Waka Waka to all our Black Stars

A few days ago, I read the Evening Standard and in the middle there was a heart warming feature about a very kind South African man who decided to return to South Africa to build a house for his black nanny-coincidentally he had two spare tickets going for a World Cup Match, and rather benevolently, he decided to provide this woman- Joyce Mbolo with a ticket. She was ecstatic, but kept it quiet, because many of her friends had wanted and planned to go to a World Cup Match, but could not afford it. The feature was touching in the sense that there was this young white man in South Africa, quietly making reparation so to speak, in the midst of all the noisy frantic celebration. It read like a piece on Holy Communion in the middle of the bacchanalia of carnival. It’s nice to see that there are still some good, grateful people around. In that feature, however, there was a comment which caught my attention and which stayed with me – Joyce when deciding to pick a team to support between France and Mexico, decided to back France purely “because they had black players”.


This led me to think about the way in which I aligned my position in the World Cup. When supporting teams in the World Cup, does race occupy a privileged position? Is it almost like tribe, trumping nationality? With the African teams it is very easy- who could ever forget the goading of Eto’o with peanuts in Spain and Italy ( to imply that he was a black chimp- yes only a couple of years ago) and his brave retort of dancing like a monkey and his defiant fist cuffed in the instantly recognisable symbol of black power? I will root for this man for whatever team he plays for because of his tenacity. I would have cried. The fact that this was the first World Cup on African soil made it all the more right to will an African team to win. So I backed Nigeria, Ghana, Ivory Coast and South Africa with gusto and felt that I was almost duty bound to do so. Algeria was a bit more difficult. Yes, it is on the African continent, but those of us who lived in France could never forget the sense of difference cultivated between us and them- Arab and Black, as different as A &B even though in some ways we were both patients, suffering the same disease. Still, Africa is Africa. They get a pass.

On the home front, I found that while I support England wholeheartedly (except when commentators mention 1966) I am especially proud when I see Ashley Cole defending, Emile Heskey deflecting, Jermaine Defoe scoring, Shaun Wright-Philips tackling, and David James saving the team from defeat. The Rob Green scuffle? I was gutted for him but just glad it wasn’t a black man who was the fall guy (for once!). Why shouldn’t I be? It was not even 50 years ago that Jack Leslie, a black man, was selected to play for England but was not afforded the opportunity to get on the pitch because of the colour of his skin. It was only in 2005 that Ivoirian Marc Zoro was reduced to tears on the pitch, and as an act of protest, took the ball and threatened to leave the field because of racist taunts from Inter Milan. Bravely, he was convinced to finish the game, but explained later that he had been playing for Italy for three years and that he encountered such daily. It was also only in 2004 that Ashley Cole and Shaun Wright Phillips were taunted with racist insults- the Spanish FA was fined £44,000- peanuts. I have read about the abuse that Paul Canonville faced as the first black player to play for Chelsea from his own fans shouting “we don’t want the nigger” and the bananas landing at his feet-I have no doubt that the almost holy black allegiance to teams like Arsenal and Tottenham stems back to this. Paul explains that this went on for more than two and a half years and even when he scored his own fans shouted “it’s still 0-0 the nigger scored, it doesn’t count”. Notably, his career ended when he got into a pre-season fight with a teammate who called him “a black cock”. He was transferred to Reading.

For all other teams, I am afraid that I do feel the same way as Joyce. Indeed we have come a long way- for example in England, Paul Ince was the first black captain of the England team in 1983 and this weekend we just saw Ashley Cole become the most capped black player for England (80 caps). However, whenever I do not have any particular allegiance to a team, it is true that I support the team which has the most black players. I am sure that there are worse reasons. In fact, I could not think of a better criterion. There are a few genuine multiculturalists who love to say that we now live in a post racial society but they need only have a quick look at the Daily Mail’s vitriol against Germany’s “foreign team” who despite being born in Germany are labelled not true Germans. Also, France’s exit out of the World Cup which was largely blamed on Anelka led to a blanket statement of condemnation from senior ministers of the “scum who grew up on council estates in the banlieue”; he could not have been speaking about any other players other than the players from poor and yes, black, backgrounds who inhabit the cites at the edge of Paris- the same “scum” mind you who brought them to victory no less than a few years ago. In the Caribbean, we have has always appeared unwavering in its support of Brazil- this possibly stemmed from the rise of Pele and his ascendancy as a top player of African hue taking his place not among the best, but as the best. However, whilst I have tremendous respect for the Brazilian side, I must say that their almost caste-like reliance on colour for social ascendancy does not sit very well with me, so my support is grudging.

This is why I shared an almost universal pride for Ghana when it trounced the United States of America yesterday. This one was for Africa, for us. And it was particularly telling that it was the proverbial Black Stars who achieved this- based on the Marcus Garveyite Black Star on the Ghanaian flag- symbol of post colonial liberty. When I visited Ghana I was so impressed by the resilience and warmth of its people, I am not surprised that it is the team charging the way forward. Trite as it might seem, it is really a symbol of what the developing world can do, on near equal footing. Were the game not so passionate, I would say it was probably part of the political machinery to ensure that at least one African team was left standing, and that one African country would charge forward as a beacon pilot project for illustrating the benefits of democracy. Jerome Boateng, who is half German and half Ghanaian, and who opted to play for Germany whilst his half brother Kevin-Prince Boateng played for Ghana must be bereft. I read that the players gathered in the hotel to drum the djembe and sing African battle songs. Our stars are indeed ascending.

