconcilable with the
sanguinary trait of the economically inspired state system, whose expansive policies are
today responsible for the destruction of preestablished culture(s). In terms of the demise
of the institutions of the Azanian national culture, historic records attest that the
systematic/incremental infiltration (and usurpation) of that nation’s culture institutions
by state agents goes as far back as the antiquity. Early record of such economically
inspired political incursions is associated with the southward expansion of the
Greco-Europeans, who are generally known to have introduced the patriarchal system
(capitalist patriarchy) in Azania. Importantly, one should read early Greco-European
migrations and settlements in three waves; and, above all, in light of the culture deficit
(and/or failures) of the expansive state system. Ostensibly, the first is associated with the Ionian and Dorian migrations of the last century of
the 2nd Millennium BCE, which resulted in the settlements of City-States in
Western Anatolia and was probably associated with the “Sea Peoples” (Hyksos) who later
appeared in Egypt and Canaan (as the Philistines). The second and third waves, which
occurred around 800 and 600 BCE, were highly organized land rush … where City-States
sought to expand their influence and relieve over-population. (Guevara, 2012)
21
Notably, the remark about the perpetual trend of the native populations—and state agents
rational historic response to such a natural phenomenon through state expansionism—is
inevitably culturally imperative. That in turn impels this ancient testimony about the
economic mind approach to native lands—the invaluable/irreducible culture assets of all
nations: “Joseph bought all the land of the Egyptians, except only the land of the
priests” (Genesis 47.22; Guevara,
2012, pp. 11-12; Kalopoulos,
2003, p. 249), which was ceded to them by Ausar (Osiris; the god King) to cover
the cost of their rituals (Diodorus Siculus, 1.21.7; Guevara, 2012, pp. 11-12; Kalopoulos, 2003, p. 249). To get to that point,
where the indigenous population of the then occupied Egypt (northern part of Azania) were
politically coerced into selling their land (the source of earthly life) in exchange for a
grain of corn from that early external capitalist agent (Joseph), the bible tells us that
there was this terrific famine of all times in that part of Azania. Although the bible has
until now remained silent on the question whether that could possibly have been a man-made
famine intended to force the local population off their ancestral land, it can rightly be
argued that such politico-economic developments explain why the culture custodians of the
Bantu-Ethiopian kingdom have historically been at the forefront of national emancipation
and revival movement. Notwithstanding, it is worth adding that by the turn of the 7th
century
Indeed, economically, early Greek, Roman, and Christian writers had extolled the fruits
of the Bantu-Ethiopians national culture, as in Homer’s Iliad: Royal Thebes Egyptian treasure house of countless wealth, Who boast her hundred gates through each of which, With horses and two hundred warriors march. (see Homer’s Iliad, 9, 381ff; Guevara,
2009/2011, pp.
219-220)
Regarding the economic autarky of the ancient Ethiopian Kingdom, Strabo described ancient Egypt as “from the beginning the most self-sufficient land on the earth” (Kalopoulos, 2003, p. 252 cited in Guevara, 2009/2011, p. 220). A point also reiterated in early biblical scripts “was watered as Gardens of the Lord, as the land of Egypt” (Genesis 13.10; Guevara, 2009/2011, pp. 219-220; Kalopoulos, 2003, p. 252).
By similar analytical token, it could be stressed without erring that, in its over
thousand years history, the kingdom of Nŋhana boasted similar economic achievements with extensive economic relations stretching as far as
Portugal, Spain, and probably beyond. In the culture front, credible evidence attests
that late Egyptian, European, and Asian students had erstwhile studied Philosophy,
Law, Mathematics, and Medicine in the tertiary institutions/Universities of ancient
Ghana. (Hannah, 1967, p.
