AFRICA; Is This You This Back That Is Bent?

Ya Asantewa
February 2012
SHKR

The morning of the Occident on our shores was couched in crimson for those who landed on
our shores were white and mad.. Those who fought and those who acquiesced, they all
ended up the same way conquered, renamed, administered
Cheikh Hamidou Kane, Ambiguous Adventure (1961)
strength is just an accident arising from the weakness of others. They grabbed what they
could get for the sake of what was to be got. It was just robbery with violence, aggravated
murder on a great scale, and men going at it blind.
Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness (1899)
In the year 1830, The German philosopher G.W.F Hegel in his famous Jena lectures
summarized the view of Europeans about Africans and this view even today in the 21st century
with all the information available to us still holds in many minds; Europeans, Americans and
most tragically African minds. Hegel declared the Africans were sub humans and had no history
and so were technically not part of the human race; I quote:
The peculiarly African character is difficult to comprehend, for the very reason that in reference
to it, we must quite give up the principle which naturally accompanies all our ideasthe
category of Universality We must lay aside all thought of reverence and moralityall that
we call feelingif we would rightly comprehend him; there is nothing harmonious with humanity
to be found in this type of character. The copious and circumstantial accounts of Missionaries
completely confirm this, and Mahommedanism appears to be the only thing which in any way
brings the Negroes within the range of culture.
Not only are Africans simply not humans, Hegel opined, they are also less developed
metaphysically. Carthage and Egypt he excused were only geographical abnormalities (the
precursor of the present incongruity called Sub Saharan Africa to politically differentiate Arab
Africa for which they now have long established evidence of higher indigenous civilization from
those black Africans). Carthage and Egypt, he declared, are actually part of the greater
narrative of Western civilization, they just happened to be on the continent of Africa which
modern political correctness resolved by dividing Africa into two, civilized North Africa and
barbaric Sub-Saharan Africa. According to Hegel and most minds even today, Carthage and
Tunisia were due to foreigners, the same way the Benin Bronzes were purported to have been
made by foreign hands and Iron working purportedly supposed to have been imported by the
Europeans in the 14th century. On the discovery of furnaces dating back to centuries before

Christ, it must have been imported from Carthage. On the discovery of furnaces dating back to
2,500BC, before anybody else in the world, the naysayers are finally nonplussed. But Hegel did
not stop here. He continued;
At this point we leave Africa, not to mention it again. For it is no historical part of the World; it
has no movement or development to exhibit. Historical movements in itthat is in its northern
partbelong to the Asiatic or European World. Carthage displayed there an important transitory
phase of civilization; but, as a Phoenician colony, it belongs to Asia. Egypt will be considered in
reference to the passage of the human mind from its Eastern to its Western phase, but it does
not belong to the African Spirit. What we properly understand by Africa, is the Unhistorical,
Undeveloped Spirit, still involved in the conditions of mere nature, and which had to be
presented here only as on the threshold of the Worlds History
Such views as Hegels, repeated over and over again well into the 20th (See Article The Origins
of Racism) and even the 21st century (Check websites and comments online about African
History), have taken deep roots and formed trees of ignorance in minds all over the world,
particularly the African mind.
This myth created solely to ease Christian Europes conscience for their barbaric treatment of
slaves and later on the brutal colonization and neocolonization of Africa, has sadly over the
succeeding 200 years become a self fulfilling prophesy. Like Lugard says in his book the Dual
Mandate, It was thus that the conscience of Europe found relief.
The world, the West and most especially Africa has been brainwashed into believing the myth
and eventually as we can see from the gross underdevelopment, poverty and disease in Africa
today, it has become a self fulfilling ongoing prophesy. The biggest tragedy of course is that
Africans themselves believe this myth with a fanatical fervor that is no longer fashionable in the
West. The colonizers succeeded beyond their wildest dream in turning this lie into our reality,
though it took about 150 years. The Africans they met of course knew better. It is their children
that knew no other life but colonial life and were brainwashed from birth, who have taken this
myth and transferred it onto their children and their childrens children, till it has become the
stark reality of today. We were told that we were barbarians and have always been barbarians,
little better than wild monkeys, habiting trees and eating raw meat and ourselves for food;
running round wild Africa naked and clueless till the White God in His Infinite Mercy sent the
white man, his angels on earth, in whom he has infused with ALL knowledge and all there is to

