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In preparing my presentation for you today, I was deeply influenced by two very important documents that arrived last week in the inbox of my e-mail. The first was the text of the new social encyclical of Pope Benedict XVI, Charity in Truth (Caritas in Veritate). The fifty or so pages of this document are filled with so much hope in relating to the larger issues of development that I thought it surely must shape the direction of my presentation. The second is the speech that USA President Barack Obama delivered in Accra, Ghana, on 11 July, just two weeks ago. Again, a text of such hopeful challenges from a world leader of African descent, offering me insights to form the tone of my presentation.

The emphasis of both Benedict and Obama obviously relate so very centrally to the title of this Seventh Congress of the World Union of Jesuit Alumni/ae, “Witnesses to Hope.” And such a title happily suggested to me to entitle my presentation this morning, “Africa: Our Potentials Outweigh Our Problems.” It is a phrase that my colleagues and I at the Jesuit Centre for Theological Reflection in Lusaka often use in describing the current situation, not only in Zambia but also throughout the whole of the wonderfully-varied continent of Africa. And it is a phrase deeply hopeful!

BENEDICT AND OBAMA

I believe that the Pope’s recent encyclical letter makes it quite clear that hope for development – in Africa or in any other place on our globe – is based on the foundation of the human person. Development that recognises the dignity of the human person in community, with rights and duties that lead to social justice, with respect for ecological integrity. We in Africa can readily relate to Benedict’s strong sentiment that:

It is the primordial truth of God’s love, grace bestowed upon us, that opens our lives to gift and makes it possible to hope for a “development of the whole person and of all persons”, to hope for progress “from less human conditions to those which are more human”, obtained by overcoming the difficulties that are inevitably encountered along the way. (#8) (Quotations are from Paul VI, Progress of Peoples, 1967)

In a similar vein, Barrack Obama called for Africans to face the reality of the opportunity of the moment, an opportunity for change and for justice, an opportunity that “must come from the decisions that you make, the things that you do, and the hope that you hold in your hearts.”

I believe that this theme of hope, so strikingly presented by these recent reflections of a Pope and a President, will surely be emphasised again when we listen in a few days to our Father General, Adolfo Nicolas. I say that because of his response to an interview shortly after he returned from his first visit to Africa, just two months ago. Asked what were his first impressions of Africa, he stated so clearly:

An overwhelming impression of very vital, very intelligent, very energetic, very kind, very joyful people… that do not receive the care and attention that they deserve. And that they are people who can still dream and hope for a better future. It has been a refreshing visit in many human and religious senses. I came back with much hope.

And so I would like to emphasise at the start that it is indeed a spirit of hope that enables the potentials of Africa to outweigh the problems. Problems there are, yes – economic, political, military, social, ecological, cultural, etc. – and there can be, must be, no denying of that! But potentials there also are – yes, human resources of women and men who are children of God, with talents and abilities often latent but when unleashed of tremendous intellectual, emotional, physical, spiritual strengths; natural resources of land, fields and forests, animals, minerals, beauty. And there can be, must be, no denying of that! Indeed, that is what we are witnesses of, as witnesses to hope.

There are those who would posit that the fact that the many potentials have not in fact been actually realised, not effectively utilised, to overcome these many problems is itself a sign of the inherent backwardness of the Continent. I deny that position on historical, anthropological and theological grounds – but my denial would take yet another major presentation to even begin to probe that controversial topic! For now, let me introduce another line of argument about the hopeful future of Africa, a line closely related to something very relevant to Jesuit education and hence relevant to you, the Alumni/ae of our Jesuit institutions.

JESUIT PRIORITY

This is the argument arising from the clear commitment of the Society of Jesus to making Africa a “priority.” Such a commitment, as many of you may know, was made by the Jesuit General Congregation 34, meeting in 1995. “Jesuits in Africa,” it stated, “are engaged in the challenge of building up a young and vibrant African Church, rooted in the richness of different cultures, creating new bonds of solidarity among their peoples, and struggling to overcome the global forces that tend to marginalise the whole continent” (CG 34, 17). Further on in the decrees (CG 34, 61), the Congregation speaks about Africa as an “ocean of misfortunes,” misfortunes that are at once the cause and consequence of this marginalisation, and it “asks the universal Society to do whatever it can to change international attitudes and behaviour toward Africa” (CG 34, 61).