Nollywood Dreams

As I write, I am watching a Nigerian film “My Wicked Uncle”. Like any melodrama worthy of its name, it features death, jealousy and cunning. In it, a man dies and his younger brother decides on an ingenious way to inherit his wealth: to sow the seeds of discord between his children and his wife. There is a beautiful introduction, a  jaw biting climax and a  successful denouement.  Such a plot would not be out of place in Hamlet. The same goes for Games Women Play which I watched an hour before- it is a solid tale of treachery, betrayal and the use of feminine wiles that likens itself to a Greek tragedy.

My experience belies the fact that it is tempting when thinking of Nigerian movies to only think about the end product- the mass produced DVDs which hold over 7 “movies” each, usually bought from a street seller on the corners of Harlem, Peckham and Accra. In fact, this is the image held by most of the snobbish bigwigs from the West, who held the Fespaco African film festival in 2007 and did not invite a single Nigerian film maker. They believed Nollywood to be the poor languishing relative in the corner, but in fact, truth was that Nollywood was unable to fit within its self imposed brackets of pseudo-intellectualism.

Truth is Nollywood is big. $236 million dollar big. The second largest film industry in the world big. Nollywood now produces more films than Hollywood, and is second only to Bollywood in terms of numbers of films produced annually. This is no easy feat for a cinematographic industry that began less than ten years ago, moreover for an industry in which actors and actresses often have very limited professional training, shoot from no fixed location, where filming equipment is minimal at best, where there is only one professional film studio and where minimal government support and investment exist. Nollywood manages to churn out hundreds of titles a year (over 800 to be precise) that manage to knock Hollywood blockbusters off the shelves in Africa, the Caribbean and in the greater black Diaspora.

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A Nollywood film shop

It is a modern day example of what Africa can achieve were it given the chance. Today, Nollywood (whose films are not commercially distributed) is responsible for a wave of entrepreneurship in Africa- the film industry employs over 300,000. Hundreds of thousands of men and women sell and resell popular titles in a vast distributorship network. Thousands of African men and women now have jobs as script writers, photographers and many more rent films and are involved in the sale and export of titles. All over the Caribbean and Western, South and Eastern Africa (I do not use the term sub Saharan Africa because I think the use of "sub" reinforces stereotypes) , women and men gather to be entertained by films such as Keeping Faith and Engagement Night. Although the stories are set in Africa, I am often am amazed at the universality of the themes and lessons- the role of the extended family, the triumph of morality over money and vanity, religion as a panacea. However, this is ultimately for-Africa-by Africa, a decidedly home-grown product, and the market is ripe.

Someone I know really grated on me by poking fun at these movies, emphasising that the standard was subpar and hinting that the people who watched them and enjoyed them somehow had questionable tastes. For someone like me, however, who savoured the early books of Samuel Selvon and Earl Lovelace and VS Naipaul primarily because the characters ultimately reflected my experiences, the reality is certainly different. I can only imagine the delight and the comfort that the African community feel when their own storytellers tell their own stories. For every Blood Diamond and Last King of Scotland, told from the voice of an outsider, there are now hundreds of DVDs recording everyday urban life in Africa- the supernatural, the romance, polygamy, economic struggles, rivalry- all told without pretensions and presenting a gritty unpolished truth. The painting may be crude, the hand may be shaky, they may sometimes shade outside the lines, but as a picture of the potential for business in Africa, it makes an indelible mark and is truly inspirational. These films mark a definite break in the over intellectualised didactic Francophone film making that often attempt to present Africa as a study and a sense of other. Africa has never been pretentiously serious. By letting the story triumph over the form, Nollywood appeals to us and unapologetically (and rightfully) so.

It is true that at times, the acting gives rise to pantomime howlers and the technical, sound and lighting skills are markedly amateur. However, even Hollywood, with its hundreds of years of cinematographic history behind it produces a vast number of shoestring films with amateur technology, bland chick flicks and action movies with predictable story lines based on its own popular culture (Kill Bill, Iron Man). Why is it then that when African cultural exploits take centre stage, they are immediately seized on and interpreted as being sub standard? A Nigerian government minister recently complained that there was a penchant to focus on voodoo, crime and advance fee fraud, and that this has harmed the image of Nigeria. Why do our own people indulge in perpetuating an inferiority complex- these films simply mirror some aspects of Nigerian life- a few even elevate to the level of social and anthropological criticism. Class conflicts, racialisation, tribalism and the struggle of immigrants in the West are all attacked with clarity and humorous insight- surely this should be encouraged.

I found it heartening that in a report commissioned by the World Bank and produced by economists Ismail Radwan and Pierre Strauss, I was able to see that the Nigerian economy is not driven by oil (18%), as is commonly perceived- but by industry, agriculture and the service sector. Creative industries lie at that crucial intersection between business, technology and the arts and are recommended as a key area in developing exports, creating jobs and driving the economies of developing countries.

The quality of Nollywood films would definitely improve if there was some investment in film making, training and production and if the legal framework could be ameliorated to protect the intellectual property rights of film makers. The fact that the African film industry has been underinvested is chicken and egg with the lack of availability and high quality.

Nollywood films not only serve as inspiration to other film makers from the continent and beyond as a mere business initiative, but are also an example and a reminder to us that we are the ones who should be telling our stories. Why should Joanna Lumley be taking us on a trip down the Nile? Why are BBC news readers and commentators explaining South Africa to us? Nollywood shows us that our stories are important, and the identity of the author is pivotal- only then perhaps we would see Africa and our cultural identities as they really are, and not as what others with preconceived notions expect them to be.