201)
Subsequently, the mythological stipulation about the wealth and decline of ancient Ghana through the giant black serpent (Bida), whose psychological existence depended on the blood of virgin lives (Auset/Isis’s life?), not only amounts to a total aberration from the ethical norms of the Azanian culture, but, above all, also reveals an unbearable state of moral decadence, at least on the part of that kingdom’s elites, by the time of Nŋhana’s demise. In contrast to the life-serving purpose of the Azanian national culture, we are told that the sanguinary Bida demanded an annual sacrifice of beautiful virgins in return for guaranteeing the prosperity of ancient Ghana. The year in which the fiancé (Mamadu Sarolle) rescued the intended victim unleashed Bida’s wrath in the form of a drought that covered the whole kingdom. Consequently, gold mining, among others, fell into decline and with it the disintegration of ancient Ghana. 22
Apart from the analogy of Bida’s mythology with the human-sacrificing rituals known of the Artemis cult (and/or other foreign deities like Allāt and Ashirath, etc.), whose followers were to later incrementally infiltrate and usurp the institutions of the Bantu/Cushitic-Ethiopians national culture, the fact that the then Islamized Mamadu Sarolle was the fiancé of Bida’s last victim, whose rescue unleashed that serpent’s scorching wrath culminating in the demise of Nŋhana, suggests that by the time of Nŋhana’s disintegration external political influence had indeed permeated the psychology of some local leaders (and with them the large sections of the local population as well). Critics could, for example, contrast Bida’s deviant sanguinary reach with the biblical testimony that Abraham refrained from sacrificing his son Isaac after his encounter with the culture symbol of Amon, the ram.
Furthermore, Maulana Karenga, who has critically explored the traditional emphasis of the
Maatian ethnics, draws our attention to the centrality of traditional norms through the
valuable teachings of Merikare: Emulate your fore-parents, your ancestors. Lo, their words endure in books. Open and read them and emulate their knowledge. For one who is taught becomes skilled. (Karenga, 2006, pp. 60-61; Merikare, pp.
35-36
23
)
Hence, the Maatian ethics, which was originally meant to instruct the wise, “comes to her/him in its pure essence like the condition of the sayings of the ancestors” (Karenga, 2006, p. 60).
As Karenga further observes, the Book of Khunanup, commonly called “The Story of the Eloquent Peasant,” which he described as a text on social justice and moral narrative, not only urges leaders to live Maat (truth, justice, righteousness) but also reminds them that long life and immortality are based on Maatian conduct. Thus, “doing Maat (justice), so Khunanup (the Peasant), is like a breath to the nose” (Karenga, 2006, p. 70). Moreover, the rejection of isfet (evil) through the Maatian conduct is not only in line with tradition, but is importantly a yearning for the eternal qualities of Ra, the authentic source of Maat and light-giver. Thus, in CT II, 149, the deceased says, “I shine like Ra daily, I establish Maat and expel falsehood.”
I am (one) who obeys no magic, who is not scorched by fire nor wet by water. I will be like Ra every day One who will be fashioned everyday by the Sun-folk who saw yesterday. (CT II, 54; Karenga, 2006, p. 64)
Despite having derived such fervent nostalgic longing for tradition from the First
Intermediate and Middle Kingdoms, the literary texts from these periods diverge
considerably from that of the Old Kingdom. Texts dated from this period show evidence of
provincial rulers increasing independence and years of famine which created huge problems
(Karenga, 2006; Vandier, 1936) across the kingdom.
As Assmann rightly observed, a fundamental characteristic of Maatian discourse in the Old Kingdom is that there
appears to be, at least formally, an implicit
“Selsbtverständlichkeit” attached to Maat. [Hence,] it was not put in
question and therefore not thematized. Everyone knew what Maat was. There arose no
communicative need to come to an understanding concerning it. (Assmann, 1990, p. 55; Karenga, 2006, pp. 55-56)
But with the breakdown of social order from this period, “L’évidence naturelle de la Maat, incoprporée dans le roi s’est decompose. La Maat, devenue problématique, deviant thématisable” [The natural evidence of MAAT embodied in the King was decomposed. MAAT having become problematic, became thematizable] (Assmann, 1989, p. 34). Not surprisingly, “Offering Maat to God which earlier is posed as social practice later emerges as a central ritual as depicted in the iconography of the New Kingdom and Late periods” (Karenga, 2006, pp. 55-58; Teeter, 1990, 1997).
