Perspectives of the chairman, Julian Bond

Writing in these pages about Africa in 1919, editor W.E.B. Du Bois said: "The African movement means to us what the Zionist movement must mean to the Jews, the centralization of race effort and the recognition of a racial fount. To help bear the burden of Africa does not mean any lessening of effort in our own problem here at home. Rather it means increased interest. For any ebullition of action and feeling that results in an amelioration of the lot of Africa tends to ameliorate the condition of colored peoples throughout the world And no man liveth to himself Du Bois was prescient in this as in so much else. He foresaw Africa's importance to the world and to African Americans; and he helped the thenfledgling NAACP adopt an interest in Africa that continues until this day.

That interest is shown in a variety of waysthrough the NAACP's lobbying efforts in Congress to ensure fairness for African nations and African people; through NAACP-sponsored political activism here at home; and through the NAACP's insistence that our educational system present a fair view of Africa's contributions to the world. But even those of us in the NAACP do not know as much about Africa as we should.

Ask someone to name three African presidents; and after Mandela, you will get a blank stare.

Ask for principal products of Africa-north, south, central or westand your answer is likely to be bananas. Ask how many democracies are there on the continent and you will receive a wrong answer that can be counted on fewer fingers than you have ears.

That ignorance is bad for Africa's future, and for ours. It is not a romantic vision of a ravaged, but redeemable, once-pastoral ancestral homeland that draws attention to Africa today, however flawed that fantasy; there is an economic and political reality that commands our attention.

Africa's potential for its own people and for the world is enormous. Once realized and unleashed, that power can energize a reappraisal of existing international relationships, and it can insert some harmony into this disharmonious world.

We can help make that happen, not by leading Africa by the hand out of her past. Rather, we can help Africa help herself, insisting that powerful nations extend help and do not erect barriers and by informing ourselves of the continent and its people.

That effort compliments the struggles we make toward full equality here. For this fact is as true internationally as it is here at home: We go forward fastest when we go forward together.

Copyright Crisis Publishing Company, Incorporated Jul 1998
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