Father General Peter-Hans Kolvenbach, S.J., re-enforced this commitment by listing Africa as one of the five areas of apostolic preference for us Jesuits. And in the General Congregation 35, meeting in early 2008, stated very clearly the meaning of this priority:

Aware of the cultural, social, and economic differences in Africa and Madagascar, but also conscious of the great opportunities, challenges and variety of Jesuit ministries, we acknowledge the Society’s responsibilities to present a more integral and human vision of this continent. In addition, all Jesuits are invited to greater solidarity with and effective support of the Society’s mission of inculturating faith and promoting more justice in this continent. (#39 (i))

Of course, to speak of Africa’s being a “priority for Jesuits” requires a bit of historical perspective. Jesuits first arrived in Africa in 1547 – indeed, Francis Xavier touched the shore of what is now Mozambique on his way to the Indies and Asia. But most of our work in Africa has developed there within the last 100 years. In 1971, our former Father General Superior, Pedro Arrupe, created the African Assistancy, the regional arrangement to encourage collaboration among Jesuits working in the sectors of education, pastoral, spiritual, social, etc. Today there are close to 1500 Jesuits in Africa, the growing majority of who are Africans, studying and working in West Africa, Central Africa, Eastern Africa, Southern Africa, and Madagascar. We are all experiencing some of the creativity and vibrancy of African Jesuits here these days in Burundi!

But what does it mean to speak of a priority that we Jesuits internationally must take in relating to Africa – that you, from so many Jesuit institutions from so many different parts of the world, might also be expected to take? I believe we have to be clear, in the words spoken in Accra two weeks ago by President Obama: “We must start from the simple premise that Africa’s future is up to Africans.” But I would add to Obama’s words that Africa’s future is within the context of a global future. And that is where priorities, options, are so important.

I want to suggest three dimensions of a priority for Africa, a priority which Africans must take but in particular which non-Africans must take. And I believe, I hope, you can see with me what relevance this has for a group of Alumni/ae from our Jesuit institutions across the world such as are represented here.

For me, priority means giving first place (1) to clear understanding, (2) to committed respect, and (3) to efficient response. Let me repeat that: priority means giving first place to clear understanding, to committed respect, and to efficient response. Priority is cognitive (intellectual), affective (emotional) and effective (operational). It has to do with what we do with our heads, our hearts and our hands,

Let me unpack each of these elements, referring at times to experiences and analyses I am familiar with from my life and work in Zambia and wider in Africa for over the past two decades.

PRIORITY OF UNDERSTANDING

First, there is need for a priority of understanding, an intellectual grasp of what actually is occurring in Africa today and why it is occurring.

Let me highlight a point we sometimes are reluctant to raise or are all-too-ready to soften: the historical impact of Europe and America upon Africa’s development or mal-development. Without being overly-simplistic, I believe we need to understand that slavery, colonialism and neo-colonialism have had immense consequences on the present situation of Africa and on its great potentials to move into the future in a truly human fashion. We need to understand that in a truthful and intellectual fashion. Truly, these historical factors do not explain everything, but you cannot explain anything unless you honestly take them into the framework of your understanding. I repeat, these historical factors do not explain everything, but you cannot explain anything unless you honestly take them into the framework of your understanding.

One factor is certainly the trauma of slavery, caused originally from the European side and from the Arab side, and then compounded from the American side. This was when millions of the best and the brightest, the strongest and the healthiest of Africans were savagely exported from the African continent to be used simply as input into the development of other peoples on other continents. It was a traumatic physical setback but perhaps even more severely a traumatic psychological setback that inflicted a racist definition of chattel (or beast of burden, instrument of production) upon the black human person.

