A few days ago UKIP attracted media attention after William Henwood tweeted that Dudley-born black comedian, Lenny Henry should go to live in a black country if he does not like England, after Henry called for more black and ethnic minority people in the UK creative industries. The statement, ‘go home if you don’t like it here’, has been banded about by whites for some time, but what exactly does it mean?
If you are from a black or ethnic minority background you have most likely in your lifetime have had the above statement addressed to you. Yet, what exactly is meant by it? The most obvious answer is that the person is asking you to return to a country where the majority of people are of your racial type. Yet again there is a sinister, subtle mind game trick being played on us who are asked to leave.
Are we to believe that if we all did go back to our countries of racial origin, whites in those countries would themselves emigrate back to Europe and their country of origin? Does this statement mean that the vast resources exploited in Africa, Asia and other parts of the world for the benefit of the Western world will revert back to the original people of those lands?
According to David Vine and Tom Engelhardt, in an article titled, ‘US Empire of Bases Grows‘, on July 16, 2012, Nick Turse, the associate editor of TomDispatch.com, said that America has over 1000 military bases overseas. There are U.S. military bases in Iraq, Afghanistan and increasingly in Africa to ensure that the vast resources in those lands are used for the benefit of US multinational corporations. Britain and the EU act much in the same way.
Back in January 2011 I wrote the article, Corporate greed has led to the world food crises and starvation in Africa, where I quoted Stephen Leahy, Inter Press news Service (IPS), in his article ‘In Corrupt Global Food System, Farmland Is the New Gold’, (January 13, 2011), who said how a billion people in the world go hungry while corporate companies buy up land in Africa to grow food and agrofuels (energy which is derived from crops) for export to rich consumers in mostly Western countries.
According to the Socialist Worker in an article titled, ‘How West wrecked a continent‘:
“The French government has continued to dominate the tax and currency policies of a huge swathe of African countries through its control of the CFA franc, a currency which had to be used by its former colonies. The French government devalued the CFA franc by 50 percent in 1993. This meant that workers’ wages were cut in half overnight and the price of imported goods, particularly medicines, rose steeply.”
It continues, “Around 90 percent of the cobalt used in the US aerospace industry came from Zaire, and the country was also rich in diamonds, uranium, manganese and tin“, and how “French troops have intervened in Africa 35 times in the last 15 years.”
In March 2010, I wrote a provocative article about UKIP’s favourite topic, immigration. It is titled, How immigration in the UK is linked to corrupt British foreign policy overseas,, where I quoted The Refugee Project, a coalition of refugee communities and organisations working to address the issues that UK foreign investment plays a role in forcing people to flee their countries. They said:
“The vast majority of refugees today are fleeing conflict, or social or economic oppression – and the vast majority of the world’s refugees live in the countries of Asia and Africa; less than 2% make it to Britain. In many cases, the British government, companies and taxpayers are directly and indirectly supporting a multitude of human rights abuses that often go with British overseas investment and policies, some of which ultimately force people to flee their homes and then their countries.”
“These investments have not just been the more obvious ones, such as waging war or allowing the export of weapons. They also include supporting large infrastructure projects, such as hydro-electric and irrigation dams, oil and gas pipelines, and mines.”
Let us return to our own countries where according to The Campaign Against Arms Trade (CATT), “For decades the UK Government has had a policy of promoting arms exports, seemingly at any cost. The result of this policy is that the UK continues to arm repressive regimes around the world. In 2000, the UK licensed military exports to 30 of the 40 most repressive regimes in the world and British weapons are being used in most of the world’s current conflicts.” (Shelling Out: How Taxpayers Subsidies the arms trade)
Mark Curtis, an independent UK author and journalist said that up until May 2000 Britain was supplying arms to both sides in the war over the Democratic Republic of Congo. Arms went to Zimbabwe, Namibia and Angola, while, on the other, it went to Uganda and Rwanda. Uganda and Angola were both on opposing sides but this did not stop Blair’s government from inviting both to the annual arms exhibition in September 2001. (‘Ten Years of New Labour’s Arms Exports’: May 21, 2007)
Let us return to our countries where the resources are owned by white corporate companies, where the leaders are hand-picked by the West, and any individual or government who tried to advocate progressive change is targeted for regime change or killed in mysterious circumstances.
The fact is, the phrase ‘Go back to your own country’ is either the most dumbest, nonsensical statement in modern English usage, or it perhaps hold a more sinister meaning for those who say it, that black and ethnic minority people should remain docile to Western domination like the good old days of the British empire. Either way, if UKIP or the racists cannot address these simple issues, then I encourage all black and ethnic minority people to put their feet up in England and enjoy all the benefits it has to offer, because they certainly have enjoyed the benefits of Africa, Asian and Middle East resources and continue to do so.
Further Reading:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/manufacturing-poor-people/24525
UKIP candidate William Henwood defends Lenny Henry tweet
