141 YEARS OF CONVENING THE BERLIN CONFERENCE [15th November 1885]

141 YEARS OF CONVENING THE BERLIN CONFERENCE [15th November 1885]

As Europeans began to discover the vast resources in Africa, their interest moved from slaves to the lands in Africa.

To avoid conflict among them, the German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck [see picture under the post] convened the Berlin Conference in Berlin, Germany.

The aim was simply to partition the continent according to the natural resources available and to regulate among them who takes what.

14 countries attended the Berlin Conference.

13 of these were from Europe, namely, Austria-Hungary, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, the Ottoman Empire, Portugal, Russia, Spain, Sweden-Norway, and the United Kingdom.

The only non-European country to attend was the United States.

Of the fourteen countries being represented, seven of them – Austria-Hungary, Russia, Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden-Norway, the Ottoman Empire and the United States – came home without any formal possession of any colony in Africa.

The conference began exactly 141 years ago, on the 15th of November 1884. It ended on 26th February 1885.

After 141 years, the evil map that is responsible for many conflicts, wars, divisions, hatred, poor political leadership, joblessness, infrastructural decay and general backwardness in our continent is still intact.

This is the reason Oyibo still control us. This is the reason they still determine who rules us and how we mine our minerals. This is the reason they don’t respect us.

With that map Africa was caged.

Britain fought on the side of Nigeria during the Nigerian-Biāfran war just because the restructuring of the Nigerian map will automatically mean the end of their control in the region.

Today an average African sees self-determination or redrawing of the criminal map as a crime.

We can redraw this map without a fight. Yes, because those who put us in this cage called map of Africa did it without a fight.

One day we shall come together and redraw that map, not according to resources or according to divide-and-rule politics, but according to compatibility. That is when we shall be free.