The smartest trick ever played on Africans was to be given suburban houses & a flash car. Throw a few toys in the playpen to distract us while they continued to enjoy the wealth. They gave us enough to toil away to maintain those toys just not enough to realise we owned nothing!!

They gave enough of us toys so we could go & show off to those who didn't have to prove that we were independent, that we had been accepted, elevated to their ranks, eating like them, speaking like them; giving others an aspiration to escape & be as much as possible like them.

And when other Africans saw our toys they wanted to enjoy them too so they came to us. But we didn't want to share, oh no! We wanted our toys to ourselves. We didn't want the dirty kids from across the tracks anywhere near us. They were an embarrassment, beneath us, scroungers.

And when other more enlightened children showed us that the toys were a distraction, we thought they were crazy dashiki-wearing, dreadlocked losers who smoked too many herbs. Who were they to try and ruin our fun. After all, we had made it. Life was good.

I often hear people quoting Bob Marley, "Emancipate yourself from mental slavery" but do we know what that means? Do we understand the reality of it & the sacrifices & battles that come with it? Are we ready for them or are we happy to be stuck in the Matrix?

END