White Settlers in Tropical Africa
By Lewis H. Gann and P. Duignan
Published by Penguin Books

Reviewed By Tatenda Gapa

THE book, White Settlers in Tropical Africa by Lewis Gann and Peter Duignan, is a desperate attempt by whites, perpetrators of brutality and repression, to present a ‘fair’ picture of events in Africa in the 19th and 20th Century.
The book painstakingly tries to justify the evils that took place in Africa as whites colonised and exploited the owners of the land.
It is one of those books written by people troubled by their conscience.
The publication pushes forward the old and tired idea that Africans must be grateful for the slave trade and colonisation as these evils ‘rescued Africans from themselves and made their lives better’.
It highlights that without the coming of white people, Africans would have remained primitive.
“Without the whites’ Gospel, the blacks were lost,” write the authors.
But the facts and truth are that missionaries were not on a mission to save souls, but to pave way for colonialists. The missionaries carried out reconnaissance work for the white brutality and barbarity that followed their coming.
Their role was to soften and ensure that the invaders did not meet much resistance when they began usurping land and exploiting the resources of the continent.
In fact, the ruler of Belgium, King Leopold II wrote a letter in 1883 instructing missionaries to concentrate more on paving the way for colonialists than teaching Africans about God.
He informed the missionaries that the Africans already knew about God and they were not to waste time teaching them about Him.
“Reverends, Fathers and Dear Compatriots: The task that is given to fulfill is very delicate and requires much tact,” said King Leopold II.
“You will go certainly to evangelise, but your evangelisation must inspire, above all, Belgium interests.
“Your principal objective in our mission in the Congo is never to teach the niggers to know God, this they know already.
“They speak and submit to a Mungu, one Nzambi, one Nzakomba and what else I don’t know.
“They know that to kill, to sleep with someone else’s wife, to lie and to insult is bad.
“Have courage to admit it; you are not going to teach them what they know already.
“Your essential role is to facilitate the task of administrators and industrials, which means you will go to interpret the gospel in the way it will be the best to protect your interests in that part of the world.
“For these things, you have to keep watch on disinteresting our savages from the richness that is plenty in their underground.”
The so-called missionaries like David Livingstone played a great role in the colonisation of the continent as they mapped routes and passed on vital intelligence that made smooth the process of colonisation.
The authors shy away from the fact that the missionaries were more like intelligence officers who lied and cheated using the collar.
Livingstone is presented as a hero in the book and is compared to the worst colonial architect, Cecil John Rhodes.
“It is to Livingstone that we owe the first reliable descriptions of medical conditions in Central Africa,” they write.
“In his own way, Livingstone was just as keen an advocate of active European intervention in Africa as Cecil John Rhodes was to become after him.
“The Christian powers, Livingstone was convinced, should expand Africa’s wealth and supply the continent with new kinds of goods; by this means African living standards would be made to rise and raw materials (sic).”
‘Difficulties’ faced by the first settlers on their arrival on the continent are highlighted.
And the indigenes are portrayed as the hindrance to progress and civilisation when in actual fact, they were simply trying to protect their territories in the best way they could.
“The indigenous tribes’ reception of the white strangers was sometimes hostile and, what was worse, always unpredictable, sometimes the natives were friendly and sold food; sometimes they were hostile and showered poisoned arrows on their visitors; obviously they were not guided by reason; they were ‘savages’ and could not be trusted,” says Lewis Gann and Peter Duignan.
Even after whites had tricked Africans into signing concessions that sold their land and mineral rights and had hoisted their flags and settled in Africa, black Africans were still considered a barrier to their so-called bid to develop the ‘Dark Continent’.
“The white pioneer could not improve his farm or build better roads as long as his native neighbours continued to practise their age-old shifting cultivation of the slash and burn variety; the colonist could not breed superior cattle as long as the tribesman’s small and diseased beasts were allowed to graze next to his sleek dairy herds,” said the authors.
The pioneers are said to have suffered at the hands of the locals demeaning the efforts of Africans to regain their stolen land.
“The pioneers suffered from hunger and disease; then war broke out with the Matabele in 1893,” they write.
“In a brilliant little campaign the colonialist overthrew Lobengula’s military oligarchy.”
The slave trade era was the most brutal period ever experienced by Africans yet the book tries to sanitise the barbarous act portraying it as a win-win situation where everyone benefited equally.
“Slave trade was not only profitable in itself, but also gave rise to numerous other industries to supply the needs of African sellers and became part of a network of trade linking Europe, Africa and the New World,” writes Gann and Duignan.
“In exchange, Africans acquired muskets, knives, cloth, beads and other luxurious goods.”
In the same way that the authors try to sanitise the slave trade period they also try to show Britain as a hero who came to the rescue of the ‘poor’ slaves who were being sold as they write: “The British Navy played by far the largest share in hunting down the remaining slave ships.”
White Settlers in Tropical Africa is therefore nothing, but another lame excuse to justify atrocities that the West must be accountable and pay reparations for.
This is one book that can make any reasonable black person livid.