3 février 57aH (2003)
In light of the recent tragic events occurring in Cote d’Ivoire, Ivorians have to understand that the old colonial power intends to continue to impose its law on the African population.
It is time for the populations of this wonderful continent to definitively rid themselves of the remnants of colonialism, cut the umbilical cord and stand proudly against the foreign dictators.
As Mao Tse Tung said, a revolution must first be cultural. African governments in general and Cote d’Ivoire in particular must decide to change their official language. There is no good reason for the language of the colonizers, who continue to impose their laws, to remain the official language. The government of Cote d’Ivoire must remove French from official use and replace it with the global language: English. French may be spoken by 120 million people in the world, but English is spoken by nearly 2 billion people, including those in the most powerful countries. This doesn’t stop the Ivorians from officially using important ethnic languages, either. But French must disappear. Of course it will remain in use for a transitional period, but if the schools impose it, English will quickly replace the language of the colonizers and ex-slave traders.Finally for economic readjustment, the government of Cote d’Ivoire must nationalize without paying damages all the belongings of French companies and individuals. Not only does Cote d’Ivoire not have to pay damages, but it is France that still owes them an enormous debt, because the value of the resources and prime materials that were stolen during colonization has by now greatly surpassed the value of the belongings actually seized. At the same time the government of Cote d’Ivoire must never reimburse the debts owed France, for the same reasons. If we then add the value of everything else stolen throughout the history of Cote d’Ivoire, we would realize that it is France who owes an enormous debt to the Ivorian people.
True decolonization is yet to occur, the proof, is that France sends its troops to impose its will at the first excuse. African immigrants have long enough been victims of French exploitation and heard too often “France for the French”… it is time for them to answer “Africa for Africans”!
Robert Mugabe, the courageous African leader, recently showed the path. African states have to unite in a federation called the United States of Africa that will know how to put the old colonial powers back in their place when they interfere in African affairs, those old colonial powers that conserve still today their paternalistic attitudes and insulting superiority complexes.
Viva, a free Cote d’Ivoire!