The second factor is colonialism which imposed a model of development on the continent that primarily benefited outsiders, not Africans. Initially, human resources were taken out of Africa through the institution of slavery, but then this was followed by the taking of natural resources – minerals, timber, agriculture, etc. Yes, Africans may have benefited secondarily and indirectly from colonialism in a few ways. But we cannot forget that the British, the French, the Portuguese, the Spanish, the Belgians, the Germans, did not come to Africa to benefit the Africans; they came to benefit those who had stayed at home!
Third, neo-colonialsm, the economic structures of trade, aid, debt and investment, the political structures of global power alignments, the cultural structures of communication and entertainment, have marginalised Africa. These are the contemporary structures of what is referred to as globalisation, but not the ideal spoken of by John Paul II, “a globalisation without marginalisation, a globalisation of solidarity,” but a globalisation which reinforces the poverty and deprivation of the people of Africa. Surely there are domestic causes of poverty and deprivation – corruption, mismanagement, misplaced priorities, inefficient governance, etc. But even if these obvious faults and mistakes were removed, Africa would, I am willing to argue, still be poor, and still be caught as it is in the unjust network of globalisation.

Moreover, we need an accurate understanding of the impact of the Cold War on Africa’s development, when decisions were made to support certain governments, dictatorial and corrupt as they may have been, because of how they could be allied to the West’s global strategic and military concerns. And we must understand the design and consequences of the Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAP) imposed on Africa by the World Bank and the IMF – economic reform that forgot, or systematically ignored, that development is first and foremost about people.

So when I speak of a priority of understanding, I mean the intellectual honesty to understand the present situation of Africa in its historical, structural context and to have the basic awareness of the new challenges Africa is going through now – in a moment of “global economic crisis” — and what is needed on a global scale to meet those challenges. I cite but one fine example of where this deeper understanding has made a difference: the analysis and advocacy around the Jubilee campaign to secure cancellation of Africa’s huge debt. I personally know that Zambia benefited in the building up of an understanding of why we were so deep in debt (e.g., for reasons not primarily Zambian), what that debt was doing to the people (e.g., curtailing social service expenditures) and how the debt should be cancelled (e.g., without externally imposed conditions).

So as part of this first dimension of setting Africa as a priority, and better enabling the potentials to deal with the problems, I urge the Jesuit Alumni/ae groups to promote more understanding, for example, through joint research projects, cooperative educational programmes, mutual sensitisation efforts.

PRIORITY OF RESPECT

Second, there is a need for a priority of respect. By that I mean promoting recognition of the dignity and worth of fellow human beings, a valuing of their contribution to global civilization, a rejection of whatever is demeaning of their experience. This might at first glance appear but a pious expression of a call simply to be “nicer” when referring to or interacting with Africans. But from experience I think it can be something much deeper, much more politically powerful, indeed, much more radical.

I don’t think I exaggerate – you correct me if I do – by stating that quite often Africa is seen as a forgotten continent, or when remembered in media representation, it is usually in a very negative picture of collapsing states, violent conflicts and natural disasters.

During occasional visits to the USA, I’ve had an opportunity to give talks to different audiences – students, church groups, development agencies, and, of course, family and friends. I usually begin my talks with a simple question: “I’m from Africa – what image or reflection or thought comes to your mind when I say ‘Africa’?”

Again and again, I heard very similar – and very disturbing – answers. The images and thoughts that come to peoples’ minds are: “hunger,” “AIDS,” “genocide,” corruption,” “poverty,” “war,” “illiteracy,” etc. Very negative images, indeed, very distressing thoughts. And images and thoughts that simply reinforce a disrespectful stereotype in so many minds of non-Africans: “Africa is the dark continent, not only dark because of the colour of skins but dark because of the lack of any hopeful future!”

Well, that’s not Africa! And that is what I repeated again and again when I heard these answers from my audiences. That’s not Africa!

What do I mean by saying that that is not Africa? I mean that that negative image is simply not true when taken to be an accurate picture of the whole of this huge and multi-varied continent. Certainly there are very sad and very painful situations of great poverty, great sickness and great conflict. But that does not tell the whole story of Africa and is by no means a truthful representation of the life, vitality, joy, hard work, dedication, ingenuity, resilience, hope and faith of the majority of the African people.