know, to come and deliver us from our abject state. Only then can we become human being s
and of course only then can we go to heaven when we die.
Our poor forefathers were all condemned to the hell they deserved as they were unfortunate to
have been born before the Good White God Almighty decided to send his white angels to
deliver us. Our forefathers of course did not believe in this balderdash but they bowed to the
superior Maxim gun and figured they will send their children to this white mans school to learn
their ways and their secrets so as to be able to fight knowledge with knowledge. Alas the
opposite happened. Our forefathers did not anticipate the deviousness of the white man. They
did not understand that they will not be satisfied with the body; they will require the soul too. And
they succeeded brilliantly; what eventually emerged from the white man schools was not a
human being anymore, what emerged was a strange mutant; not African, not European, just this
entity that cannot be named, that only aspired to ape his masters in everything; speech, dress,
food, house, mannerism, everything, while being trapped in a black mans skin and mortified
everyday by that fact. His mother tongue was now vernacular (what is that?), his clothes which
allowed his skin to breathe in the hot climate was now bush and exchanged for a full 3- piece
suit, suitable only for the cold climes of the temperate climates of the West (there is still nothing
more incongruous than a suit, tie, etc, in the sweltering heat of the tropics);his healthy food
(filled with different kinds of vegetables to provides adequate nutrients) was now also bush and
was exchanged for the artery clogging sausages and bacon of the English breakfast. His brick
houses and thatch roofs to keep the insides of the houses cool in the oppressive heat of the
noon day sun, was exchanged for ozone layer damaging cement ,which keeps all the heat
inside the house and the tin roofing sheets, the better to bring the heat into the house. But we
were not starving at our first contact with the Europeans but now we starve and about 90% of
Africans live in abject poverty.
But it was not always this way. Africas back was not always bent, trembling with red scars under
the heat of the noon day sun. Its children have not always starved and we have not always been
so simpleminded. In the following pages we shall explore Africas technological state in the far
past and find out if it is true that we have never been able to think or invent tools. There has
always been a lot of talk about Nok art but always as if it occurred in a vacuum. In this edition
we discuss the Nok people themselves and their technology and structures that must have
existed for that sophistication of art to develop and thrive. We shall discuss metal working in
Africa and inventions made 2,000 years before Christ. Yes, before Christ. And 2,500 years

before the white man became Gods angel imbued with ALL knowledge directly from heaven;
3,000 years before we acquired the inability to think.
Why is all this important you ask? Why is history important? All that was in the past, this is the
present. Lets forget all that, we say. But apart from the famous George Santayana quote that
those who forget their history are destined to relive it, which seems to be happening to us with
the recent loss of even the little self respect we had at independence. Now we have to invite
oyinbo1 farmers to come and farm for us apart from selling vast hectares of the most fertile land
to Korea and China to produce food for their people, while 90% of Africans starve. It will also be
wise for us to learn from these oyinbos we worship so much.
In 455AD, the Vandals sacked Rome, seat of the mighty Roman Empire, and whatever little light
of civilization that would have reached Western Europe died and Western Europe descended
into over 700 years of what is now known as the Dark Ages from which darkness they did not
emerge till the 13th century. With the collapse of the Roman Empire, Intellectual life, literacy of
any form of the most rudimentary form was wholly confined to the monasteries of Europe and
was limited to the monks and nuns therein.
In fact, as at 410AD and as late as 600AD, the British, Germans, Gauls and most of the other
tribes of Western Europe were on sale as slaves in the Roman slave markets. Like the Rev
Thomas Bokenkotter said in his book A Concise History of the Catholic Church,
A delightful tale relates how Gregory the Great2 first conceived the mission to the Angles and
the Saxons. While walking near the Roman slave market, he spotted some youthful Angles for
sale and noted sadly that such bright looking lads should be slaves of darkness. When told they
were Angli, he replied that they had faces of angeli (angels) and should be coheirs with them
in heaven. They were Deira? Again he responded with a pun: they must be saved from the
Deira Dei (the wrath of God). Their King was named Aelle? Alleluia, Gregory exclaimed, should
be chanted in the land.
The whole of Western Europe was totally illiterate. There were no schools, no centres of
learning, no hospitals, nothing. It was a truly barbaric existence. Wars, strive, disease, sickness,
1 Now taken to mean anyone that is not a Black Nigerian, which includes everybody else; Russians, the
Japanese, East and West Europeans, Indians, Chinese, Lebanese, Brazilians, South Americans,
Jamaicans, South Africans, Zambians, Guineans, Sierra Leoneans especially the Creoles, Liberians and
all others that we share this planet with; all are now seen as Oyinbo in this our now confused state.
2 Roman Pontiff of the Catholic Church 590-604

