“I See A Vision”

Speech given by Akindele Thomas Decker

I see a vision for Africa. One that involves and integrates the minds, the intellects, the
theories, and philosophies of the likes of our past intellectually enlightened storytellers.
The vision for Africa is a tango of a knot, tied between the ides of memories and
thoughts. I see a vision expressed in the collaboration of the minds of men and women,
our Africa’s own kings and queens. A vision with a new mentality, one that is fit not to
go to war with the enemy, but to use the African soul, which was given to us by the
creator. The soul seeks not war or battle, but peace and solutions. The soul seeks passion.
It seeks compassion from the heart of the bearer to the mind of the other. I see a vision
for Africa. A new era for a sanctified population. Not one divided by the idiosyncrasies,
or the geographic installations that were long ago used to define the nation of Africa. This
vision, is one that re-defines man as who he must be. This vision sees the equivalence in
race but the obligations of it also. I see a vision for Africa. An integration of the
theocratic words of Edward Wilmot Blyden in the ides of Pan Africanism and African
identity; the statistics of W.E.B. Dubois in his search for the Philadelphian Negro; the
economic conversions of Kwame Nkrumah, not sir or emperor, but a product of the
Kente cloth of Ghana, as he paraded in it the essence of the African Vision. I see a vision
for Africa, in the heart of young Tanisha in Georgia, little Kofi from Ghana, tiny Ayodele
from Nigeria, and young Andre from Atlanta. In these, the African Vision is installed, as
a message carried on by the birds of Egypt. They carried along the words, the dialects,
the theories, the architects, the motions, motives, and motivation. This they carried on
from city to town, from emblem to symbol, from language to culture, from ancient to
now. I see a vision for Africa, and the introduction was a voice right in your hearts…you
must first listen, then learn, understand, then think, as you sight your place in this most
abundant future, lest your heart pump a lasting beat, and your mind seek the figure of
speech, with a tone that you were born with. Shout and be heard. I see a vision for Africa.
Lest the sky must fall, and the ground overturned, or the walls close in, or the wars
abrupt; lest they find it first, and you’re stopped to think, or the clues are lost, or the signs
forgot. I see a vision for Africa, and lest I be stopped, with a lasting breath or blasting
torch. I see a vision for Africa.

This comes from my heart as I watch the News, and peep the story from the Daily Paper.
I see young, old, and poor African people, not discriminated by the color but by the
essence of their being. It is as if, we are cursed as a people, but I say impossible, as we
have seen struggles worth the investigations of detectives, historians, anthropologists,
missionaries, and doctors. I see the ongoing bloodshed in placing like Rwanda and
Uganda, and I say to myself, what will it take for you to understand your impact to the
solution of our problem. We sit sometimes and wonder, “Why is the world the way it is?”
while Mariama in Sierra Leone begs for a dollar, Steven in Europe banks in 20 million.
The conversions in my mind are just simply confusing, but yet not impossible so there
must be a reason. Not the reason we are used to hearing as in economic defaults or
society’s downsides. The reasons lie in your own heart, in your ability to move from this
dimension to the next. The people of Africa suffer not because of the lack of economic
stability, but lack of the African sibling. It takes one man to change another, as it takes
one village to change another as well, yet indeed it takes a nation to change a nation.
There is a nation of Africa calling. Yet we answer to one man. There is a nation of Africa
calling. Yet we answer to one man. Is it because we hear the voices of too many, and
maybe get nervous that we may not be able to perform? Or maybe we hear the voices of
some, but wait until all of the voices are heard. Yet, when will you hear your own voice?
Which speaks to you not from your experience or your stories, or your life stories, or
even your stories of your children’s stories. Your voice comes from within. When will
you hear your own voice, so that you can understand the message it holds? There is an
African Sibling who awaits your answer. So when will you answer. The future of Africa
holds not economic power, or scientific power, or even intellectual power, but the power
of the spirit, the power of the soul, the power of compassion. We may not see it now, but
it is yet to come. When I watch my African People, publicized on the television
infomercials and news highlights, I see young toddlers eaten away by hunger. I see
fathers and mothers, confused without the uttermost sense of direction or leadership of
their families, due to the lack of knowledge for where the resources lie. I see
grandmothers, stricken by silence, their most indigenous enemy, as they hold the talking
drum of wisdom, but without the people to preach to. I know I must be saddened, but yet
somewhere deep in my thinking, I see a vision for Africa. There will come a time, when a
nation will speak to a nation, and the African Diaspora will hear the voices of their
African Siblings, and lo and behold, that swarm, that migration, that force, which will
arrive on the shores of Africa, equipped with the armor of compassion and readiness to
aid. There will be an African Nation, where the main activity is to share. Then we will
see the true intention of our struggle, as now we hear the voice of one man, yet soon, we
will hear the voice that is within us. The voice of a nation with a message carried on by
the birds of Egypt. Carried along the words, the dialects, the theories, the architects, the
motions, motives, and motivation. This they carried on from city to town, from emblem
to symbol, from language to culture, from ancient to now. I see a vision for Africa, and
the introduction was a voice right in your hearts…you must first listen, then learn,
understand, then think, as you sight your place in this most abundant future, lest your
heart pump a lasting beat, and your mind seek the figure of speech, with a tone that you
were born with. Shout and be heard. I see a vision for Africa.