The meaning of Fidel Castro in Africa

The late Cuban leader, Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz, of the tiny island nation, near mainland United States, played a significant role in the struggle for the independence of Angola. He airlifted thousands of troops to fight on the side of the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola [MPLA] during the latter’s struggle to secure […]

The late Cuban leader, Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz, of the tiny island nation, near mainland United States, played a significant role in the struggle for the independence of Angola. He airlifted thousands of troops to fight on the side of the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola [MPLA] during the latter’s struggle to secure freedom for the last bastion of colonial domination on the African continent. 

In the 70s, I attended a press conference in Nairobi hosted by President Kenyatta, himself a freedom fighter after a meeting of a select group of African leaders trying to settle differences between the main Angola Liberation Movements of Agostinho Neto’s Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola [MPLA], Holden Roberto’s National Liberation Front of Angola [FNLA] and Jonas Savimbi’s National Union for the Total Independence of Angola [UNITA].

Those were agonizing times for African leaders as they had to deal with different fighting groups who, though ironically were fighting the same enemy but remained bitterly divided among themselves in each country. This was particularly true in Angola under colonial rule. But for the decisive intervention of President Fidel Castro in lifting large numbers of battle-ready troops to fight in Angola, Africa would probably not have overcome the disaster in the southern part of the continent, with Apartheid South Africa under white minority control, spreading its tentacles to Namibia, Angola and beyond.

Cuban leader Castro had always remained in our mind for his action beating back South African troops in Angola but last week he came forcefully back to our memory after nearly ten years of ill-health.  With the news of the passing of Fidel Castro, known affectionately as the Great “El Commandante.”

My mind went back to many events across Africa since 1971 when I left my home country Ghana to work with African students and youth under the auspices of the United Nations students and youth movements [ISMUN], a Non-Governmental Organization recognized by the United Nations’ Economic and Social Council [ECOSOC]. This period also extended to the second half of my working life, serving as a journalist covering Africa from my base in the United Kingdom.

In this capacity I became involved in events and groups whose activities were influenced by the iconic, larger-than-life figure – Fidel Castro. I am thinking of generations of young Africans of that time since 1972 that are now adults but have, over the years, had their imagination and idealism fired up by no less an enigmatic figure like Fidel Castro, leader of the Cuban revolution  for 50 years.

Among today’s many leaders who participated in our activities and training programs are James Orengo, a former student leader and currently a leading senior Senator in Kenya. There is Sam Kutesa, the current Ugandan foreign minister and past president of the United Nations General Assembly; a fiery student activist from Tanzania known as Chivanga; and Emmanuel Goddard of the Gambia, recently retired from Wall Street. Others are student activists from Sudan, Liberia, Egypt and Morocco.

Ahead of the Extra-ordinary Summit called to recognize which movement was to rule Angola, US President Gerald Ford had dispatched envoys to many African countries including Nigeria, trying to deny recognition to the MPLA, then considered by the West to be communist-inspired.

Senegal’s President Leopold Sedar Senghor, speaking to the Summit, proposed that recognition be extended not to any one particular group but to all three, arguing that today’s fighting groups, guerillas and revolutionaries could be tomorrow’s freedom fighters; and champions of human rights. 

When President Senghor finished speaking, Tanzania’s President Julius Nyerere asked for the floor. He said there was no basis for OAU to grant recognition and legitimacy to leaders of FNLA and UNITA who were receiving the backing of outsiders including South Africa. Furthermore, Nyerere said he did not want President Senghor to confuse the chairman about the issues being discussed, given the manner in which the renowned Senegalese poet addressed the summit using abstract “philosophical terms”.

President Idi Amin, the Summit chairman, felt that Nyerere was hinting at his limited formal education and complained that President Nyerere was insulting him, to which Nyerere replied that he was only asking Senghor not to confuse the issues. Quietly, Dr. Peter Onu explained to Amin that President Nyerere was only referring to the chair and not him [Amin] as a person. Dr. Onu was later to confide in us how he skillfully defused what was a tense situation at the Summit.

General Murtala Mohammed made his memorable “Africa has come of age” speech, placing Nigeria firmly among the progressive countries that recognized the MPLA led by Neto, thereby effectively guaranteeing Nigeria’s place as a frontline state.

While some African leaders dithered, even with South African tanks rolling into Angolan territory, Fidel Castro took a resolute stand. Castro, a longtime supporter of African Liberation Movements with clear anti-imperialist credentials, decided not only to support the MPLA movement to take power in the war-torn country but he actually established a beach-head across the Atlantic Ocean where an armada of planes brought over 36,000 troops of several battalions to fight on the side of the MPLA, eventually defeating South Africa’s ill advised intervention.

Castro long remained an enigmatic figure. Castro had such an iconic personality across Africa that pictures of him and Ghana’s former leader, then Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings, taken when Rawlings visited Havana for the Non-Aligned Summit in 1979 not long after seizing power, appeared to have given a boost to the house-cleansing campaign taking place in Ghana at the time.

 Castro remained a much sought after figure among world leaders whenever he attended international conferences, making fiery speeches. I saw him live at several Non-Aligned Summits including the one held at Belgrade, the capital of the former Yugoslavia, now Serbia.

Fully dressed in his green fatigues, Castro’s speeches always had his listeners cheering at the forcefulness of his delivery and expansive gesticulations. Though speaking in Spanish, which required simultaneous translation, conference participants clearly always preferred to hear Castro’s voice than wait for the translation. Castro holds the record as the individual who made the longest speech ever, running into 4 hours and 29 minutes.

By the death of Fidel Castro at age 90, the world may not see a leader of his stature for a long time. To those of us in Africa, Fidel Castro, the revolutionary par excellence, the “El Commandante” would, for long, remain with us for the sacrifices he made in Angola. 

  Asante is a veteran journalist who for many years served as political editor for leading African magazines published in the United Kingdom. He also covered rebel wars in Liberia and Sierra Leone.