insecurity of life and property and near starvation was part of everyday life. Darkness reigned
supreme all over Western Europe. The Arab world and the Chinese world were meanwhile at
the epoch of World civilization. They were the 1st world of their day and Europe was the 4th world
of illiteracy, disease and abject poverty. Much as Africa is today, with reference to the Western
1st World. The Arabs had the latest technology and the most enlightened scholars;
mathematicians, physicians, chemists, doctors and other top rate scientists and thinkers.
Western Europe did not even know trigonometry existed.
The only light that remained from the Roman civilization (which was mostly Mediterranean
anyway and not Western European) was the light of Christianity and the only literate people
were the monks, a few Kings and some members of their courts. All European languages were
vernacular. Latin was the only literate language and if you did not speak or read Latin you
could not even read the Bible which was the only book you thought existed anyway. Now from
this almost total darkness, Italy started emerging in the 11th century and the rest of Europe only
started its own emergence in the 14th century. What happened to cause this emergence?
Well, the Crusades happened. As the Rev. Thomas Bokenkotter said in his book, A Concise
History of the Catholic church,
In comparison with the Eastern Christians, whose stand against war was generally consistent,
Western Christendom appears much less enlightened. The barbarian invasions and the
conditions of feudal society made war a constant fact of life; ecclesiastics tried to channel this
bellicose energy for the Churchs own purposes. Holy war in the service of the Church was
regarded permissible and even desirable...
And with the Crusades came the revival of long distance trade as the silks, spices, gold, and
most importantly, the returning Crusaders brought with them from the high civilization of the
Arab World; that magic of intellectualism; books, books and more books. First was the full
translation of all the books of Aristotle. That is, the European intellectual went far back into the
history of Western civilization (more than 1,000 years in fact) to revive the study of Aristotle; that
brilliant ancient philosopher. But more importantly, the Crusaders brought back all the books of
Aristotle which had not been available in the West and along with these books, they also
brought back books by the leading Arab thinkers and philosophers of the day; philosophers and
thinkers of high civilization; Avicenna who is credited to being the modern inventor of Medicine,
and other Arabic books on Mathematics (which was unknown in the west), trigonometry,
astronomy, geometry and thus began first in Bologna in 1099 and Paris in 1140, the light in

