We saw an opportunity to jump-start an economy once terrorized by colonialism. So we pitched in.
By Gregory Jackson, EB PREC Board Member
Ghana's Year of Return 2019
In 2019, we found ourselves in the middle of the UN’s International Decade for Peoples of African Descent. We also found ourselves in the midst of the Year of Return, proclaimed by Ghana’s president in 2019 to mark 400 years since the start of the transatlantic slave trade.
I co-founded Repaired Nations with my brother Tut in 2017. We wanted to help other African Americans find their way into Africa's Renaissance in ways that coalesce the Diaspora. We sought to heal deep economic and cultural wounds. I felt called in 2018 to participate in the Year of Return and was determined to bring friends, colleagues, and family with me.
We organized a cultural exchange trip last year to create pathways for the Black community to regeneratively reinvest in Ghana, without perpetuating the inequities of today's capitalism. We primarily sought out to create cooperative relationships that bloom into:
- Cultural content,
- Import/export partnerships,
- Thought partnership, and
- Community-owned real estate development uniquely structured to prevent displacement.
We learned that Ghana, a Pan-African powerhouse, is poised to step up after the African Free Trade Agreement created the world’s largest free trade zone. Encompassing 54 African countries, the African Free Trade Agreement chose Ghana as the administrative seat. We saw an opportunity for the African Diaspora to support and jumpstart an economy once terrorized by colonialism. Ghana received $1.2 Billion from tourists during this hallmark year.
Check out the awesome pictures and videos from our presentation to the Network of Bay Area Worker Cooperatives.
Organizing to Get to Ghana
While organizing the Repaired Nations Cooperatives Conference & Exchange in 2019, I faced an excited hesitancy from people who really
wanted to go to Ghana but either didn’t have the money to make the trip happen.
Knowing that our community isn’t flush with cash and the trip to Ghana is expensive, we made a huge commitment to fundraising. We hosted a masquerade party fundraiser, did a ton of grant writing, and received generous sponsorships from EB PREC and the Sustainable Economies Law Center. As a result, we were able to subsidize the trip to a cost that everyone could afford.
On average, our attendees received help with ⅔ of the trip. In the end, after working with dozens of people, 28 folks made the trip with us, and over 75 people attended the Repaired Nations Cooperatives Conference & Exchange.
To document our journey organizing the conference and sharing with others what it takes to do the same thing, we did semi-regular podcasts (one can be found on Youtube), and collaborated with the Take Care of Each Other World Tour.
Trip's Meaning and Impact
The first major intention of the trip was to help bring African Diasporans who would not have had the opportunity to travel to the Motherland. The second major intention was to create pathways of communication within the Diaspora that may bloom into economic solidarity.
You can hear expectations of attendees before we head out and the after debrief on Soundcloud. Shout out to Malakia for doing an amazing job!
Many of the attendees to the Repaired Nations Conference were in community before Ghana, and are more close knit because of it. Just the experience of touching down in Africa changed our lives and helped us release unwarranted fears. Upon return, many attendees shifted their lives into cooperative directions by either shifting the mission/intention of their current organizations or creating entirely new ones.
Many of us are from East Oakland, and we began actively building the cooperative economy we want to see once we got back. The East Oakland Grocery Cooperative and Authentik Afrkan have made huge waves. And a cooperative corridor is budding on Foothill Blvd!
