Secret taping- “We must keep Africa down” caught on tape

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Gloria Emeagwali

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Jun 16, 2022, 12:09:07 PM6/16/22
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Does anyone recognize the speaker?
Please share the information.
VIDEO-2022-06-14-17-15-01.mp4

Uyilawa Usuanlele

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Jun 16, 2022, 2:34:08 PM6/16/22
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Dear Prof.,
                  I dont think it is a secret recording. It seems to be a part of a series of lectures or seminar in which some Africans participated. I watched it in 2021 and even drew my students' attention to it. It has been all over youtube and whatsapp.
Uyi
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Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Secret taping- “We must keep Africa down” caught on tape
 


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Femi Kolapo

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Jun 16, 2022, 2:34:38 PM6/16/22
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A Whatsapp group sent this clip to me over a year ago. I find the clip suspicious and probably taken out of context. Its truncation points are too convenient and rather dubious. One needs the totality of the speech to be able to pin any offense on him. 

it might as well be a sarcastic, dramatic, re-presentation of what the man perceived the global capitalist system was doing to Africa – probably a rebuke. 

digital information can be so easily diced up and joined up to misrepresent people and cause them harm. The guy might be lucky he had no name tag on. 



Femi J. Kolapo  | Department of History | www.uoguelph.ca/history   

  IMPROVE LIFE 

________  

A thought for the month:

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                "I am wise not because I know but because I know I don't know" - variant of a saying attributed to Socrates.

 


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Gloria Emeagwali

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Jun 16, 2022, 2:39:01 PM6/16/22
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Uyi
Do you know the name of the speaker?

Why would he say this with African students in the audience? Was he 
aware of their presence and just didn’t care?Do you know the name of the conference?

Thanks

GE

Cornelius Hamelberg

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Jun 16, 2022, 3:44:11 PM6/16/22
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What would Walter Rodney say about this? 

In this excerpt either Howard Nicholas, ostensibly a sympathiser and friend of Africa is being satirical,  telling it as it is, the way the exploiters see it. He does not strike me as being the devil incarnate or as in any way recommending the neo-colonial trade policies whereby the WEst will maintain its higher standard of living at the expense of Africa  South of the Sahara.

Uyilawa Usuanlele

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Jun 16, 2022, 9:40:26 PM6/16/22
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He is Prof. Howard Nicholas, of Erasmus University, Rotterdam, Netherlands
Uyi
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Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Secret taping- “We must keep Africa down” caught on tape
 

Emeagwali, Gloria (History)

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Jun 17, 2022, 9:55:16 AM6/17/22
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Good to know.  Thanks.


Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History/African Studies, CCSU
africahistory.net; vimeo.com/ gloriaemeagwali
Recipient of the 2014 Distinguished Research
Excellence Award, Univ. of Texas at Austin;
2019 Distinguished Africanist Award
New York African Studies Association
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Sent: Thursday, June 16, 2022 9:39 PM

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Victor Okafor

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Jun 17, 2022, 11:54:46 AM6/17/22
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Comrades:

When I was in graduate school, one of my professors was fond of saying to us, his students, that "what surprises me is that people are still surprised after a thousand years of being surprised." So, who on this forum is surprised about a historical truth (as reflected in the so-called secretly-recorded “We must keep Africa down” verbal affirmation) of the fundamentally-mercantilist agenda and purpose of the Western world’s engagement with Africa, historically and contemporaneously? Anyone on this forum who is surprised by the video recorded reaffirmation of this historical strategic and underlying principle of the Western world's engagement with Africa is not only out of touch with a well-established, well-documented, a zillion-times analyzed ideological and practical truth of earthly geopolitical and geo-economic human relations, but must have also been living in intellectual outer space all this while. And, I dare submit, with all due humility, that such a person should have no business with the enterprise called African Studies.


On Thu, Jun 16, 2022 at 12:09 PM Gloria Emeagwali <gloria.e...@gmail.com> wrote:


Does anyone recognize the speaker?
Please share the information.

