This year's Distinguished Nyerere Lecturer will be Prof. Samir Amin who will deliver a lecture on Crisis of Capitalism and Imperialism & Exiting from Capitalism in Crisis: Initiatives in the Global South. The Guest of Honor will be the Hon. Samia Nkrumah, parliamentarian from Ghana and daughter of Kwame Nkrumah. She will deliver opening remarks titled Reflections on Osagefyo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah's Pan-African Vision.
Dr. Nkrumah, Ghana's founding prime minister, and Tanzania's founding leader, Mwalimu Nyerere, had a few things in common. In African Socialism Revisited, Nkrumah wrote:
Any meaningful humanism must begin from egalitarianism and must lead to objectively chosen policies for safeguarding and sustaining egalitarianism. Hence socialism.In a speech delivered in Ottawa Canada in 1998 Mwalimu Nyerere said:
The Arusha Declaration...together with our national language, Kiswahili, and a highly politicized and disciplined National Army, transformed what had been a motley of more than 126 tribes into a cohesive nation. That achievement goes a long way to explain the political stability which my country still enjoys today. That stability comes under ever-increasing strain as inequalities of wealth and power within the country get greater and as our economic woes persist.Both were fervent proponents of Pan-Africanism and the unification of the African nations, only differing in how they felt the objective should be reached. Dr. Nkrumah said African countries that had become independent should immediately form a single African government and army. Mwalimu Nyerere said it was best to come together in smaller groups of countries as an intermediary step towards a united Africa.
Those opposing views were not only advocated publicly by the two but, according to Mwalimu Nyerere, continued for many years through private correspondence between him and Nkrumah.
On the 50th anniversary of Ghana's independence, in a speech he delivered in Accra, Mwalimu Nyerere appeared to support Dr. Nkrumah's position. Mwalimu said:
...too many of us had a vested interest of keeping Africa divided....Once you multiply national anthems, national flags and national passports, seats of the United Nations, and individuals entitled to a 21-gun salute, not to speak of a host of ministers and envoys, you would have a whole army of powerful people with vested interests in keeping Africa divided.Posts related to this one:
http://madarakanyerere.blogspot.com/2010/04/nkrumah-lives.html
http://madarakanyerere.blogspot.com/2011/09/my-version-of-year-2010-in-review-may.html
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