Gideon Adeyeni, a development worker and activist during the Christmas break, travelled to Accra, Ghana on his bicycle. He narrates his experience in this short travelogue
I wrote a greater part of this piece sitting under a tree on my way to Tema from Aflao, Ghana.
Between 23rd and 28th December 2023, I rode my bicycle from Lagos, Nigeria through Benin Republic, Togo to Accra, Ghana, as part of actions for Africans Rising Campaign for the free movement of African peoples (citizens and descendants) on the continent. If I was asked how I felt during the six-day ride, I would have borrowed the ungrammatical yet profound expression of the old lady during the movement led by Martin Luther King, when she said “My body is tired, but my soul is rested”.
During the ride, I had the opportunity to see a part of the beautiful continent more keenly and to interact with her people so closely. I would recommend the freedom ride to anyone, even though I would also warn of its high risk and tediousness. It is a fulfilling albeit tedious journey!
I did this as a pilot ride for the “Pan African Freedom Rides”, recognizing that such dramatic actions help galvanize the people towards campaigns like the Free Movement Campaign. I had proposed Pan African Freedom Rides as one of the actions for the Borderless Africa Campaign in 2022, with the strong feeling that physically transcending the colonial partitions called borders left by colonists will help our people in psychologically transcending them and thus commit to breaking them.
Upon arriving in Accra, I had a live television interview with Onua TV on the morning of December 29, 2023 https://www.facebook.com/100003520176939/videos/2218104685064867/ .
I have also put together my travel notes which I typed with my tired fingers each day after settling in my hotel room during the ride.
Throughout this tedious yet fulfilling journey, I remained constantly motivated by the understanding that revolutionary actions like this, which require serious self-denial, are personally redemptive and socially liberating.
I hope that this action will inspire more dramatic and disruptive actions in the coming period within our movement and beyond, so that we may put sufficient pressure on those who defend this deadening status quo, and thus win some concrete progress.
- Adeyeni is a Programme Officer with the Corporate Accountability and Pubic Participation Africa (CAPPA)
