2:03

Women rights activists, community workers, and a

2:05

veteran politician, among the few outstanding women

2:13

who served in the

2:15

legislative council. Women's

2:30

lives are amazing life, my

2:32

father and his siblings are

2:34

good people, cause

2:36

she raised them right. Her

2:42

dad sent her to school at a time when most girls didn't get to go, and

2:48

that's what inspired her dedication to

2:51

women's empowerment and

2:54

education. You

2:58

know, time's kind of running out with that generation,

3:00

so I do want to also motivate people

3:03

to talk out about that. I

3:05

thought it's encouraging me to be a child, but it's

3:07

encouraging me to chat to the elders and

3:14

be like, alright cool, what was your

3:17

perspective on that? Get to the bottom

3:19

of, you know, what happened

3:23

and what was life like? In

3:27

1966, Dutta's father was

3:29

killed when Ugandan independence descended into

3:31

mayhem, and even though

3:35

she never got to ask the killers where to

3:37

find his buddy, Jutta forgave them. Like her

3:40

father, she had a love for the kingdom,

3:44

but after his murder, she ran for cover in England. Why

3:47

did I go to France? Because the

3:50

cover went into his there in the break.

3:54

My little husband also went with

3:56

him to London. tell

4:00

these stories because the passing of

4:02

a grandparent is the end of an era and

4:06

that whole generations central endeavor

4:09

was secure in independence. Remember?

4:23

We've been looking at African and

4:26

Caribbean independence struggles so

4:28

far this chapter. And

4:30

if you notice in all these

4:33

struggles international solidarity has been the

4:35

largest factor. Because

4:38

history shows when one country

4:40

can take advantage of another there's

4:43

a chance they'll act up. While

4:48

most of those young democracies were black and brown

4:51

they wanted a colleague and they

4:53

weren't breaking down. They were

4:55

so free of their lives. On

4:58

third round they showed that our thinking was

5:00

just a little bit better. But

5:05

the dynamic between a former colony and

5:07

its former colonizer can be hard to

5:10

capture. Take

5:13

Jamaica and Britain in the late

5:16

70s for example under

5:18

Michael Manley and Margaret Furture. She

5:23

became British Prime Minister just

5:25

as his time as Prime Minister finished. Up

5:30

to that point Manley's whole career was

5:32

based on mobilizing his global peers to

5:35

address the question where do we go

5:37

from here? To

5:40

the man's credit he tried his

5:42

best to push a new fresh politics

5:44

through. The

5:49

easiest thing would have been to go along with

5:51

whatever the West wanted to do.

5:56

But Manley was operating under the assumption that

5:58

Jamaica would decide how his own life economy

6:00

would function. Soon

6:04

enough he would find out it was

6:06

damn near impossible to function without Washington

6:08

and London. See

6:11

by this point America had the biggest slice

6:13

of the global campaign. And

6:17

it wanted to run the world of Britain

6:19

run its empire according

6:21

to Professor Radhika Desai. The

6:24

US knew that he was never going

6:26

to be able to acquire an empire

6:28

as a size as Britain had. But

6:31

it would essentially fail to make

6:33

the dollar the world's paralysing. The

6:36

problem with this was of course that the

6:38

sterling system relied on empire. If

6:40

you don't have empire you're going to have

6:42

to engage in some pretty shady

6:44

shenanigans in order to make the dollar the

6:47

world's money. Let's

6:52

go back to 1945. The

6:56

Allied forces had won the war. A

6:59

new world order was underscored when

7:01

the International Monetary Fund was formed. The

7:05

World Bank and the IMF came out of this

7:07

settlement after the Second World War. This

7:09

is Grieve Chewa, a Zambian

7:11

researcher. The idea was essentially to say

7:14

we are always going to have crisis

7:16

of one form or the other. And

7:18

as brothers and sisters we need to

7:20

look out for each other. So we're

7:22

going to establish two organizations. The World

7:24

Bank to finance long term development and

7:26

then the IMF to sort out short

7:28

term financial crisis. Now

7:30

the sad thing is that this

7:32

great idea on paper became captured

7:35

by the US and Western Europe.