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Sincerely,

Victor O. Okafor, Ph.D.
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Eastern Michigan University


Dr. Oohay

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Jun 17, 2022, 11:54:54 AM6/17/22
to usaafric...@googlegroups.com, Uyilawa Usuanlele
What about first identifying the thematic contexts of the (particular) part in question and also of the series itself?

Emeagwali, Gloria (History)

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Jun 17, 2022, 3:20:37 PM6/17/22
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Prof Okafor,

No one on this forum was surprised
at the content, or disclosure about
Western intentions for Africa. Catching 
the person on tape was the surprise. I 
wanted to know whether it was a 
Tony Blair type personality or some  
IMF or World Bank official caught on 
tape.These are the masters of double
 speak and denialism and  we should 
grasp every opportunity to document 
their accidental confessions.
Documentation is key for African
Studies.When I started my series 
of video interviews in 2012, or 
thereabouts, that is what I had in
mind, although my series focused
on the good guys not the “evil”doers-
but it would have been great to catch
one of those policy makers on tape.


Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History/African Studies, CCSU
africahistory.net; vimeo.com/ gloriaemeagwali
Recipient of the 2014 Distinguished Research
Excellence Award, Univ. of Texas at Austin;
2019 Distinguished Africanist Award
New York African Studies Association

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Sent: Friday, June 17, 2022 10:59 AM

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Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Secret taping- “We must keep Africa down” caught on tape

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Comrades:

Victor Okafor

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Jun 17, 2022, 6:06:48 PM6/17/22
to Emeagwali, Gloria (History), usaafric...@googlegroups.com
Greetings Professor Emeagwali. Please, know that I applaud you for sharing the video clip with us. That was indeed an exercise in creative courage. And, I whole-heartedly agree with you that "we should grasp every opportunity to document their accidental confessions." I never meant to imply that the material should have been ignored. I also want to point out that so far, I have not read any reaction to it which would suggest that any of us on this forum was surprised by the essence of the verbalized ideology of hegemony, exploitation and control. 

Chidi Anthony Opara, FIIM

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Jun 18, 2022, 8:42:48 AM6/18/22
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When I saw the video, I knew immediately that it would be one of those "distorted information" making the rounds on some information circuits.

The funny part is that someone apparently speaking to an audience in the open was being "secretly recorded".

The surprise part is that such viewpoint was being expressed to an audience in the open.

It is a fact that a section of the western opinion leadership harbour such sentiment about Africa, but it is something that is usually discussed in the innermost sanctum of policy formulation, not at conferences.

-Chidi Anthony Opara (CAO)

Sent: Friday, June 17, 2022 10:59 AM

Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Secret taping- “We must keep Africa down” caught on tape

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Comrades:

When I was in graduate school, one of my professors was fond of saying to us, his students, that "what surprises me is that people are still surprised after a thousand years of being surprised." So, who on this forum is surprised about a historical truth (as reflected in the so-called secretly-recorded “We must keep Africa down” verbal affirmation) of the fundamentally-mercantilist agenda and purpose of the Western world’s engagement with Africa, historically and contemporaneously? Anyone on this forum who is surprised by the video recorded reaffirmation of this historical strategic and underlying principle of the Western world's engagement with Africa is not only out of touch with a well-established, well-documented, a zillion-times analyzed ideological and practical truth of earthly geopolitical and geo-economic human relations, but must have also been living in intellectual outer space all this while. And, I dare submit, with all due humility, that such a person should have no business with the enterprise called African Studies.


On Thu, Jun 16, 2022 at 12:09 PM Gloria Emeagwali <gloria.e...@gmail.com> wrote:


Does anyone recognize the speaker?
Please share the information.

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Sincerely,

Victor O. Okafor, Ph.D.
Professor and Head
Department of Africology and African American Studies
Eastern Michigan University


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Emeagwali, Gloria (History)

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Jun 18, 2022, 9:41:42 AM6/18/22
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Good points. Now we know that
the talk was given   in front 
of a big audience,  and not to a select 
few.  It could certainly be secretly recorded
either way. Some large audiences
are asked not to tape proceedings.



Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History/African Studies, CCSU
africahistory.net; vimeo.com/ gloriaemeagwali
Recipient of the 2014 Distinguished Research
Excellence Award, Univ. of Texas at Austin;
2019 Distinguished Africanist Award
New York African Studies Association

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Moses Ebe Ochonu

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Jun 18, 2022, 9:59:47 AM6/18/22
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I thought the speaker was describing and critiquing the unequal and exploitative capitalist system that keeps and has kept Africa down in order for the West to access cheap African labor and raw materials. How did we get to the point of reading the tape as some sort of secret or secretly recorded confession?This was clearly a public lecture. Am I missing something? 

It's pretty clear to me that the speaker is rehashing a familiar world system, underdevelopment theory, neo-Marxian, and core-periphery analysis of how the industrialized Western "core" needs and structures an impoverished African "periphery" as a zone of labor and raw material extraction, a historical fact about how the exploitation of Africa has fueled the prosperity of Euro-America that Samir Amin, Walter Rodney, Saul Arigghi, Joseph Inikori, Eric WIlliams, and many others have enunciated in multiple publications. Why is this being discussed as a revelation or secret confession by the white man? 


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Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Secret taping- “We must keep Africa down” caught on tape

EXTERNAL EMAIL: This email originated from outside of the organization. Do not click any links or open any attachments unless you trust the sender and know the content is safe.

Comrades:

When I was in graduate school, one of my professors was fond of saying to us, his students, that "what surprises me is that people are still surprised after a thousand years of being surprised." So, who on this forum is surprised about a historical truth (as reflected in the so-called secretly-recorded “We must keep Africa down” verbal affirmation) of the fundamentally-mercantilist agenda and purpose of the Western world’s engagement with Africa, historically and contemporaneously? Anyone on this forum who is surprised by the video recorded reaffirmation of this historical strategic and underlying principle of the Western world's engagement with Africa is not only out of touch with a well-established, well-documented, a zillion-times analyzed ideological and practical truth of earthly geopolitical and geo-economic human relations, but must have also been living in intellectual outer space all this while. And, I dare submit, with all due humility, that such a person should have no business with the enterprise called African Studies.

On Thu, Jun 16, 2022 at 12:09 PM Gloria Emeagwali <gloria.e...@gmail.com> wrote:


Does anyone recognize the speaker?
Please share the information.

--
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Sincerely,

Victor O. Okafor, Ph.D.
Professor and Head
Department of Africology and African American Studies
Eastern Michigan University


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Emeagwali, Gloria (History)

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Jun 18, 2022, 10:11:34 AM6/18/22
to Moses Ebe Ochonu, USAAfricaDialogue
 This is exactly how it was promoted  and 
received from the previous 
source- namely, as a “secret “ recording.
Apparently it has been around
 for some time. Now we know that there is an
Amsterdam connection and that it was
presented at a conference.


Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History/African Studies, CCSU
africahistory.net; vimeo.com/ gloriaemeagwali
Recipient of the 2014 Distinguished Research
Excellence Award, Univ. of Texas at Austin;
2019 Distinguished Africanist Award
New York African Studies Association

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Okey Iheduru

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Jun 18, 2022, 11:52:20 AM6/18/22
to USAAfrica Dialogue
Moses:
I'm with you here. It's truly baffling that a video clip that has been around for over five years is suddenly the subject of this animated waste of time and energy. I've used the satirical clip several times in my classes when covering structuralist (Marxist, neo-Marxist, Dependency and World-System) theories--just to let students (in a 100% white students classroom) "hear it from the white man." There's nothing "secret" about it. There are plenty such "uncomfortable" videos on YouTube for anyone who cares to view and possibly use them for their purposes.

Okey

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Okey C. Iheduru


Emeagwali, Gloria (History)

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Jun 18, 2022, 3:51:56 PM6/18/22
to Okey Iheduru, USAAfrica Dialogue
To tell the truth, I heard it for the first time
last week.Too bad.
But I wanted to know who said it
and when,  and the context.

I  appreciate those who
provided the info. Thank you.


Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History/African Studies, CCSU
africahistory.net; vimeo.com/ gloriaemeagwali
Recipient of the 2014 Distinguished Research
Excellence Award, Univ. of Texas at Austin;
2019 Distinguished Africanist Award
New York African Studies Association
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