By Owei lakemfa

THE French in 1789 carried out what can be termed a universal revolution. It declared in its violent overthrow of the monarchy that all “men are born free and remain free and equal in rights”. Human beings, the revolution declared, can do anything with their freedom, provided they respect the liberty of others. In proclaiming freedom, liberty and equality for the human race, the French revolutionaries affirmed that resistance to oppression is legitimate.

However, in practice, the French did not classify the Black man as part of the human race covered by this declaration. They saw nothing wrong in enslaving, colonising, dispossessing and dehumanising the African people. They plundered the African continent, divided its peoples and even tried to strip them of their culture, language and humanity in the name of assimilating them.

But in 1960, the French had to give up 14 of its colonies within 11 months. So hurried was France that within the 20-day period of August 1 to 20 of that year, eight French colonies were granted independence. There were various reasons for this, but they can be captured under 10 points. First is the disgrace of France in the Second World War when it was over ran by Germany.

Following the November 1940 invasion of the country by Germany, France was sliced in two; Germany occupied one part and left the other under the French Marshall Henri Petain, a collaborator. But two years later, after a 12-hour operation, Germany seized the rest of France. In the total four years of German occupation, the French army fought on the side of Hitler and was defeated. In 1941, while France was under occupation, its mandated Arab territories; Lebanon and Syria declared their independence. Another issue was that even after France was liberated by the allies, it could not stand on its own as its economy had collapsed. It had to rely on external aid and capital.

Also during the war, many Africans who fought for France came to realise that their colonial masters were mere mortals who were no more cowardly or courageous than those they colonised. Another challenge to French colonialism were the powerful winds of Pan-Africanism and the strong storms of nationalism that swept through Africa with their tidal waves of freedom. In other parts of the world, colonies were unravelling; countries like India, Pakistan, Ceylon and Burma had between 1947 and 1948, snatched their independence, showing the light to those still in the darkness of colonialism.

Rather than accept reality, France decided to block the flow of independence by retaking its colonies, but the resistance of the colonised people, especially in Vietnam taught it bitter lessons. Vietnam, a country colonised by France in 1884 had declared its independence on September 2, 1944 only for France to re-emerge from the ruins of the Second World War to make a renewed ownership claim of the country.

To enforce its re-colonisation, it sent 200,000 troops, but in one of the most brilliant and stunning military victories in human history, the Vietnamese defeated France in 1954 at the battle of Dien Bien Phu. Only 3,431 French soldiers out of the 20,000 that defended the seemingly impregnable French fortress lived to tell the tale. The invincibility of France in the colonies was irretrievably shattered. France began granting independence to select colonies like Morocco on March 2, 1956 and Tunisia 18 days later but had greedily decided to annex neighbouring Algeria as one of its provinces.

One million Frenchmen and women lived in rich and beautiful Algeria in the 1950s and had like their government, vowed never to give it up. The war of independence began in 1954 and the French military soaked Algeria in so much blood and committed so many atrocities that the French Fourth Republic was overthrown in May 1958. Four months later, France decided to ‘democratise’ its colonisation by asking its subjects in “oversea territories” to decide in a plebiscite to vote “Yes” or “No” for a new French Community with full internal governance but not independence. French president, Charles de Gaulle personally toured Africa to ask the colonies to vote “Yes”.

France with its stranglehold on the colonies was confident about the outcome only to be shocked by Guinea led by trade unionist, Sekou Toure which returned a resounding “No” verdict with a 1,134,324 vote to 56,981. Guinea with capital in Conakry coasted home to independence on October 2, 1958. France tried to discourage other colonies by harshly punishing Guinea; cutting off all links, ostracising it from its neighbours and trying to crush it economically, politically and socially.

Rather than submit, Guinea turned to the Socialist countries of the Eastern bloc which provided it with the needed oxygen. The independence of Guinea could not be ignored and there was the high possibility of anti-colonial wars as was going on in Algeria. So, France hurried to prepare the rest of its territories for “flag” independence which ensured their continued and complete reliance on the mother country. 1960 was the chosen year France decided to hand over its African territories to mainly trusted and pliant African leaders.

Cameroun, the first to be independent also provided the classical French method of ensuring that independent-minded nationalists did not replace it. The leading nationalist party from 1948 was the Union des Populations du Cameroun (UPC) led by Reuben Um Nyobe. It rejected client ties with France and demanded the Africanisation of the Cameroun civil service. It was a pan-ethnic secular movement that eclipsed all other parties, except in the north where the pro-French emirs who opposed independence, put up some resistance. In local assembly elections, the French brazenly rigged elections against UPC candidates, and after pro-independence demonstrations in major parts of the colony, it banned the UPC.

The French then handed over the colony to two of its stooges; Andre Mbida, leader of the Beti ethnic group and Ahmadu Ahidjo leader of the northern party, the Union Camerounaise. On February 18, 1958, the French appointed Ahidjo prime minister, and that same year murdered the nationalist, Reuben Um Nyobe. On January 1, 1960 it handed over ‘independent’ Cameroun to Ahidjo and his clan who had opposed independence in the first place!