Vuvuzela & 2010 World Cup: Africans Get Rid of Neocolonial Virus

**By Akadu Ntiriwa Mensema, Ph. D.

Vu

Vuu

Vuuu

Vuuuuu

Ah! Vu Vu Zee La Africa

Oh! Vuvuzela Africa

You are here to stay

Historic pristine horn

Of Xhosa, Zulu, Tshwane

You have always been with us

You have overpowered the West

You resonate immaculate sounds

Inspiring

Summoning

Commanding

Clarifying resonance

Soaring eloquence of music

Twinkling musical possession

Of evocative appreciation

Music that commands the wind

Music that holds the sun still

Music that brightens the moon

Music that horizons Africa

Ah! Vu Vu Zee La Africa

Faultless jingle

Married to soothing echoes

The horn of old Africa

Welcomes all to the new Africa

Via pathways of South Africa

Vu

Vuu

Vuuu

Vuuuuu

Ah! Vu Vu Zee La

Your soothing silhouetting music

Soothing music has drowned the West

Western noise-making

Noise that seeks to demonize Africans

Demonize African soothing tunes

Don’t mind Africa’s siblings

Arrogant siblings of hegemony

They have their ice hockey

Where noise cheers violence

Where violence cheers noise

Where blood is a signifier victory

They have their football

Where noise cheers concussions

Cheer-leaders of female nudity

They have their soccer games

Where punk-drunks slaughter noise

Cacophonic racists cheer whiteness

They have bull-running games

Where noise cheers gory bloodiness

Cacophonic NOISE

They call it CIVILIZED noise

Vu

Vuuu

Vu Vu Zee La

Oh! Vuvuzela

You have drowned the Western noise

Western cacophonic noise-making

Africa’s imperious siblings

Always have home-grown ideas

Ideas that marginalize Africans

Hegemonic marginalization

Of our religions

Our languages, epistemology

Of our names

Our worldviews, ontology

Of our social formations

Our gendering, sexualities

Of our statehood, statecraft

Our foods, oxygen

Of our sun

Our blackness

Anything of African origin

Encapsulated in Western imaginings

Of negativist frameworks

Africa our Africa

Mother Africa of vuvuzela

Our Africa’s noble calling

Of soothing music

From South Africa

Heard from vuvuzela

Dazzling the world

Is noise in Westernized ears

Of Africa’s arrogant siblings

Vu

Vuu

Vuuu

Vu Vu Zee La

Vuvuzela

Privileged West

In the garb of hegemony

Of inventing everything

Of wishing to have their way

Africans stand firm

Stand, Africans stand firm

Let us blow our Vuvuzela

Vu Vu Vu Zeee Laaaaaaaaa

Has overpowered their noise-making

Cacophonic Western noise-making

Of our bane of darkness

Vu Vu Vu Zeee Laaaaaaaaa

Our Africa has emerged

Africa emerged to be heard

To make healing music

To make empowering music

Ah! Vu Vu Vu Zeee Laaaaaaaaa

*Akadu N. Mensema, Ph. D., is a nationalist Denkyira beauty. She is a trained oral

historian cum sociologist and Professor in the USA. She lives in Pennsylvania with

her great mentor and teaches Africa-area studies at a college in Maryland. In her

pastime, she writes what critics have called “populist hyperbolic, satirical”

poetry. She can be reached at akadumensema@yahoo.com