But this positive picture very rarely gets presented in the main global media. Please correct me if I’m mistaken! I’m disappointed and disturbed – indeed, angry – by the common television and newspaper reportage of Africa outside the Continent. In general, there is very little reported about Africa in the news. And when that news is presented, it is a story about killings in Darfur, or HIV rates in South Africa or corruption in Nigeria or hunger in Ethiopia. Frequently featured are pictures of young soldiers holding AK-47s or starving pot-bellied children.

I believe that such imaging of the people of Africa is degrading, demeaning, disrespectful. Surely we who are associated with the best of Jesuit tradition of education should promote a priority of respect to be shown the African people. For it is only with a focus on the positive, the potentials, that we can effectively deal with the problems, the predicaments. Let me offer a few examples from my experience.

For example, recent political and economic events in Zimbabwe are truly tragic, and these tragic events find their way regularly into media and conferences around the world. But what about some positive events, for example, the current efforts at inter-party dialogue and cooperation? Is that fairly reported? Or the area of dealing with HIV and AIDS? Zimbabwe has very high rates of infection, but recent reports show a noteworthy drop in prevalence of HIV among youths, with indications of significant behavioural changes occurring. Has that been reported?

Moreover, there often are stories about democratic failures in Africa. But what about stories of democratic successes? It’s not surprising that there has been so much attention paid to Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf and the hope that her election has brought to Liberia – a strong woman president. This can indeed be positive. But why not focus also on the peaceful electoral transitions that occur regularly in Botswana or recently in Tanzania and Benin? And it should not have required a visit of President Obama to Ghana to lift up public awareness of a successful democracy there. Surely there are many political stories that deserve widespread coverage in the Western media as a sign of positive democratic processes on the continent of Africa.

Turning closer to my home, Zambia, I venture to say that probably very little is known about this country. (Indeed, some people I’ve talked to thought I came from The Gambia! Well, at least the countries’ names sound alike – but there is little else in common!) Granted that there are many problems in Zambia. But there are also great potentials and this source of hope deserves respect. Rich in mineral resources, abundant in agricultural lands, lavish in tourist sites, blessed with 45 years of peace – Zambia is the envy of its neighbours! Yes, poverty is unacceptably high and political leadership often leaves much to be desired. But the positive dimensions of this “One Zambia, One Nation,” as our founding president, Kenneth Kaunda, never ceased to emphasise, should not be overlooked.

So I urge that our Jesuit Alumni/ae groups represented here take up the challenge to make a priority of respect for Africa. This could be done through some exchange programmes (for example, visiting African Jesuit institutions), through civil society educational efforts about positive stories of African development, through church Lenten campaigns showing creative efforts by women and by youth to better their own situations.

PRIORITY OF RESPONSE

Third and finally, a priority of response means primarily for me the effective mobilisation of justice, of structural change, toward meeting the needs of Africa in our world of today. Let’s be practical. We are talking of advocacy, of political pressure, of promotion of change toward greater global equity. Is there a role for Jesuit educational institutions and their Alumni/ae in assuming a priority for this response and what would that entail?

Remember what we saw, for example, in the Jubilee campaign in recent years. Behind the worldwide gathering of signatures on petitions, the massive demonstrations at meetings of the G-8, the appealing glamour of rock stars meeting presidents, prime ministers and popes, behind these public efforts to bring about change in the debilitating debt structures that unjustly bound poor countries there were the political negotiations driven by both analysis of the economic failure of debt and the human and religious values of dignity, community, solidarity, option for the poor.

These negotiations are indeed bringing about debt cancellation for many poor countries. (Many, but not yet all!) I know this from the experience of Zambia’s reaching the so-called “HIPC completion point” – reduction in debt stock from US$ 7.2 billion to under US$ 1 billion. Surely there are problems yet to face – for example, how to properly use the freed-up resources for poverty eradication, or how to avoid falling again into deep debt. But structural change has begun, a consequence, I believe, of the priority of response put on this complicated and damaging issue of external debt.

One can of course say that the response we speak of here should not only be in the form of advocacy for justice but also include direct assistance, e.g., scholarships for students, medical aid missions, building of schools. Yes, I agree, but I don’t want to distract from a priority response of addressing the deeper structural causes of the poverty, causes of the impoverishment, of Africans.

