Pan-Africanism was a movement and ideology that articulated the unity of all people of African descent. It claimed that people in the diaspora and those on the continent shared not only a history but a destiny. In this aspect, it remained a romantic idea, refusing to recognise the reality in both Africa and America.

The civil rights movement in America, while expressing solidarity with the African anti-colonial struggle, was fundamentally a fight for full citizenship of blacks in America. In other words, blacks in America primarily identified themselves as and fought to be accorded all rights due to American citizens.

African unity, too, was idealistic, ignoring a number of historical realities. For instance, the first order of business of the OAU, an organisation formed by pan-Africanists to bring about African unity, was to declare the colonial boundaries inviolable and sovereign. There was also a problem with pan-Africanism’s assumption that Africans were the same people in every aspect.

Kwame Anthony Appiah writes that to have travelled in Africa of the 18th or 19th century was to feel “in every place profoundly different impulses, ideas, and forms of life.” An even bigger obstacle to African unity was the fragility of individual countries of the OAU.

Often enough, these countries tended towards murderous disintegration. Therefore, pan-Africanist ideas of unity of all people of African descent and continental unity were undermined by reality and misconception.

But there is a pan-Africanist idea that for a long time continued to enjoy academic currency: The idea of pre-colonial democracy and egalitarianism. Julius Nyerere most aptly captured this idea, arguing that democracy and socialism were rooted in traditional African society.

In the 1980s and 90s, pan-Africanists, wearing flowing robes and stroking their beards, would, with appropriate histrionics, hold forth on the need for modern Africa to model itself on the democratic and egalitarian pre-colonial society. The conference halls would erupt in loud cheers.

Those arguing, more practically and realistically, that Africa’s future was not to be found in the past, and that it had no choice but to reconstitute itself on the basis of modern democratic concepts and constitutional models, were often dismissed as Afro-pessimists, people who believed nothing good could be found in Africa’s heritage.

The realists would eventfully win the debate. Today, no one really disputes that African social and economic renewal must be based on democracy and constitutionalism, not some mythical notions about the past. And yet every once in a while, pan-Africanism rises from the dead, and attempts to influence debate on all kinds of issues.

In a paper proposing the direction and shape of the East African Community, Prof Dani Nabudere argues that the colonial boundaries dividing the East African states should be abolished in favour of the creation of an “East African entity that will reunite existing East African communities…”

He argues further: “It is only the opening up of colonial borders that will enable the people of Africa to exercise their sovereignty in the context of developing pan-African unity.” Nabudere’s proposition dispenses with historical realities, relying instead, on pan-Africanist mysticism.

Nabudere is not the only pan-Africanist zombie haunting African public discourse. Others come out of the shadows to hurl abuse at those who do not promote the “Africa Rising” narrative. The old pan-Africanist invective – Afro-pessimist! – is back in vogue, and is unleashed with self-righteous anger at those naughty Africans who suffer from colonial brainwashing.

But how can we refuse to see the Africa that is not rising when every event reminds us of the unpleasant reality? Take, for instance, the recent swearing in of Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni.

In attendance were guests such as Robert Mugabe, Jacob Zuma, Teodoro Obiang , Omar al-Bashir, Hassan Sheikh Mohamud and Salva Kiir, men whose actions consistently underpin the Africa Not Rising reality.

Mugabe’s policies have impoverished a once-promising country. In neighbouring South Africa, Zuma has proved himself most adept at accumulating wives and personal wealth. Teodoro Obiang runs Equatorial Guinea like a personal fiefdom, apportioning to himself, his family and their cronies the country’s oil wealth.

Bashir has been indicted by the ICC for crimes against humanity. Sheikh Mohamud’s bumbling regime has failed to exert authority and bring peace to Somalia. Salva Kiir and Riek Machar led the warring factions in South Sudan’s genocidal civil war.

Museveni himself has modelled himself after the dictators he once decried. To not talk about the Africa that is not rising is not possible. It is in your face, everywhere you look.

Tee Ngugi is a political and social commentator based in Nairobi. E-mail: [email protected]