Post: #1

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/2014/0404...wer-is-yes

Back to Africa? For some African-Americans, the answer is yes

A steady trickle of African-Americans find a homeland in Africa, whether motivated by love, money, or a desire to connect with ancestral roots. Ghana has become a particularly popular destination.

By Chris Stein
April 4, 2014 11:40 AM

Jimmy Thorne says that relocating to Ghana is one of the best moves he’s ever made.

It doesn’t matter if he, an African-American, gets called “obroni,” the local word for white person, in the streets, or if some of his family can’t quite figure out what he’s doing in this West African nation so far from his roots in North Carolina.

In his eight years in Ghana, he has found his wife, reconnected with God, and even manages to play golf daily. Ghana is home to him now.

“Once you accept it as your home, why wouldn’t you stay in your home?” Mr. Thorne said. “This is where we come from originally, so maybe that’s why we’re here. Maybe it’s divine providence.”

Whether motivated by love, money, or the desire to rekindle a long-lost connection, black repatriation to Africa remains alive and well, even if it never quite became the high-volume, emotional return to African roots that initially captured the imagination of black intellectuals and celebrities like boxer Mohammad Ali decades ago.

Some 3,000 African-Americans live in this country of 25 million, according to the African-American Association of Ghana. Their migration is more a trickle than a flood, attracting mostly retirees who want to start charities, rediscover their roots, or simply relax, the association said.

Ghana has become the destination of choice for African-Americans looking for a spiritual home, if not an ancestral one, on the African continent.

“Wherever it is that we find ourselves, in Africa is where we should be," says Imahkus Okofu, who moved to Ghana from New York City 24 years ago and now runs a health spa and has authored books on repatriation. “Whether we come from Sierra Leone or Ghana, or wherever, we are the result of the transatlantic and European slave trade.”

Ghana’s government has met the African-American embrace of its country cautiously.

Former Ghanaian President Jerry Rawlings passed legislation to grant an indefinite residence permit for people of African descent, and the country recently set up a new bureau to harness the country’s diaspora, including African-Americans, for development.

But African-Americans complain that it’s basically impossible to get that permit. Many add that the reception they receive from Ghanaians is less of brotherly embrace and more of puzzlement as to why they’d want to move to a place like Ghana, which has seen rapid economic growth in recent years but still struggles with widespread poverty.

“They don’t quite understand why we would leave America and come to Ghana, to suffer, as they think,” Mrs. Okofu says.

Since the 19th century, African-Americans have moved back to the continent in fits and starts.

Liberia was created in the 1800s century as a place for freed slaves to settle in; Jamaican activist Marcus Garvey is well known for his efforts in the early 20th century to develop the West African nation for African-Americans who wanted to move back.

The dual upheavals of the American civil rights movement and the end of colonialism in Africa saw a number of prominent African Americans move to newly independent African countries.

Controversial black power and civil rights activist Stokely Carmichael spent much of his later years in Guinea as a guest of the dictatorial President Ahmed Sékou Touré.

But it was Ghana that has consistently captured the attentions of prospective immigrants.

Author Maya Angelou lived in the capital, Accra, shortly after the UK’s Gold Coast colony became Ghana; and Martin Luther King Jr. was a guest at the country’s celebration of independence (as was then-American Vice President Richard Nixon.)

Ghana’s first president, Kwame Nkrumah, promoted the idea of African-American settlement in the country, granting NAACP founder W.E.B. Du Bois, who had settled in Ghana, citizenship in his later years.

But the halcyon idealism of Nkrumah’s early years ended rudely in 1966, when he was ousted in a military coup.

The idea of citizenship for African-Americans came back under the rule of military dictator turned democratically elected President Rawlings, who stood next to Bill Clinton at a Washington press conference in 1999 and promised to open the country to African-Americans who wanted to settle.

“Is there any reason why you should not have the right to enjoy the citizenship of where you come from?” Rawlings told reporters.

Philbert Johnson, director of Ghana's diaspora bureau, part of the foreign ministry, acknowledged that a law is on the books to allow foreigners of African descent to settle in Ghana, but that few have successfully completed the process.

That frustrates Otis Davis, the president of the African-American Association.

After retiring and after repeated visits here, Mr. Davis moved to Ghana in 2011. He spends his time running a charity that focuses on education, and manages a few small businesses.

