All-Africa education safari

A later address by Diallo Telli, Secretary General of the Organisation of African Unity, and a handshake in New York with U Thant, Secretary General of the United Nations, made Nyeyere’s word germinate as a vision of millions of secondary school pupils; college and university students across Africa, participating in a grand rhythm of thinking, […]

A later address by Diallo Telli, Secretary General of the Organisation of African Unity, and a handshake in New York with U Thant, Secretary General of the United Nations, made Nyeyere’s word germinate as a vision of millions of secondary school pupils; college and university students across Africa, participating in a grand rhythm of thinking, chatting, sharing data and policy options as Heads of State and Governments of African countries. With the coming of Internet, a cerebral All-Africa rhythm shall fertilize this Pan-Africanism. Pupils and students simulating Goodluck Jonathan, Macky Sall, Salva Kiir, Jacob Zuma, Abdelaziz Bouteflika, or Yoweri Museveni, Joseph Kabila, Eduardo Dos Santos, Isias Afewerki in schools and colleges in Mozambique, Namibia, Mali, Kenya or Ethiopia would talk to each other and lobby other Student Presidents in schools and colleges in Zimbabwe, Swaziland, Gambia, Tunisia Eritrea, Ghana etc. They shall ‘Think Daringly Big of Africa in 2090’.
In pioneering the vision at Ahmadu Bello University and several secondary schools in Abuja and Nairobi, Kenya, we have exploited rehearsals as informal play-time tools for sharing and meeting researched African affairs. Learning how to stand at a podium; use eyes, hands, voice and face to communicate with audiences become our infrastructure. Rehearsals mould learning audiences which acquire confidence as evaluators, creating educational fun-times as participants grow into each other.  Inventing oneself as an African leader, never before met or heard to the satisfaction of peers as brutal judges, is a mountain confronted with anxiety; defeated with joy.
Realisations that politicians are dramatists and wielders of the power of speech during conflicts over ideas and viewpoints, comes slowly. Prolonged military rule in Nigeria; bans on charismatic, witty, bombastic and rebel politicians of the pre-military era, left no role models.  Glimpse of success with such power, induces a retreat into secret rehearsals among roommates and close friends, preserving a surprise impact for a public show.
Sharing information about other African countries; experiencing the challenge of popping out a policy proposal or ‘a country’s interest’ out of news headlines about events in other African countries, remains a pull of attraction to group rehearsals. The spectacle of animated journalists charging forward to throw questions at leaders never fails to have appeal. Targeted leaders panic and indulge impulses to flee.  Questions they have no answers for draw threats to offending journalists. Freedom of the press has few natural defenders. Play-anchored learning flourishes here as both journalists provide often subversive information through their questions and informed leaders also provide new information.
Britain’s Royal Geographical Society, a group of businessmen, once financed travel by fortune-seekers to map Africa and Asia and find local resources for British manufacturers. Mungo Park found rice thriving in the in-land delta on the River Niger in Mali.  Building knowledge about Africa for the support of African commerce and local industries is yet to sprout similar benefactors. Learning about Africa and thinking for Africa through the use of Internet is no substitute for physical trekking across the continent, but ‘’Video-Game African Safari’ awaits classrooms, lecture halls and fun joints.
Showing the documentary film ‘’Last Grave at Dimbaza’’ to students preparing to present the ‘’MOCK OAU SUMMIT’’ at Ahmadu Bello University, yielded two typical moments of creativity. Yahya Abdullayi as Oliver Tambo, President of the African National Congress, fainted while recounting deaths of hundreds of thousands of African children from malnutrition caused by land-hunger in South Africa. He was grabbed before he hit the floor. Mallama Amina Dikko, as correspondent of the Pan African News Agency (PANA), began reporting the ‘’breaking news’’ to PANA’s bureaus in Tripoli, Dakar, Lagos and Harare. She proclaimed that Oliver Tambo suffered from hypertension. The jam-packed audience was horrified, wove breaths of silence. A flavour of struggles against racial oppression in South Africa came to them ingeniously. A contribution to the educational diplomacy of the African National Congress awaited measurement.
Michela Wrong cites an Eritrean wit which underlines their national trait of ‘’iron control’’, namely: ‘’I didn’t get where I am today’’. It is a useful banner to carry in the marathon of building a rhythm of dialogues by youth Presidents such as Uhuru Kenyatta of Kenya and Koroma of Sierra Leone from schools in Namibia, Eritrea, and Nigeria locking minds with youth Presidents Sirleaf Johnson of Liberia, from schools in Juba, Ouagadougou, Dar es Salaam, or Lilongwe. At a January 29, 2014 ‘’Africa Youth Summit’ at Addis Ababa, involving  250 youths, two pupils from Anglican Girls Grammar School in Abuja – Suulola Folakemi and Taga Steffi as presidents of Zimbabwe and Senegal, respectively – presented a mini-simulation of an African Union Summit. It was a moment of historic adventure and achievement for them and school; planting at Addis Ababa a flag first hoisted in 1978 from Ahmadu Bello University campus, Zaria.
Climbing Mount Kilimanjaro is said to be slow and fatal from one trail.  The use of Internet will shorten arrival at the vision of Africa’s youth engaged in ‘Video Game All-Africa’ for learning about Africa and Thinking Big for Africa.