Ours is not Uhuru for freedom; no, it’s Uhuru for independence!

Dar es Salaam-based political and social commentator

I would propose the examination of the following problematic in any Political Thought 101 class: Does a nation’s independence lead to its people’s freedom? Or, alternatively, how is it that the independence of nations in the Third World has not necessarily translated into their peoples’ freedom?

It is interesting to note, at the outset that in our linguistic construction, in Kiswahili, that is, the two words, “independence” and “freedom” are given as “Uhuru”, which renders the problematic nominally nonsensical, because in our language “freedom” is Uhuru, just as “independence” is.

It is when you try to unpack the concept that you come up with what I am thinking. We know that “independence” is that state of affairs where our different nations, here in Africa as well as in much of the Third World, managed to shake off the shackles of colonialism after that bitter period of being chattels, literally, at the service of White masters who had imposed themselves on us and made us slave for them, literally for free.

That enslavement was accompanied with narratives and myths to justify that state of affairs, mainly that theirs was a superior race come to free us from backwardness and obscurantism, to enable us to do what is called “development”.

We of course know that this was a white lie, and that it was never the intention of the colonial master to make us “develop,” whatever that meant.

That narrative, in the hands of the likes of Belgium’s King Leopold and others, was strengthened in its telling when it was pointed out that our continent was being ravaged by the evil doings of Arabs who were involved in the slave trade in the countries on the western board of the Indian Ocean, which were in contact with the Arab Gulf and were indeed brutally exploited and demeaned by that sinister commerce.

What these narratives did not explain is why the Europeans (not Arabs) were everywhere else on the African continent doing pretty much what the Arabs were doing to us in our part of the continent.

Indeed, in some cases, there is very little to distinguish what Leopold did in Congo from what the Arabs did on the western chores of the Indian Ocean.

Significantly, Tippu Tip, arguably the greatest Arab slave trader in Congo, was at some stage a representative of King Leopold.

Be that as it may, we all eventually gained our independence, established our own governments, and later even declared that we were “republics.” Still, we managed to separate our countries’ independences from our peoples’ freedom, so that we could effectively state that our country’s independence (in Kiswahili “Uhuru” has very little to do with our people’s freedom (“Uhuru”).

Read: We must defend the freedom we need if we’re to thrive as citizens

It is not a laughing matter, though it might sound like someone is trying to tickle your ribs. In the 1970s, as I went round the continent as a young lad, I actually was in a country where a poor old man was manhandled by the president’s goons after he asked a question in the following terms: "Monsieur le president, I am an old man and I have seen situations come and go. We had a great famine in the 1930s and it ended; then we had the war in the 1940s and it ended; all along we had colonialism, and it ended. Now this independence, when will it end?”

That is indeed a question that is likely to be asked by people who fail to comprehend why Uhuru is divorced from Uhuru. They, like the unfortunate little man in that cited West African case, have come to the conclusion that what they have been enduring is just another bad but transient phase which will end, like the others.

To be honest, who can blame such a sentiment, when very little of what our rulers do shows they understand that their duty is to serve, to lead, and not to lord it over their people.

In civilised European nations — there are only very few—you hardly hear any politician threatening citizens, which is a regular feature in our countries.

You hardly witness people in Sweden, say, being clobbered by police because they have demonstrated against poor services, but in our countries, it is so common that if you do not hear it, you may wonder what has gone wrong.

We once heard a very senior government official saying, “These people will have to be beaten up; they just have to be beaten, there is no other way, they will just have to be beaten up!”.

And that was in parliament, a statement captured – I’m sure this man knew—in the Hansard records, but he did not give a hoot. No wonder a little later a senior police officer, no doubt taking the cue from his political boss, warned a political party planning to carry out an all too legal demonstration: “You just dare! You will be beaten like stray dogs!”

So, how different is that from colonialism, and how can you try to equate Independence with Uhuru?