He says he loves the place, not just because he can live on his Social Security income, but because of the feeling of connection or re-connection that comes with living in Africa.

But he sometimes feels that Ghana doesn’t love him back.

“You find yourself as being obroni,” treated like someone with no connection to the place you live, he says. “We’re giving back to society here, but I don’t think we’re getting a fair shake.”

To change that, the African-American Association has joined forces with groups of Afro-Caribbean people and others who settle in Ghana, to push for more support from the government.

In a policy reminiscent of the Nkrumah era, Mr. Johnson of the diaspora bureau says he plans to work with African-Americans, along with more recent emigrants from Ghana.

“If you have 5,000 persons of African descent living in Ghana, you have to organize them,” Johnson says, using the ministry’s estimate of African-Americans in Ghana. “The experience they’ve [acquired] in the country that they live in can be a valuable experience for the country.”

Some prospective migrants to Ghana are dissuaded from settling by the chaotic markets and sewage-filled gutters that are part of daily life in Ghana, Thorne said. But others see opportunity.

Four months ago, Otis Davis’s son Ezra came, and decided to stay. He plans to try his hand at the jewelry trade.

“It’s not really just about the money,” Ezra Davis said. “You have the ability to create something … to contribute.”

Post: #2

Money to be made in Africa. That's the most appealing thing to me. As far as the women, East African is more my type. I wouldn't mind making a trip one year. I wonder what's the best country for a week long stay and possible business venture. 30k a good start up investment? Maybe a computer cafe or import American cars.

Haven't heard much about Ghana.

Post: #3

With Mitt Romney's self deportation comment and all...I wonder what he would say about this.

(04-06-2014 11:11 AM)Belize King Wrote:  Money to be made in Africa. That's the most appealing thing to me. As far as the women, East African is more my type. I wouldn't mind making a trip one year. I wonder what's the best country for a week long stay and possible business venture. 30k a good start up investment? Maybe a computer cafe or import American cars.

Haven't heard much about Ghana.

I would suggest even more, 75 or 100K. You have to take into account VERY high taxes, corruption, crappy infrastructure and inflation. Not to mention, as the article implies...people are out there to make a buck out of you. It's like in China where if you want to make business you have to hop in bed with a local when creating a company...at least that's how it is in Nigeria.

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Post: #5

If I was an African-American and I had to deal with these kinds of hoes, I'd also go to Africa.

Post: #6

(04-06-2014 11:29 AM)Cattle Rustler Wrote:  It's like in China where if you want to make business you have to hop in bed with a local when creating a company...at least that's how it is in Nigeria.

I've heard its actually the Chinese who are invading Africa for business purposes.

http://www.wimp.com/chineseafrica/

Post: #7

Over the years I've played with the Idea of setting up shop in ZA. This was an interesting documentary

Post: #8

(04-06-2014 12:56 PM)JayMillz Wrote:  

(04-06-2014 11:29 AM)Cattle Rustler Wrote:  It's like in China where if you want to make business you have to hop in bed with a local when creating a company...at least that's how it is in Nigeria.

I've heard its actually the Chinese who are invading Africa for business purposes.

http://www.wimp.com/chineseafrica/

I didn't explained myself correctly. I was stating how most african countries operate, and used China as a non-african example. Most chinese, if not all, companies in Africa are state owned. This makes everything else easy for China since the host government doesn't want to piss off their main source of investment/aid/bribes (China) but it's different for individual citizens from other countries.

Post: #9

(04-06-2014 01:30 PM)rhodey Wrote:  Over the years I've played with the Idea of setting up shop in ZA. This was an interesting documentary

This looks intriguing.

Post: #10

An interesting article almost a decade old: The African Hacker (2005)

Quote:With home-brewed code and a little help from Microsoft, a programmer in Ghana launches Africa's first software empire

Post: #11

(04-06-2014 11:29 AM)Cattle Rustler Wrote:  With Mitt Romney's self deportation comment and all...I wonder what he would say about this.

(04-06-2014 11:11 AM)Belize King Wrote:  Money to be made in Africa. That's the most appealing thing to me. As far as the women, East African is more my type. I wouldn't mind making a trip one year. I wonder what's the best country for a week long stay and possible business venture. 30k a good start up investment? Maybe a computer cafe or import American cars.

Haven't heard much about Ghana.