Europe. This flowering of knowledge and thinking merging the ancient Western thoughts of
Aristotle with the then cutting edge thoughts and technology of the Eastern Arabic scholars and
its polymaths; Avicenna, Yahya ibn Adi, Abu Sulayman Sijistani, Shahab al-Din Suhrawardi, Ibn
Bajjah, Mulla Sadr, Al Amiri, Averroes, Maimonides and Ab Hayyn al-Tawhd etc; to build a
new civilization that is now known as the Western civilization, which has taken man to the moon
and space, has changed the way we live our lives in ways that were unimaginable just 400
years ago.
They did not invite Arab experts to come and help them build their Universities or their roads or
their civilization. They built a new civilization by themselves albeit based on all knowledge they
could acquire from all parts of the world at that time, as well as new thinking by their now
emerging scientists and thinkers. The Western Europeans fused the knowledge they brought
back with their own peculiar circumstances, challenges and needs, to build a new civilization to
solve their particular problems. They did not stay stagnant begging for technology transfer that
will never happen.
Ghiyath al-Din Abu'l-Fath Umar ibn Ibrahim Al-Nishapuri al-Khayyami , more commonly known
as Omar Khayyam, best known for his Rubaiyat had already written his seminal work, Treatise
on Demonstration of Problems of Algebra in 1070, solving cubic equations by geometric
means, 500 years before it was discovered in Western Europe. The word Algebra itself comes
from the Latinisation of the name of the Arabic Mathematician, philosopher, astronomer and
geographer, Abu Jafar Muhammed ibn Musa Al Kwari (c780AD-c850AD). Mathematics itself
could have started in Africa but for lack of archeological evidence, we cannot for now make such
assumptions. But, the earliest evidence of numerical recording in the world was excavated in
Swaziland, South West Africa, dating back to about 35,000BC! The Babylonians understood
what is now known as the Pythagoras theorem as early as 1,800BC- 1,650BC, more than 1,000
years before Pythagoras (c580BC-500BC) was even born. The ancient Greeks freely
acknowledged that their mathematics especially their geometry came from Egypt. To Egypt also
we owe the 365 days division of the year and the 24 hour divisions of the day; to the Chinese
we owe the invention of paper and to the Indians, the invention of Zero as well as our current
decimal system called the Hindu-Arabic numeral system. A lot of our knowledge of
trigonometry and algebra is owed to the Near East. The rest of the world was far, far more
developed, than Europe was at the time it came out of its Dark Ages and started its now barely
400 year old journey to become the Kings of the world. They not only caught up but have

surpassed even their teachers, changed forever the way we live our lives and dominated the
world.
What is the point of this narrative, it is to point out that now in this our dark ages, Africans should
finally copy something good from these oyinbos we worship like gods. We should go back into
our distant past to gather and remember the knowledge of our past, fuse it with modern day
cutting edge knowledge and technology and build something new that will propel the human
race further ahead in its quest to live a more fulfilling life here on earth. Who knows what cures
for Cancer is lodged inside the head of some native doctor we have been taught to denigrate?
Who knows what fuel saving, steel making technology is lodged in the skills of our forefathers
that will reduce the worlds dependence on fossil fuels and save the ozone layer?
We would also discuss the state of our steel industry 3,000 years after we were making carbon
steel ourselves. We discuss where imported technology has gotten us thus far. Imported
technology will not rescue Africa. It will not develop Africa. It has not rescued us in 150 years
and it never will. African thinkers, engineers, scientists, philosophers, historians can and must
be allowed to rescue Africa. Otherwise, our wandering in the wilderness of want and
underdevelopment will continue for a long time.
There is no reason why we cant build steel plants from scratch ourselves. The first European
that built a steel plant had never seen one before. He conceptualized it and invented the
process and the machinery from his fertile brain using the old knowledge already in existence
plus new discoveries that were taking place at that time. There is no reason why with our
knowledge of the different steel making techniques in the world today combined with our
knowledge of ancient methods, our fertile brains cannot design and invent a brand new cost and
energy efficient technology to produce steel.
It is a fallacy that ALL the knowledge in the world has been developed. The Western world is still
innovating and discovering new things every day. In fact some scientists have claimed that we
have not even scratched the surface in understanding how the Universe works. Till date,
earthquakes can still not be predicted accurately. Let us use our brains to find solutions to our
problems and stop being parasites to the world, perpetually begging!!!! Almost 5,000 years ago,
our forefathers learnt and mastered the secrets of turning iron ore stones into metal and tools
and also learnt they had to make the process as efficient and fuel saving as possible. How
come we their descendants with far more knowledge available to us now cannot do the same
thing?