Ostensibly, I have explored in considerable detail (in Azanism) the role external and internal political forces played in undermining the institutions of the Bantu-Ethiopians pharaonic culture, especially during the reign of Amenophis III and IV. For our present purpose, let’s then assume that Akhenaten/Echnaton’s radical aberration from traditional culture norms (as validated by the sand mounds of al Amarna in Arabs-occupied Egypt) was the historic precedent of Bida’s transformation from being originally the symbolic representation of the eternal Spirit of the Bantu-Ethiopians common ancestry into a monstrous political deity, whose psychological existence depended on the blood of virgin Auset(s). Without such external political interventions the pseudocultural developments that was to later cement the demise of the institutions of the Azanian culture would have been unthinkable—not in Manfouir/Menefre (Greeks Memphis), Iwnu/ Ā[w]anu (Greeks Heliopolis, Jewish Beth-Shemesh or the biblical On), Karnak/Thebes, Napata, Meroe, or later Kimbé Salah/Saleh (the capital of Nŋhana).
As for the demise of Nŋhana, Arabo-Islamic tradition also attests to the fact that Almoravid Muslims from the North succeeded in infiltrating the kingdom incrementally and eventually invaded it. Initially, the Islamic community at Kimbé Saleh remained a separate community some distance away from the king’s palace. It even had its own mosques and schools, while the king retained his traditional beliefs. In the kingdom’s closing days, however, traditional kings had to rely on Muslim scholars to run the administration of the territory. With Takrur to the west already transformed into an Islamic community, which then evolved ever closer trading ties with the Arabs-occupied part of colonial Africa, it was only a matter of time before Kimbé Saleh, whose local languages in some parts of the city were already deemed sacrilege for Islamic practices, would succumb to the same political pressures that earlier cemented the demise of the Azanian nation.
With the demise of Nŋhana in the 13th century
Ethnic and Culture Reintegration as Nationalist Rejection of the Colonial Heritage
If indeed the enfeebled Hausas’s city-states, which in the 18th century fell so miserably to Osman Dan Fodio’s Arabo-Islamist forces (not to mention the fact that both Mali and Nigeria, in short the AU, are presently heavily reliant on their former European colonial masters in their fight against the resurgent Arabo-Islamic colonialism), are the future political ideal pan-African intellectuals and leaders would envisage for Africa’s pseudoethnic (tribal) entities, they should be reminded that—in genuine national context—the Hausas, like other subculture groups of Nŋhana, attest to sharing the same ancestral lineage with the rest of the Bantu/Cushitic-Ethiopians. In fact, Dan Masanin—a Hausa historian, Maitama Sule, who is also a leading figure in the Kano Emirate, not only believes in an authentic ethnic connection spanning the whole of the indigenous inhabitants of Azania but also argues credibly that the Hausas are ethno-culturally linked to the rest of the Cushitic-Ethiopians. He even goes further to cite linguistic similarities as well as the fact that these subculture groups shared the worship of the Sun-god prior to the introduction of Christianity and Islam in colonial Africa. If anything, most informed Hausas not only believe to be the original inhabitants of the Nubian (Saharan?) Desert region but are also convinced that some of their leaders are descendants of the indigenous Pharaohs. Even today, the palace of Daura contains a sword which some Hausas believe came from the pharaohs. 25