I would suggest even more, 75 or 100K. You have to take into account VERY high taxes, corruption, crappy infrastructure and inflation. Not to mention, as the article implies...people are out there to make a buck out of you. It's like in China where if you want to make business you have to hop in bed with a local when creating a company...at least that's how it is in Nigeria.

There's a show on Discovery channel about a couple obroni from USA who went to Ghana to mine for Gold. A must watch for anyone thinking of doing business over there and the extreme corruption that one has to deal with.

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Post: #13

(04-06-2014 04:38 PM)TripleG Wrote:  

(04-06-2014 11:29 AM)Cattle Rustler Wrote:  With Mitt Romney's self deportation comment and all...I wonder what he would say about this.

(04-06-2014 11:11 AM)Belize King Wrote:  Money to be made in Africa. That's the most appealing thing to me. As far as the women, East African is more my type. I wouldn't mind making a trip one year. I wonder what's the best country for a week long stay and possible business venture. 30k a good start up investment? Maybe a computer cafe or import American cars.

Haven't heard much about Ghana.

I would suggest even more, 75 or 100K. You have to take into account VERY high taxes, corruption, crappy infrastructure and inflation. Not to mention, as the article implies...people are out there to make a buck out of you. It's like in China where if you want to make business you have to hop in bed with a local when creating a company...at least that's how it is in Nigeria.

There's a show on Discovery channel about a couple obroni from USA who went to Ghana to mine for Gold. A must watch for anyone thinking of doing business over there and the extreme corruption that one has to deal with.

Damn, that show looks fascinating. I have to watch this. But I'm sickened seeing how Westerners and Chinese can just go in there and buy up African land, extract the resources and get rich while the people native to that land are still living in squalor. These resources belong to the people of Africa. How the fuck are foreigners allowed to go in there and basically grab it? Are Africans profiting from their own resources? I'm as disgusted as I am intrigued by that trailer.

Post: #14

I've always wanted to visit Africa. Ethiopia seems like an amazing place with churches that are carved out of solid rock. But the reality of the place has always scared me:disease, poverty, violence. Ghana seems to be getting it together, but it's a very tribal society. You might be able to cut a deal with one of the hereditary kings; there was a Discovery channel show about a Dutchman who married into a Ashante noble family and was appointed Lord Mayor of his town.

Post: #15

Every time I hear of this I always think of the old Eddie Murphy comedy skit where he talks about going back to African to get his 'perfect, unspoiled African wife' ("Umfuufu") but that, inevitably, he thinks that after he brings her back to the US she would get spoiled by her American friends and turned into just another Feminist gold-digger (and take half his money)...

Eddie Murphy's RAW - Bush Bitch [HD]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIwpypavI4o

Anyway, I think this is a cool idea and if I was African American looking to get back to my roots and game hot black chicks with no attitude I'd do it in a heartbeat as long as I had the safety angles worked out. Wouldn't the Dominican or Haiti also work too? (closer at least to the US).

Post: #16

I have some questions brought on by the Black Without Borders film and the article that started this thread.

Does it seem like to anyone else that these repatriates are kind of ignorant to local customs or that there is a historical divide that's not being addressed in the their perspective and the text? Why do they have friction in Ghana?

The Americans who moved over there seemed to have imported some of the more degenerate US culture with them, surprisingly as some of their entrepreneurial actions or their lifestyle.

Why the oversized, fancy house houses and lavish living? I know they have to realize the implications of their choices on the local populous.

Hilarious to see African American be guilty themselves of gentrification, privilege and all the other things they blame American society of afflicting upon them. What makes their actions different from the whites who started businesses over there? Notably, who of them can criticize European-run charities in Africa?

Seeing that completely disenchanted me of believing AA concern over the state of Africa

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Post: #18

That really didn't seem like a lucrative business plan, or a well formed one for that matter.

If I were to try something like that, it would definitely involve revolutionizing some present system to make it more efficient or offering a business/service that drew in more cash to the region for growth. Their effort came off unnecessarily strenuous.

Post: #19

(04-06-2014 04:46 PM)007 Wrote:  

lol...I love this clip! As i write from my hotel in Pattaya, i just remembered the Chris Tucker comment in that movie, "I mean it, man. I'll bitch-slap you back to Bangkok." Wrong Country bro!!! :-)

Post: #20

I was born in Ghana and moved to North America at the age of 2! I made my 1st trip back to Ghana in November 2012 at the age of 37. Primary motivation was to see my last Grand Parent (GM who was 98 years old).