We have been the brawn of the world for too long; it is now time to be the brains also. We are
not the first to go through a period of decline. It is not peculiar to the Black man; this period of
decline. All peoples from all over the world of all races have gone through their Dark ages or
Middle Ages as it is now called. We are not the first to be slaves for hundreds of years and we
are not the first to be colonized. The Romans colonized Britain and Western Europe for upwards
of 400 years. That has not stopped them from creating arguably the greatest civilization in World
history. Our history of slavery and colonialism should not be an albatross on our necks to stop
our development. It is history we must learn from and move forward from there. It is not because
we are cursed or black or that we are inherently stupid. It is just a phase in our history as the
history of all other races. We should move forward from this and rejoin the human race for a
better life here and now for us, our children and a better world for all of humanity.
In conclusion, we suggest that the Federal government or patriotic Nigerian billionaires follow
the part of the most rapidly developing countries in the world today and as a matter of urgency
set up in one of our Universities, an Engineering department who would be empowered and
given the mandate to design, develop and build a steel technology suitable for our Iron Ore and
operational within our peculiar circumstances.
It has been discovered that the major common denominator that has fueled the growth of the
BRIC countries; China, Russia, Brazil and India; is the huge percentage of their GDP they
spend on research and development (R&D). The amount spent has been found to be even
higher than that spent by the developed G8 countries. They set their own standards of
development and have succeeded beyond anybodys wildest dreams.
60 years ago, who would have thought India or china will be in pole position today. Hence the
need for developing our respective departments of Engineering Research and Technology
Development in Africa.
This department will be given a fixed period and specific targets to meet. It shall invite our best
brains from all over the country. A lot of our Engineers and Engineering Professors are wasting
away. This technology must be indigenous; taking advantage of all the knowledge available in
the world today as well as the knowledge of our forefathers. The old men that still remember
how they used to produce Iron should be interviewed and consulted. The various blacksmiths

that are still practicing should be consulted. The excavated furnaces should be studied and
analyzed and if necessary adapted for a much larger scale and more advanced technology3.
The department will work together with the Science department to include Mathematicians,
Chemist, Physicists and other physical scientists. The department, both lecturers and students
should be wholly dedicated to this project for the whole period of the mandate. They may in the
course of their research even find out that another metal will be more suitable for the things the
world currently use steel for and who knows what New Age will be birthed with this project?
They should also develop technologies for processing some of the byproducts of the whole
process. Nigerian Iron Ore is usually found in conjunction with other Rare Earth Metals which
are becoming very useful in the new age we live in. The effective processing of these metals
should also be part of the mandate. Even the international experts with the superior technical
knowhow are constantly researching for new technologies to simplify and reduce the cost of the
steel making process. With the recent upsurge in environmental concerns all over the world as
well as shortage and expense of raw materials and energy costs, scientist and engineers the
world over are constantly looking for more efficient ways to produce steel. We should not be left
behind and we do not need technology transfer for this. In the past 30 years there has been new
technologies developed from scratch and implemented, so if we had started 30 years ago at the
time we began our truncated journey into steel production, we may by now have created a
brand new technology, exportable all over the world and we would actually have a steel industry
by now instead of perpetually waiting for foreign experts and technologies that have barely
moved us an inch forward.
There are capable Nigerian brains that are up to this herculean task and there is evidence to
prove it. In 1994, Nigerian Scientists, Engineers and technologists got together and developed
all by themselves a process of upgrading the purported low grade Iron Ore at Itakpe (usually
between 35-45%) to the super concentrate grade of between 65-67% without the addition of any
beneficiating plant contrary to the original provision of the designers of the steel plants we have
had built for us4. The Nigerians did not stop there. They went ahead and produced the first all
3 Following years of research and innovation in international steel making process, new developments
include the coating of the furnace refractory lining with slag between heats to extend the life of the
furnace lining; furnaces found in the Nok civilization excavations reveal c2,500 year old furnaces coated
with slag.

4 http://www.afristeel.org 2002, DR. Sanusi Mohammed. Nigerian Steel Industry- Historical Development.

Nigerian Steel5, contrary to the original provisions of the designers of the steel plants we have
had built for us and which we use today thereby wasting huge foreign exchange to import iron
ore from Brazil and elsewhere.
Instead of encouragement and funding, the reward for making this great leap forward for Nigeria
and possibly Africa, what the members of the team got was mass retrenchment and not a kobo
was allocated to the sector in the 1996 budgetary allocations.
This trend of frustrating our best brains and reducing them to a state of abject despair and
frustration must not continue. We must celebrate our best brains, pamper them and give them
the opportunity to move all of us forward. Everyone suffers from our underdevelopment .We will
be surprised if we pursue this goal with all sincerity and dedication without our usual tribalism
and quota system impediments, what new horizons and vistas will be opened in our path for
development.

5 A sample is available at the Secretariat of the African Iron and Steel Association in Abuja