Furthermore, in the mythological stipulation about the origin of the Hausas, we also learn about the “Hausa Bakwai” (seven Hausas), Kano, Zazzau (Zaria), Gobir, Katsina, Rano, Daura, and Biram, and the “Banza Bakwai” (Zamfara, Kebbik, Nupe, Gwari, Yauri, Yoruba, and Kororofa). This other seven Hausas are considered to be the descendants of an extramarital affair between the Hausas’s male ancestor Bawa and a concubine. The significance of this latter narrative is not only the inclusion of Yoruba among the common lineage of the Hausas but also the fact that it contains a fantastic twist that purports a genealogical link between the Hausas and the Arabs. And as we shall see, this latter legendary narrative merely reveals the creative genius of later Islamized Hausa scholars, who might have desperately tried to reconcile local myths with incoming Arabo-Islamic influences. Thus, just as early Arabic and Islamic scholars established a spurious ancestral link with the biblical Abraham and his Cushitic-Ethiopian (Egyptian?) wife, so too did political-expedient Hausas, whose legitimacy as leaders was by now not based on their elevated knowledge of the local culture but instead dependent on their genealogical link to the founder (prophet) of Islam, see the need to reinvent their ancestral history in line with the Arabo-Islamic leadership model. In any event, Islamized Hausas and Fulanis are not idiosyncratic in making such spurious claims. It is an established norm in colonial Africa that most local leaders subservient to Arabo-Islamic political influence are one way or the other genealogical linked to Prophet Mohammed. Thus, when I left Luanda ([A]Ngola, South West Azania,) in the early 1990s, Islam was virtually nonexistent. It was recently introduced into that part of Azania by local converts from the Great Lakes region and/or West and North Azania. But that should not preclude the possibility that there might already be some politically conscious converts who conceive the need to establish such a genealogical lineage. One must not forget that the legitimacy and future of Morocco’s (hereditary) Monarchy hinges on similar spurious assumptions.
If anything, this critical review of the mythology of Bida and that of the Hausas’s origin suffice to validate the foregoing arguments. In the myth of the Hausas origin, we are told that the son of Bagdad king (Bayajidda or Abuyazidu) had a quarrel with his father, and, consequently, left Bagdad only to find himself in Daura (one of the seven city-states of the Hausas, north of Kano). While in Daura, Bayajidda (outsider) found out that the local inhabitants were being terrorized and deprived of drinking water by a giant serpent, which took over the well of the local community. As gratitude for Bayajidda’s brave act in killing that giant serpent, the king of Daura gave him his daughter to marry. Their first son Bawa (servant) went forth to give birth to the Hausa–Bakwai (founders of the seven city-states of the Hausas). 26
Putting aside the question why the entire population of Daura would in those days have depended on a single well for its source of drinking water, critics are reminded that the time Osman Dan Fodio’s Arabo-Islamic forces captured the city-states of the Hausas Bagdad (Iraq) was among the most important centers of Islamic scholarship. Moreover, with the inclusion of the “Hausa Bakwai” and “Banza Bakwai” in this legend, one could reasonably perceive a rational incorporation of incoming Arabo-Islamic patriarchal influences in the myth of Hausas’s origin. Thus, just as Sarah—Abraham’s first and legitimate wife—begot Isaac (the male ancestor of the Hebrews), and his illegitimate Nuba–Egyptian wife, Hagar, begot Ismael (the presumed male ancestor of the Arabs), so too had the Hausas’s male ancestors both legitimate and illegitimate sons. Bayajidda’s killing of the giant black serpent (the primordial embodiment of the eternal spirit of the Bantu-Ethiopians ancestry) tends to add even more to that romanticized legend in that it not only incorporates elements of the mythology of Bida but also implicitly invokes the wholly politicized biblical narration depicting Abraham’s sacrificial killing of the culture symbol of Amon (ram) in the place of his son Isaac—during the occupation of Lower Egypt by the Hyksos. In viewing this, are we not dealing here with a systematic external political attempt to extirpate the culture/mythical symbols of the Bantu-Ethiopians national culture?