7:42

The IMF is a big part of

7:44

money funded by the

7:46

United Nations members. Because

7:49

it's dominated by America people

7:51

perceive underlying United States agendas.

7:55

See when you borrow from the IMF you

7:57

got to run your economy how they tell you. The

8:01

idea is you don't know what you're

8:03

doing so Western X-mas are going to help you

8:05

through. No surprise that the

8:08

IMF is at port of the Washington DC

8:10

that managing the act of the IMF is

8:12

effective to take by Europeans. Usually

8:15

this involves them recommending public

8:17

service cuts to end reckless

8:19

spending. And

8:22

they recommend that you accept the entry and

8:24

exit of money in and out of your

8:26

country. Even if

8:28

it raises the prices of your property or

8:32

destabilizes your economy. Basically

8:36

the IMF recommendations don't

8:39

reduce poverty but they allow

8:41

wealth to preserve its place.

8:44

And Jamaica serves as a perfect case. In

8:47

1977 a

8:51

minister had been respected and the ministry

8:53

of the war was fair. And

8:57

the war was supposed to solve its problem. The

9:00

IMF knew me. The

9:05

whole idea was to set conditions which the

9:07

government could not meet. When

9:09

the government failed to meet them you would have to

9:11

really go ahead and knew the one in which the

9:13

conditions became tighter. The

9:18

The The The

9:23

The Remember

9:26

last episode when we

9:28

looked at Jamaica's contribution to Britain's rise

9:31

through different times. Remember

9:33

how we saw the transition between

9:36

two economic systems. From

9:39

a cantaloum where the

9:41

wealth created in a colony was taxed

9:44

and controlled by the monarchy to

9:47

capitalism where colonizers

9:50

basically controlled their own economy. So

9:54

Britain went through all those changes but you know what

9:56

stayed the same. The

9:58

fact that Throughout this

10:01

whole period, African labor

10:03

was used to enrich the West,

10:05

which progressed. Meanwhile,

10:07

the people of Africa ended

10:10

up poor and dispossessed.

10:24

Europeans used to talk about this honestly, until

10:27

abolition changed the policy. See,

10:30

when slavery was seen as a monstrosity,

10:32

no one wanted to be associated with

10:34

it, obviously. So

10:36

they spent at least a century

10:38

trying to suppress the role

10:40

of slavery in the rise of the West.

10:44

They framed the rise of capitalism like it

10:46

was separate, like

10:48

it was all the product of sacrifices and

10:50

effort. So

10:56

someone like Margaret Thatcher wasn't

10:59

raised to be ashamed of Britain's rise to the

11:01

top. She

11:04

was told Britain was great because Britain was winning,

11:06

and if it was winning, why would it stop?