It is significant that the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) list a series of targets to be met by 2015 to deal with the sufferings of those who are poor, especially in Africa. The first seven of these goals address immediate national problems: cut by half the number of those facing desperate poverty and acute hunger, assure universal primary education for all children, address gender disparities, cut back infant and maternal mortality rates, curb the spread of HIV/AIDS and malaria, deal with environmental challenges such as scarcity of water and slum dwelling.

But the eighth goal deals with the international structural relationships within which the other goals will be met or will not be met. This eighth goal calls for a genuine global partnership, the promotion of greater cooperation among all nations with special concern for fairer deals for poor countries in trade, aid, debt, new technologies, etc. This goal focuses on issues of globalisation, migration, gender, climate change – all structural issues. And to be honest, not enough attention has been paid to this eighth goal in our MDG campaigns.

What are people – you in Europe, we in Africa –doing about the WTO and its expanding power to influence development efforts in poor countries, about the imposition of Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) that are grossly unfair trade arrangements, about aid tied to conditionalities that reinforce a neo-liberal model of economic growth, about new debt arrangements that can lead us again deeper into debt, about a profitable but deadly arms trade that promotes civil wars and ethnic conflicts in Africa?

Yes, response as a priority will mean an option for promoting structural justice campaigns, now more necessary than ever before. Why? Because the so-called war on terrorism is already taking precedence in so many decision-making circles over the war on poverty, or, better expressed, the promotion of integral, sustainable human development. So I would like to urge that Jesuit educational institutions and Alumni/ae associations pay more attention to a priority of response that is necessarily political because it involves advocating for global structures of justice.

CONCLUSION

Let me conclude by returning to the theme of hope, of hope that enables potentials to outweigh problems on this beautiful continent of Africa. As I said earlier, our hope today can be inspired by two world leaders who recently touched the soil of this continent, Pope Benedict and President Obama, and who have powerfully spoken of hope.

But it can also be inspired by recalling the words spoken 26 years ago by our sainted Father General Pedro Arrupe to a gathering of Alumni/ae such as this. In his rightly famous – and rightly radical – address entitled “Men for Others” (appropriately, “Men and Women for others”), Father Arrupe said:

This is our hope: that we have educated you to listen to the living God; to read the Gospel so as always to find new light in it; to think with the Church, within which the Word of God always ancient, ever new, resounds with that precise note and timbre needed by each historical epoch. For this is what counts; on this is founded our confidence for the future.

I think that today this confidence, this hope, for the future requires that we who have come together to this conference take seriously the Jesuit call for a priority for Africa, a priority of understanding, respect and response. I think that if Father General Arrupe were alive and addressing us today, and without prejudicing the title of tomorrow’s address of Father General Nicolas, he might have spoken of “Men and Women for Others as Witnesses to Hope”!

My friends, I recall that several years ago, I was preparing to go from Zambia to the United States for some lectures. As I was departing to the airport, one of the Jesuits pulled me aside and said quite plainly and bluntly, “Tell them that the future of the world depends on the future of Africa.” “Tell them that the future of the world depends on the future of Africa.” Yes, well, what could you possibly mean, I asked. He simply said, “Think about it, pray about it, and say about it!” I think that this is the same truth expressed by the German Federal President Hans Kohler when he stated, “In my view, the humanity of the world can be measured against the fate of Africa.”

For what hope to we have for our world’s future if we don’t put a priority on understanding the tremendous potential of Africa, far outweighing the problems; or don’t put a priority on respecting the Africans, full of dignity as God’s children, able to contribute so much to the whole world; or don’t put a priority on responding to the needs of Africa, not only through missionary charity but through political justice.

That’s the challenge facing all of us in this World Congress gathered around the theme “Witnesses to Hope.” My sisters and brothers, I pray we have the wisdom and the courage to be such witnesses to hope and with God’s good help face up to that challenge!

Thank you!

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Peter J. Henriot, S.J.
Jesuit Centre for Theological Reflection
Lusaka, Zambia

17 July 2009