Open Letter to African Students

Students generally have a future-oriented approach to the world and society. That is not to say they have a revolutionary approach, only that they see things in the context of the world they will inherit and not from the perspective of previous generations. What the African Revolution seeks to do is agitate among the African student population in such a manner that will generate increasing revolutionary consciousness among the largest percentage of our student population. In this way, we will produce the new film makers, writers, artists, religious leaders, diplomatic, business, and political cadre, song writers, playwrights, and so on necessary for the ignition and successful prosecution of first the African Democratic Revolution, and then the socialist revolution that must follow.

Several decades ago the Hon. Elijah Muhammad wrote in his book Message to the Black Man that Kwame Nkrumah was the model for all conscious African students – i.e. one who used his intellectual development not for personal gain, but for the political-economic and social benefit of the masses of his people. This is the precise prescription that should be followed by any student who opposes the forces of oppression and exploitation. Such a student would enthusiastically follow a path of selfless devotion and service to the masses of his or her people; and the peoples of the world in general. Every student must ask him or herself this one simple (if compound) question: "Do I want the world I live in, the world I plan to raise a family in, the world of my future – to be one of human misery and suffering or a world of where the human spirit can achieve its greatest heights?"

To achieve the better world for our common future, students must play the role of catalyst and complementary agent to the prime factors of revolution the toiling masses:

In the words of Osagyefo:

"Throughout the world, student protest has become an increasingly prominent feature of contemporary times. But students suffer a double alienation. They are alienated from the Establishment, and in many cases from their own families; but more important, they are alienated from the working class which should make use of their efforts in the revolutionary struggle." p 74, Class Struggle in Africa, K. Nkrumah

We call on African students, be you Ghanaian, Guinean, Zimbabwean, Egyptian, Moroccan, Angolan, Namibian, Azanian, Libyan, Algerian, Eritrean, Ethiopian or whatever, to take up the mantle of revolutionary students transformed into revolutionary political leaders such as Osagyefo, Mangaliso Robert Sobukwe, Patrice Lumumba and countless others, and carry the banner of the African Revolution.