11:13

See, people like Thatcher believed the

11:15

West must leave the rest, because

11:18

the West was wealthiest, so

11:20

it must be the best. I

11:39

created the wealth. It

11:41

is a political system which will

11:44

deal with this poverty. The

11:52

political system is

11:54

not the secret to the West's success. Oh

11:58

no. Let's

12:01

look back on the Western Track record

12:03

to assess events addressed in Chapter 4. As

12:08

we can certainly see from Episode 33, Franklphone

12:11

Part 1, since the

12:13

1400s, Westerners have changed

12:16

the trade relations in regions that

12:18

were far-flung. Now

12:23

European demand for African slaves

12:25

was another obstacle to enter

12:27

African trade, and

12:29

ecosystems of diplomacy and cooperation

12:32

descended into clashes and raids. What

12:42

did we learn from Episode 29, Drama

12:45

in Ghana Part 1? Ghana's

12:48

were Westerners came for slaves,

12:50

where European competitors came in

12:52

waves. A small number

12:54

of settlers engaged in trade and named

12:56

the place the Gold Coast. The

12:59

history of slavery and resource extraction

13:01

hangs over the coast like an

13:03

old ghost. When

13:14

Nkrumah was born, Ghana was called the

13:16

Gold Coast, one of those

13:18

spots where Europeans used to load gold

13:20

full of gold and human beings, locals

13:23

sold those until the

13:25

Europeans put all of them in a

13:27

chokehold. Can

13:35

you see it? The pattern

13:37

across the origin stories of the countries we've

13:40

looked at in Chapter 4? It

13:43

saw slavery and resource extraction. Maybe

13:46

the West's success is less complex than

13:49

Margaret Thatcher thought. Maybe

13:52

the secrets of Western successes, the

13:55

fact they've extracted the best from the

13:57

rest, the best resources,

13:59

the best human beings nothing

14:02

but the best for the West Europeans

14:06

combined that with fighting for trade

14:08

routes and combined that with some

14:10

scientific breakthroughs combined

14:12

with pouring more and more

14:14

energies into colonization over four

14:17

centuries that's

14:19

a lot of money that's

14:22

a lot of money last

14:30

episode we saw how Michael Manley

14:32

tried to give Jamaica social

14:35

democracy how

14:37

he reimagined the global south to

14:40

redefine his place in the global

14:42

economy after

14:50

Kwame Nkrumah a decade before

14:53

along with Julius Nerire of

14:55

Tanzania Michael Manley became a

14:57

major voice defending the right of poor

14:59

countries to make a choice to

15:02

choose how to govern themselves take

15:05

care of their people and recover their

15:07

wealth these

15:12

leaders reasoned that poor countries outnumbered

15:14

rich ones in the United Nations

15:18

and if they didn't use this to their

15:20

advantage their people would

15:22

face continued violations they

15:25

noticed the West developing welfare reason investing

15:27

in social housing and healthcare systems

15:31

and they wanted this change to extend across

15:33

the water a

15:36

new international economic order

15:46

these ideas were all well and good as

15:48

long as rich countries signed on wish

15:51

they never would instead

15:53

they took advantage of a global

15:55

recession to make it clear we ain't

15:58

taking normal suggestions Poor

16:00

countries were facing rising deaths. They

16:02

needed cash as a matter of

16:04

life and death. They

16:07

kicked off the cycle of the

16:09

West weaponizing debt through

16:11

the IMF. What

16:15

you really needed is to sit down

16:17

with them and say look, can I

16:19

work out a five-year problem? And

16:21

in the meantime, I am strapped for some cash.

16:23

So can you help me up front get out

16:25

of the cash mind and then put it in

16:27

the context of a long term development plan? No,

16:30

I mean sir, no. Long

16:34

term development is you are broken. We

16:42

lend you some money in a very short

16:44

time frame at full

16:46

interest rate and

16:48

they then impose upon you tremendous

16:53

restrictions.

16:55

So

16:58

the IMF didn't say cut out this education

17:01

problem or cut out this health problem. What

17:04

the IMF said is you must spend only

17:06

so much money on health and education. And

17:10

the implication of that was that

17:12

you had to cut out some problems. What

17:24

you really needed is to

17:26

spend only so much money on health

17:28

and education. So you must spend only

17:31

so much money on health and education. Well,

17:33

go ahead. But that's

17:36

my truth. My answer

17:38

is across business, but one of them cannot with area. What

17:40

if maybe the bitch could come from a block? What

17:42

if it's not to me? I mean, it's been economic.

17:44

What if me was the type of person who's a bitch

17:47

who's a bird? I'm a friend with cousin Barnes, a

17:49

star from the ring, but what if he did I

17:51

brought first? In

18:02

2015, Jamaican artist, Bizzy Signal

18:04

released the song, What If? and

18:07

on it, he imagines his own career

18:09

and the world around him looking a lot different.

18:23

The song's got its usual rapid flows and

18:26

clever words but one line

18:28

always stood out from the second verse What

18:38

if Jamaica never owed the IMF tax?

