On May 25, 2021, at 2:00 am ET (US and Canada; 9:00 am Kenya) the Africa Faith and Justice Network premiered a video sponsored by the Coalition for Africa’s Liberation and Restoration in honor of the 1-Year Anniversary of CALAR’s “A Declaration: Africa Remember Who You Are.” CALAR also issued a statement (below).
CALAR’s Call for Action on Africa’s Liberation Day
25th May 2021
The CALAR is calling: Arise, children of Africa! Stay awake; for a new day is dawning for you! Africa is experiencing great movements of hope, liberation, and restoration within and among the diaspora communities.
African youths are outperforming in global intellectual competitions and inventions. African professionals are coming up with ground-breaking discoveries in medicine, engineering, science, and technology; and the world is increasingly recognizing and utilizing the unique talents of African women and men in its diverse endeavours.
Some African leaders are realising the need to look inwards and harness the abundant human and material resources with which God has generously endowed Mama Africa for the growth and development of their countries. They are realising that corruption at any level is an inner worm that eats away, weakens, and destroys all efforts at development; and so, must be eradicated.
In the Diaspora, many individuals and organisations are increasingly recognizing that they have an indispensable role to play in the liberation and restoration of their beloved continent. Some have returned to the homeland to set up businesses and help raise up and build their beloved continent.
Within the continent, many youth movements, such as #EndSars, have registered their dissatisfaction with the status quo and their eagerness to put an end to over five hundred years of concerted efforts to denigrate Africans and the continent itself in a variety of ways. Others, realising that a divided Africa is detrimental to Africa’s development, are advocating for an Africa without borders, common passport, and common currency. Despite the unrelenting counter forces, this movement of hope and unity is growing and waxing strong.
These happenings are all clear signs that God is visibly doing a new deed in Africa.
Sadly, these accomplishments, innovations, and liberating movements are undermined by increased ethnic and political infighting and outright war in the continent. A close observation shows that these conflicts exist mostly in countries with enormous material resources. How these conflicts arise and the way they are linked and sustained, convince us that there is a link between them and material resources. In truth, most if not all of the multidimensional conflicts and outright wars going on in Africa are fueled by outsiders who are interested, not in the good of Africans, but in their enormous material resources.
As long as we Africans continue to allow ourselves to be used as self-destructive agents by these exploiters, Africa’s resources will continue to be depleted; Africans divided and weakened, and thus lack the combined energy and will needed to mine and utilize our wealthy resources for our own good. A divided and weakened Africa provides fertile ground and open door for manipulators and exploiters to mine and cart away the wealth of the continent, including its
unique human resources, to enrich their own countries.
We call on all Africans to lay down arms, largely imported and team up together to defeat these blatant exploitations. Let us refuse to be used against our brothers and sisters; refuse to continue to be divided along political, linguistic, ethnic, regional, and religious lines; and to return to our traditional African ways of settling disputes in the spirit of Ubuntu, where all are gainers, and none are losers.
In this pandemic era, many initiatives have been made by Africans to find a cure for COVID 19. Unfortunately, African leaders have failed to invest in research to develop a remedy. Yet many Diaspora Africans have contributed to developing the remedy that African leaders are ever so eager to spend their countries’ resources to acquire. We call on African leaders to first look inwards for solutions, to fund research for this pandemic and other medical issues peculiar to the continent.
It is our firm belief that the youth of Africa, who are among the most vibrant and innovative in the world, have a unique and indispensable role to play in the liberation and restoration of Africa. We urge all Africans to do whatever it takes to empower them and facilitate their initiatives in shaping a better future for themselves and generations to come. We urge the youths themselves to remain firm and focused in life, and refusing to be bought over, to act always with integrity.
To this end, like the traditional town crier, we cry in unison:
- Africans arise! Take up your lives and live! Lift up your continent and embrace it! Appropriate and celebrate the wealth in abundance that God has given to you for your total liberation and restoration.
- Long live liberated Mama Africa in service firstly to her own children, then to the world!
CALAR 2021 statement in pdf here.
Don’t forget to sign the Declaration and Pray for Liberation and Restoration.