In contrast, I observed in Azanism that the blood that circulates the veins of the culture symbols of the Bantu-Ethiopians Kingdom (e.g., the Ram or the Apis Bull of Manfouir/Menefre) is dependent entirely on the vegetation (remedy) of Ausar/Osiris resurrection. Moreover, that Anubis and the Subk/Sebek deity, the predynastic crocodile deity of the Moabas (Moabites of pre-Israelite Canaan?) or later the culture symbol of the capital of the present day Mali (Bamaka-ko [Crocodile of water]), were also included among the Judges of the Dead during the dynastic Pharaonic period begs the conclusion that the custodians of the Azanian culture had erstwhile succeeded in acculturating these latter cannibalistic animals in accord with the life-serving purpose of genuine culture(s). In the case of Anubis, after it had lost a survival (intellectual) contest against the Rabbit. 27 With this analytical discernment, revivalist intellectuals would simply like to remind the pan-Africanist (and other pseudonationalist) intellectuals that we share the genuine nationalists position that the Bantu-Ethiopians are ethnically and culturally akin, and that the prevailing (divisive) colonial model influencing the psychology of the subjects of colonial Africa is not a realistic substitute for genuine identity formation process. To strengthen this position, let’s expound on the history of the Dagbon (also known as the Dagbon-Molé) of modern Nŋhana (Ghana?), as this adds more to the ongoing analytical discernment in support of an ethno-culture national identity for the Azanians.
In the mythology of the origin of the Dagbon-Molé one is told that their male ancestor, Tohadzie—the red hunter—descended from Zamfara (one of the “Banza Bakwai” of the Hausas). The young Tohadzie, who, like his grandfather Bayajidda, was doubtlessly driven by sociopolitical ambitions, left Zamfara only to find himself in a town of the then nascent Mali Empire. It would seem Tohadzie arrived in Mali shortly after the disintegration of the kingdom of Nŋhana. For, unlike Bayajidda, who earlier rescued the indigenous inhabitants of Daura from the terror of a giant black serpent which took control of the locals’ only source of drinking water, the brave Tohadzie had to grapple this time with a black buffalo (the “Apis Bull” of Manfouir?), which astonishingly not only took control of that Malian community’s only source of drinking water but also killed anyone who dared to fetch water from that town’s river. After leading the drought-stricken community to slain their bestial enemy, Tohadzie was also not only offered a Malian princess (called Pagawugba) for marriage but he also eventually inherited the throne of that local community. If anything, the newly wedded royal couple eventually gave birth to a son (Kpognambo), who, in line with the hereditary norm of the incoming patriarchal model, was also imbued with Tohadzie gallantry and hunting qualities.
Inasmuch as the killing of the eternal spirit of the Bantu-Ethiopian ancestors by Bayajidda or the killing of the sacred Apis Bull of Manfouir by his grandson Tohadzie is concerned, it could reasonably be argued that the “Green Crown,” which originally had served as the legitimate gerontocratic title of the Pharaonic system had (after the demise of Karnak) lost its culture significance, and the political events that unfolded since then right through to the current political crisis engulfing the whole ECOWAS region amounts to what one could readily qualify as genuine political sorcery.
Succinctly, after the death of Kpognambo’s parents, he traveled westwards from the then Malian Empire to Buin (in Fadan Grumah), 28 where after defeating the Tendana, he usurped the kingdom’s throne and ruled it until his death.
In Buin, Kpognambo married two wives, Sihisabiga (daughter of Buin spiritual leader) and Suhuyini (the daughter of the king of Fadan Grumah). Suhuyini gave birth to Gbewaa 29 and Sihisabiga gave birth to Malgimsi, Nyelgili, and Mamzisheli.
