Speakers Corner is a means for the creation of an African oriented mind through the dissemination of information, and the exchange of thoughts and ideas. It is to ignite a consciousness and an urgent awareness of who we are through knowledge of our history, culture, our values and to find ways to right the wrongs that we ourselves have passively been participating in for the last four hundred years. It is a means to enable social and economic re engineering of African people and the cornerstone of the movement is the belief that “The Spirit Of Africa Lies Abroad”.
The Spirit of Africa truly lies Abroad,
And it beckons we arise and hit the Road,
to seek the spirit of our Spirits of course,
The residual slaves forgotten by Wilberforce;
Looted from the pyramids in Cairo and Ovonramwen’s Court
and caged in fish bowls listening to languages they know not”.
…by Theo A. Lawson
What is the Spirit of Africa and why it lies Abroad
The Spirits of our Ancestors represented in the Masks, Figurines, Stools, Carvings and Images created in wood iron brass bronze and gold, that were the symbols of our traditional forms of worship, embodiments of our spiritual powers an well being. The guardians and repositories of these forms of worship were distroyed, their teachings and practices that had for centuries ordered our societies outlawed and our shrines and Palaces desecrated sacked and looted.The Spirit of Africa was beaten, broken and carried abroad along with our people to be enslaved in plantations and museums.
The Spirit of Africa has been subjugated to the creeds and beliefs of strangers, intruders with foreign ways of worship, not originating from our lands and people and has thus been shorn of its power leaving us, its people subjected, confused and helpless
After centuries of colonization Africans all over the world have been brainwashed into believing that our own ancient ways of life are primitive, heretical, taboo, and wrong while only their foreign ways are right.
In consequence the Spirit of Africans lies in foreign schools and universities while ours lie disdained ruined and rotten, it lies in the shining cities and malls of London Dubai Paris and New york while we continue to suffer economic depravation with our markets full of every conceivable form of imported rejected substandard merchandise and food stuffs.
The Spirit of Africans lie in Brazilian hair, Bleached skin and foreign designer goods all in the quest to be as much as possible what our foreign masters have dictated …poor copies of themselves.
The Spirit of Africa must be brought back to source
We must receive back our ancestral spirits so we can once more be blessed by them
Re build our torn pride in our discarded languages culture and traditions
Re plant our farms,Set up our industries
Re align our lives with our own values.
For too long we have bemoaned the fate of our nations and whispered the truth of our salvation to ourselves alone. It is time to lead ourselves to a new land which shall be built on these foundations:
Knowledge of our history ancient and modern
Knowledge of our heroes ancient and modern in every field of endeavor
Knowledge of our traditions and culture ( language dress food and religious beliefs and practices
Research Resuscitation Preservation and Dissemination of our traditional Building and Production methods.
Knowledge of our Creative arts and Artists
“Knowledge is the power that frees the mind.”
Write up by enye
Join us at Freedom Park,Broad Street Lagos.Tuesday 22nd September 2015. 7PM. Follow on Twitter @speakerscornerf and Instagram @speakerscornerfp. For more information Email speakerscornerfp@gmail.com
