Everytin Join: African Diaspora - Realities, Frustrations, Innovations

 I couldn’t stop laughing the first time I heard this phrase from an eloquent, softly spoken, editor of a global media house. We had been speaking about macroeconomic developments on the continent which led to a conversation about how interconnected life is. That was when she traded her slightly Americanised lilt to drop in the baseline: “everytin join” in her finest Nigerian pidgin.

She had chosen to join up the dots of her past, present and future, by moving from Europe back to the continent of her heritage, such that her children would have an appreciation of their culture, while having a global perspective. As a UK born Ghanaian who retraced her parents’ footsteps to the motherland 13 years ago, I can very much relate to this and I know I’m not alone. But that journey is slightly complicated.

The romantised view of the continent that some members of the UK’s black (4%) and mixed ethnicity (2.9%) community, respectively, may start off with, seems to give way to a relationship that resembles reality after some time. Growing up in the West, there are many stories of African Diasporans of my generation loving the allure of family gatherings at the weekends, eating jollof and bofrots, dancing to highlife classics and getting dressed up with some colourful, kente inspired outfits. But in the move back home, or indeed, spending significant time there, you begin to bear witness to certain recurring patterns which can begin to grate. For instance, being asked one too many times, “nti, y3 y3 ni d3n? (what are we going to do)” by the policeman who pulls you over in traffic because they feel they haven’t been adequately paid so how about a little community spirit by showing some [monetary] love? Or when your place as first in the queue becomes a debate about semantics: did you know that first place isn’t actually about being an early bird but rather, it’s about “whom you know” or “what you know [to put in an envelope]”?.

But like with any relationship, once you acknowledge the frustrations, you’re better equipped to make a choice: either to walk away or to work with what you’ve got. You can’t really do both. Developing one’s own coping mechanism has translated into converting frustrations into projects for some. Last week, it was great to speak with the founder of an organisation which bridges the divide between the Diaspora community and different parts of the continent by ensuring there’s a soft-landing for those seeking to invest or set up projects. It could be in arranging paperwork or handholding through a process or signposting to the right people, “because unless you’re there [on the ground], you could be sending money home for a house to be built, only to find when you turn up, that you’ve been sent photos of other properties and all your money has been squandered”. This very same issue of funds going astray is being tackled by a brilliant African entrepreneur who is solving the lack of trust issue with a tech solution. Another entrepreneur is trying to overcome patriarchy and a culture that is resistant to change by seeking to identify a CEO who can steer the company in the direction of a globally competitive firm.

Indeed, thinking long-term, contemplating structures – from insurance to the quality of leadership and organisational culture-  which could be put in place to insulate against the risk of what the country analyst in me would term as goal conflict, is worthwhile. It’s risk mitigation as well as disappointment mitigation, frustration mitigation, wasted energy mitigation, romantic-bubble-bursting mitigation. Alas, everytin join.

Photo by Joe Darams on Unsplash