After Kpognambo’s death, and with replacement of the gerontocratic constitution of the Azanian culture with the incoming economically inspired patriarchal model, and with four sons of an early political marriage vying for the throne of Buin, it was only a matter of time before internal dissension fractured that kingdom. The ensuing conflicts forced Gbewaa and his followers to emigrate to Pusiga, the Upper Eastern region of modern Nŋhana (Ghana). Here, Naa Gbewaa and his followers established the kingdom of greater Dagbon, which he ruled until his death. Kpognambo’s other sons, Nyelgili founded the chieftainship of Nangodi and Namzisheli founded Tongo.
Following the death of Naa Gbewaa, similar succession wars ensued among his sons and grandsons. Such divisive conflicts reached their peak when Zirli murdered his brother Kufogu to inherit Biun’s throne—and this much to the disagreement of his other siblings. With that act, the final stage was set for further conflicts leading to the eventual breakup of the Dagbon Kingdom into the modern Dagbon kingdoms (with their lion rulers; Staniland, 1975).
It was in the midst of such perdurable political crisis that other Naa Gbewaa’s sons, Sitobu, Tohagu, and Mantambo migrated further southwards from Pusiga and found the Manprusi Kingdom (Tohagu), the Nanun Kingdom (Mantambo), and Sitobu, the modern Dagbon Kingdom. Hence, the Nanun, Mamprugu, and Dagbon people consider each other as brothers. In addition, a daughter of Naa Gbewaa, Yentuagri, married a Patan Grumah and they found the Mossi Kingdom. The narrative even goes on to add the Kusasis and other groups of modern Ghana, To[n]go, and Burkina Faso among descendants of the Dagbon. 30 That the Patan-Grumahs are today found in Mali, Niger, Guinea, Chad, Sudan, and parts of Southern Libya, and so on suffices to remind critics of the complexity involved in terms of identity formation process in Azania as a whole.
Important about this concise history of the Dagbon-Molé is the interrelated ethnic role the Hausas and Patan-Grumahs (the Moabas) have played in the emergence of the other subculture groups (tribes?) of that region. Subsequently, in Azanism, I referred to the Bantu-Ethiopian subculture group called “Luok Niib” (inhabitants of the underworld) whose seven male ancestors shared the same ancestral lineage and who until today not only maintain the Subk/Sebek deity of the predynastic period but also continue to worship Hyen-Nu (Heru/Horus?). 31 Furthermore, while the kingship titles of the other subculture groups of Nŋhana are Nam, Naan, Naba (also linked to Meroe), Nana, and so on, “Bét” (messenger), which I paralleled with “Bes-Ptah” in Azanism, is the authentic kingship title of Moabas. It is even culturally significant that “Nab” in Moar/Molé means cow; and indigenous Pharaohs during the dynastic era were known to be referred to as “bulls, either of the sky or earth” (Christopher, 2002).
Therefore, the custodians of the Azanian national culture, who until this day consider the total liberation of the Nile Valley region as concomitant to the reintroduction of the “Ritual of Resurrection,” which, as noted elsewhere, is irreducibly bound with that peoples’ culture quest for real freedom (as life in its eternal manifestation), will lament African leaders’ and pan-African intellectuals’ subscription to the colonial African ideal as a total aberration from the genuine national cause.
In fact, culturally speaking, apart from the promise of paradise after the violent death of the profane in her or his myrmidon service to the state system, leaders of the world’s dominant political religions, which continue to influence the psychology of the subjects of colonial Africa, are far from convincing genuine nationalists with their economic response to the imminent culture challenge humanity faces, namely, the perpetual growth of native populations. However, in contrast to the murderous reach of these political sorcerers (as in the human-sacrificing rituals remarked elsewhere of foreign political deities, which in contemporary context is merely transmogrified into the incessant rivalries of the expansive states), the custodians of the Azanian national culture were—from the onset of their nation’s social history—not only prescient of that imminent culture challenge but even anticipated that through the appropriate culture measures humanity is intellectually capable of attaining real freedom. Accordingly, the well-known “Ritual of Resurrection” in the “Book of Coming Forth by Day” and the closely related culture process of the “Mummification of the deceased indigenous Pharaohs” should be seen as supplementary to the underlying objective of the Azanian culture—that is eternity first and then resurrection.