I was not impressed upon arrival. I almost got into a fight with some employee punk at the airport who was aggressive and pulled my bag away and demanded money since he carried it 10 feet for me. I just arrived and had no money in his currency to give him and the $5 CDN I offered to get him off my back just got him more pissed off. He told me that they could have my bags inspected and cause problems for me. Really??? My 1st time back and this is how you treat people. My older brother, parents (arrived a week before me) and a few cousins who were waiting for me in arrival area, were pissed when they heard this...my cousin who had connections with military at the airport wanted to escalate this. I said forget it. Not worth it.

Weather was brutally HOT. Having been to Thailand, India, Mexico, Philippines and Cuba...Ghana was by far the hottest country I have been to. Could have been the area we were in....LACK of trees for shade....no wind for cool breeze...no means to beat the heat than to stay indoors w/ A/C.

Traffic was brutal. Not as bad as other counties I have been to. A new mall that was built in Tema by the Hwy was supposed to have an under-pass built BUT do to Political corruption, the money that was supposed to be used to build the under-pass merge from the hwy was pocketed. Since this was never built, this created massive gridlock because that section of the hwy became a bottle neck. Not fun sitting in traffic for hours in the HEAT for hours.....I asked myself, why was I here.

Another concern, I was told by everyone in my neighborhood that I should refrain from walking out at night due to the amount of crime in the area.

As other have mentioned, yes there were a lot of Asians in Ghana...to be more precise, Koreans. They were everywhere...vacationing...doing business...etc.

Real Estate - The market is booming! I have been encouraged time and time again by my parents to invest in Real Estate since I can make a killing.

The women are nice. I didn't get a chance to explore the game here since I was there for 9 days and was deep in family activities the entire time.

That was a bit of my experience there. Again, went primarily to see my last Grand Mother....i should have made a better effort to really check out the city of Accra.

Tons of tourists there, I am told it is safe. If I wasn't there for family activities and went here as a tourist, maybe the experience would have been a bit different!

Post: #21

rcraig33hb - Give Ghana another shot. The first time back can be a bit of a shock especially coming from the 'luxuries' of Canada but you will become addicted.

I plan to go to Ghana at some point in the future, I got an uncle living there and it's very close to Naija.

If you think Accra was rough, Lagos will make you scream.

Post: #22

(04-06-2014 01:30 PM)rhodey Wrote:  Over the years I've played with the Idea of setting up shop in ZA. This was an interesting documentary

Nice documentary. Just be sure to bring your "A-Game" if you don't want to lose your shirt here. South Africa is a deceptive place. You drive, or if you're mad/poor walk, around some areas and you think it's very undeveloped and must have lot's of "low hanging fruit" style business opportunities. But it really doesn't. Despite how things look sometimes many industries and business practices in the private sector are leading edge. In retail, property development, finance, engineering and the rest you'll need to be well qualified and at a top Western/developed world level to succeed. But if you do succeed the lifestyle can be quite good.

Not sure I agree with the woman in the documentary who seemed to suggest that being an "African-American" would help you in business here. There are various "Affirmative Action" programs here, but they would not, in fact may not, apply to foreign born people of the black, or any other race (won't bore you with the constitutional/legal reasons for this). In any event to benefit from these programs you'd also need all sorts high level connections anyway. Aside from that people may be curious about black Americans. Certainly better to be a black American than a black person from another African country, who often have a poor reputation amongst local people.

It's certainly an exciting adventure for a foreigner to start a business out here. For those interested probably a good idea to do a LSD trip before you invest. (No, LSD in this case = Look See Do) to try to get an idea of what you'll be facing.

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Post: #24

Much of the world is already in Africa including tons of Euros and Asians. I think Americans just have this backwards attitude towards Africa (or for that matter most places in the world) and they have little idea that most of the countries in the world with the highest growth rates are in Africa. The Chinese are literally taking that place over but you'll find few American companies even trying other than some oil companies in Angola etc.

Post: #25

I can't speak for everyone, but I know men from Senegal, Uganda and Somalia personally and they don't brag on it competing with the stand of living in comparison to the states. I'm not judging these nations on cultural policy or practices, but I couldn't see myself living out my life in Senegal after hearing a former child soldier's life story of being kidnapped in his home country.