18:42

That's a good question. 50

18:47

years on from Jamaica's first IMF loan,

18:51

inequality across the island is grown. The

18:55

rich have gotten richer while the poor have

18:57

gone poorer yet Jamaica is

18:59

celebrated as a top performer. That's

19:03

because the West rewards system doesn't

19:06

applaud developing countries for offering their people

19:08

the best support system. According

19:13

to Jamaican professor, Ronaldo McKenzie,

19:16

from 1973, the

19:18

start of Mani's government, all

19:21

the way up to 2007, Jamaica's

19:23

real GDP grew by less than

19:25

1%. Let's

19:29

look at how the government funds were spent. In

19:36

the 2009-2010 budget, debt repayment took up 56% while

19:42

salaries for civil servants was

19:45

22.5%. Leaving

19:49

less than a quarter of

19:51

the budget for infrastructure, security

19:54

and everything else. Education

19:58

got 12.6% and

20:01

health got 5.3. Boy

20:05

in the first seven years of my life Jamaica's

20:08

currency lost 72% of

20:10

its value. Unemployment

20:14

declined from 15% in 1990 to

20:18

10.6% in 2008 but a lot

20:21

of that's down to the growth of the informal

20:24

sector which is insecure

20:26

sometimes undocumented work. 28% in

20:30

1990, 43% in 2001.

20:36

Meanwhile middle-class income

20:39

has declined due to

20:41

inflation and that dead growth rate that

20:43

I just mentioned. Add

20:46

this to the islands reliance

20:48

on imports especially oil, food,

20:51

consumer goods and

20:53

you get an economy vulnerable

20:56

to outside shocks like

21:00

the fall in global demand of aluminium

21:03

leading to a 70% decline in

21:05

bauxite revenue in just one

21:07

year. Or

21:10

the 2008 financial crash which

21:12

saw payments from overseas Jamaicans which

21:14

had been rising every year for

21:16

a decade drop by

21:20

two hundred and thirty million dollars

21:24

with almost 15,000 drop losses

21:26

in just eight months. We

21:30

ain't even mentioned the natural disasters which

21:33

cost the country 1 billion in damages

21:36

for our 2005. We

21:40

ain't even mentioned the Covid pandemic. Well

21:56

at the time when Michael Manley accepted a 1977 loan The

22:00

country really needed it. I

22:03

don't want to downplay how poorly he'd handled

22:05

the economy. There wasn't even enough money to

22:07

pay the government staff. But

22:12

I will say, that

22:14

was his right as Jamaica's leader.

22:17

Every government has the right to make

22:20

mistakes in pursuit of a better life

22:22

for its people. But

22:25

the cost of failure shouldn't be the loss of

22:27

sovereignty. I

22:31

don't know. Was

22:33

man's attempt at socialism a

22:35

noble ambition or just

22:38

economic suicide? I'll

22:40

let you decide. I'm

23:00

not going to do that. I'm going

23:02

to do that. I'm going

23:04

to do that. I'm

23:06

going to do that. In

23:22

the 1970s, my grandma

23:24

and grandpa returned to Uganda.

23:29

Yeah, there was danger but they were going

23:31

there regardless. Because

23:33

you know, home

23:35

is where the heart is. But

23:40

the stress of exile took a toll on my

23:42

grandpa. And

23:45

he got cancer. Uganda

23:51

had been independent for a decade but

23:53

he couldn't access adequate care.

23:58

The best vicinity was over. so

24:01

his only option was travelling there. Back

24:06

then under Idi Amin's government, my

24:09

grandfather needed permission to fly, so

24:12

my grandma went to the relevant

24:14

person and got a malicious reply.

24:19

Permission Denied. The

24:26

guy didn't like my grandad's politics to the

24:29

point he didn't care if he lived

24:31

or he died. And

24:33

in 1976, he died. My

24:42

grandma soldiered through the next 10 years,

24:44

raising kids and pressing on with her career.

24:49

In 1986 there was a change of

24:51

regime and judge became minister

24:53

for women's affairs. She

25:08

lived a long life of service. Teaching

25:12

had led her to a higher purpose. Despite

25:16

all the suffering she never lost

25:18

hope, if anything her struggle only

25:20

broadened in scope. She

25:23

became an advocate for progress, never

25:26

a voice of anger. The

25:29

one, the only, joysome

25:33

panga. We

25:40

need people like my grandma to remind us.

25:43

The injustices we face don't

25:46

define us. Yeah,

26:00

give us a second. Yeah, yeah, alright. Produced

26:03

by me and my guy, Ben Brick. With

26:06

an original score composed entirely

26:09

by Ben Brick and

26:11

recorded by the BBC Kwanzaa Orchestra.