The Undying Flame of Patrice Lumumba
Vision Statement
India and Africa share a deep historical relationship. Not only do we have ancient civilizational connections, we have a deeply interconnected modern history. The father of our nation, Mahatma Gandhi, spent 21 years of his life in Africa. It was in Africa that he first tested his tools of civil disobedience and nonviolent resistance. African leaders deeply admired India’s freedom struggle, which was the first movement for the freedom of darker people which articulated a new philosophy and a new democracy. Indians have always expressed their solidarity with Africa’s struggle for freedom and unity.
The world is shifting rapidly today and relationships between civilizations and nations are remaking themselves. In a time rife with conflict and war, Asia has emerged as a force for stability and peaceful, constructive relationships between nations. We are living in a time when formerly colonized nations, including India, China, and the nations of Southeast Asia and Africa are rising to a new consciousness of their role in world history. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s trip to Ghana signals a new focus on the relationship of India to Africa. It is in this time that we celebrate the life and legacy of the great independence fighter Patrice Lumumba.
Patrice Lumumba, born on 2 July 1925, has become a symbol of the fight for freedom and democratic aspirations of formerly colonized nations around the world. He was born into a poor peasant family in the Belgian controlled Congo. He worked as a clerk and a postal official before devoting himself to the Congolese freedom struggle. He quickly became the paramount leader in his country and won his country’s freedom and elections. In a plot orchestrated by foreign powers he was removed from power, imprisoned and eventually murdered in 1961 at the age of 35. Lumumba was a courageous fighter and a revolutionary and we commemorate his legacy both to understand the past and to learn for the future.
The history of Africa in the 19th and 20th centuries has been a heroic and tragic history. First, African society was torn apart with the trans-atlantic slave trade. Africa was then partitioned among colonial powers in the first world war, and its resources plundered. Therefore, as India gained freedom, different parts of Africa were leading their own struggles against colonialism.
Lumumba was part of an emerging African leadership that knew of and had studied India’s freedom struggle. He was part of the leadership of the first stage of African freedom struggles. Among these was the leader of the Ghanaian independence movement, Kwame Nkrumah, who employed methods of “positive action” in Ghana’s struggle for freedom against British colonialism. Ghana was one of the first African nations to achieve independence in 1957. The second stage of freedom in Africa included the struggle against Portuguese colonialism in Guinea Bissau. This struggle was led by Amilcar Cabral, a freedom fighter, thinker and philosopher who led a heroic armed guerilla struggle that led to independence in 1973.
The culmination of the African freedom struggles was the end of apartheid, and its racial and economic oppression of the black population in South Africa. This was only achieved after a long and historic struggle with principled leadership including figures like Nelson Mandela, Winnie Mandela, Oliver Tambo and Chris Hani. At the same time, there were Indians like Yusuf Dadoo and Monty Naicker. E.S. Reddy and Romesh Chandra, both sons of the Indian freedom struggle, would play a central role in the international movement against apartheid in South Africa.
However, the struggle against colonialism and neocolonialism in Africa remains incomplete. Many of the African leadership who sought a new democratic future for their country, including Lumumba, Nkrumah and Cabral were removed from power in coups or assassinated. The struggle for Pan-African unity, started by the African-American activist and scholar W.E.B. Du Bois was never allowed to develop. Conflicts across artificial and colonial borders continue to lead to strife and civil war.
Our time calls for renewed understanding between the peoples of India and Africa. We can not understand Africa, without understanding the vision and struggles of its freedom fighters. Therefore, in commemorating Lumumba, we celebrate and study five personalities who shaped Africa’s struggle: Patrice Lumumba, Kwame Nkrumah, Amilcar Cabral, Oliver Tambo and W.E.B Du Bois.
The future of humanity will be decided by the democratic aspirations of the peoples of Africa and Asia. Africa, with its rich natural and human resources, will play a central role in the remaking of world relations on more equal terms. We call on the Indian people to know their brothers and sisters in Africa, and to know better the ties of the struggle for human freedom that bind us together. The civilizations of Africa and India have known deep ties, disrupted by colonialism, which must now be restored. Our commemoration of Lumumba’s legacy is part of this effort.