To transpose the afflatus of the Azanian culture radically, the custodians of the culture institutions of the Bantu/Cushitic-Ethiopians Pharaonic system are unanimous in their conviction about the homogeneity of local/national culture(s). Nevertheless, they also tend to maintain that in each earthly nation’s culture quest for a superior (immortal) identity, leaders of the various earthly nations would ineluctably arrive at an epistemological junction (in the form of an Ankh), where they would be summoned by the conscience of Universal Existence to present their distinctive culture documents (e.g., the Maat) as testaments to each nation’s nonpareil service to Life. But, in light of the foregoing analysis, the panache of the Bantu-Ethiopians culture school is simply that such a conscious voluntary integration of the earthly nations culture documents (is this the Universal Constitution of Nations?) at the advent of a perfect humanity, which is capable of transiting the terrestrial and celestial provinces must not be confused with the democratic constitutions of existing Polities (which are mainly composed of economic adventurers/speculators, political sorcerers, mother murderers, homosexuals, pedophiles, etc.)—because the objective of the overarching Constitution is the service of Life in her eternal manifestation. In other words, the perception that pristine culture must be subservient to Life’s purpose unequivocally contradicts the prevailing multicultural casuistry at the base of the democratic constitution of the nation-state system, which, as observed elsewhere, is—even if somehow panurgic and fortuitous—fully embraced by both AU leaders and PAMs intellectuals.
Conclusion
Apodictically, this essaic-article took critical issue with the mainstream views espoused mainly by agents of colonialism, leaders and intellectuals of the PAMs and those of Africa’s tribal irredentism, that there is anything ethno-cultural (and hence national) about the so-called African tribes. Drawing largely from the social history of precolonial/prepolitical Africa, that is, the Bantu/Cushitic-Ethiopians kingdom (Azanian nation), I demonstrated lucidly and vividly that far from being distinct ethno-culture nationalities as is often portrayed in the mainstream scholarship, the African tribes are better considered subculture groups, whose providential and provincial culture norms and practices erstwhile paid tribute to the objective of the Azanian culture. For instance, using the culture symbols and practices of some local groups and linking them to that of predynastic and dynastic Pharaonic periods, I observed that there is compelling evidence against qualifying the so-called African tribes as distinct ethno-culture national communities. In genuine culture context, the old age Ritual of Resurrection and the interrelated culture process of the mummification of a deceased indigenous Pharaohs attest that the moral objective of that nation’s culture is irreducibly subservient to Life’s purpose as exemplified by the immortality of Hyen-Nu (Heru/Horus?). Furthermore, there are recurrent culturally sanctioned ethical instances among the elderly of these subculture groups (e.g., the moral constraint from eating the flesh of any of the culture symbols assigned to their nation’s culture institutions such as the Subk/Sebek deity, the Apis Bull, the ram symbol of Amon, etc.), which genuinely pay tribute to the overarching culture norm. Moreover, the fact that at its apogee, the process of the Ritual of Resurrection began in the Delta region of the Nile Valley and ended at the Sources of the White Nile, where the spirit of the deceased indigenous Pharaohs was introduced into the pneumatic habitation of their ancestors, contradicts conventional wisdom that ancient Egypt (during the reign of the indigenous Pharaohs) was a distinct national community isolated from the rest of Azania. Therefore, the emphatic approval of the pending Arab colonial occupation of the sacred land of the Bantu/Cushitic-Ethiopians Kingdom-Azania and/or the approval of the emergence of pseudoethnic identities on Africa’s political plain by the AU leadership and PAMs intellectuals indicate how really disingenuous these are on the question of national emancipation and unity.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research and/or authorship of this article.
Notes
Author Biography