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Jasmine Melendez
World Literature
Mr. Marfield
12 November 2009
Seeing Africa through African Eyes

Bernth Lindfors, a professor of English and African Literatures at the University of

Texas, describes Chinua Achebe as a “Novelist of Cultural Conflict”. Achebe holds the

magnificent and unique capability of analyzing and foretelling the historical events of his

country, since only nine days after his country’s republic downfall, he published A Man of the

People. In this novel, he brings to surface a series of cultural and political issues that contaminate

his nation. The term “cultural infection” is not only an evocator of pessimistic ideas about

culture, but it is also a theory characterized by thought-provoking and insightful outcomes.

Chinua Achebe’s A Man of the People, his fourth book, encompasses this very same concept of

“cultural infection”; by fragmenting the African democratic system of government and

intentionally exposing the disposition of Nigerians, Achebe reveals powerful and significant

perceptions about the effects of colonization on post-colonial countries.

Democracy is “the free and equal right of every person to participate in a system of

government” (Encarta 2004); a first reading of A Man of the People tells the story of Odili’s

struggle for a better democracy in his country, but by analyzing carefully how each character

portrays what democracy really is, we develop a conscious thought of democracy’s

ineffectiveness. The story reveals the incompetence of all those who gain positions in the

government. We cannot forget Chief Nanga’s “new four storeyed building” (116), and his

immoral way of caring only about women, land property, and cars. Likewise, Odili, the main

character and narrator of the story, shockingly possesses similar traits as he proves himself

corrupt and immoral by displaying arrogant and revengeful qualities; perhaps the most noticeable
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corrupt idea that Odili possesses is his act of hypocritically joining an opposing political party,

the C.P.C., for the sole purpose of getting revenge against Chief Nanga. Additionally, Max who

is a member of the C.P.C., which by the way is a communist party, accepts a bribe; this unethical

and crooked act not only shows that the so called “educated elite” is not so different from the

“ignorant” people, but it also frames the C.P.C. as just as corrupt as the P.A.P. .We, therefore,

become conscious that the system of democracy is, consequently, inoperative. So, why is it then

that no one specific party can function effectively?

I believe that the key to analyzing this significant problem is to understand the origins of

politics and its features. Well, let us just say that politics itself derived in Europe. We discover

that the “word politics originally has connotations in the ways in which to create the ideal

society” (Aristotle, 1996). The views of Plato also reveal that “politics implies measures which

could and should, in the views of their devisor, be implemented in the hope to create a better

society, than that which is already present” (The Republic, 1987).

This concept of politics further tells us, however, that it is mankind’s intrinsic nature to

be selfish, and that by trying to gain power over another, man will do whatever possible to gain

the interests of as many groups of people as possible, whether it is done honestly or dishonestly;

the men in A Man of the People know that politics implies power. Nanga is perhaps

representative of the typical political man, for he is characterized by a number of selfish

attributes, and his main goal is to perpetuate himself by trying to get people to succumb to his

own ideas and interests.

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So, we see that politics derived from the European country, Athens. According to the

great philosophers, Plato and Aristotle, “Politics is a way of combating the degradation of society

into a violent and unconstructed mess by reducing it to be governed by the primitive instinct of

man in order to resolve conflict”. However, we observe that these obsolete philosophies are

contradicting because how can man resolve conflict when man himself is involved in conflict?

Consequently, not only does politics allows men to turn against each other so corruptly, but it

also proves itself dysfunctional in Odili’s society; as previously mentioned, “politics implies

measures which could and should, in the views of their devisor, be implemented in the hope to

create a better society, than that which is already present”. There is no evidence that the society

is in a better state than it was before the Europeans colonized!

So, was all this concept of “politics” really necessary in this part of the world? Nigeria is

one of the wealthiest countries in the world, mainly because of the richness of its land! This is

just one of the colonizer’s ways of infecting a society’s culture. Odili describes his people as

contemptible and mindless, but at the same time he fails to realize that his people’s minds are as

infected as his. Even us as readers may have concluded that the people are unintelligent and

hopeless, but it just proves how our very own minds have been infected by the colonizers. It is

commonly said that the Europeans had a “civilized mission”, but A Man of the People reveals

how dysfunctional and uncivilized a colonizer’s ideas can serve in another country, Nigeria.

Lindfors contributes.

Then, with the coming of the white man, things fell apart, and anarchy
was loosed upon the Ibo world. The white men, in other words, were not
bringers of light to a dark continent, as was popularly supposed, and their
“civilizing mission” did not result in peace, order and harmony. Rather,
they were ignorant servants of a powerful English queen who disrupted a
well-ordered, cohesive, pacific society by imposing on it their own forms
of government.
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Furthermore, the realm of politics clearly points out that in a political system, conflict is

bound to occur. Placing men against each other is, as evidently seen in Ngugi Wa Thiongo’s

Weep Not Child, an effective technique that the colonizers used to control the people; the

colonizers knew that the union of African tribes was their most effective form of resistance,

which they (the colonizers) must target. Achebe knew, saw, and still knows all that was, would,

and will happen to his country, hence the revelation, A Man of the People.

Conclusively, Achebe ends his novel with no evident or meaningful solution. Even though

Nanga was overthrown, Odili and the C.P.C. were still not victorious, for Max was killed, and

Odili was hospitalized. Many, like Achebe, blame the European colonizers for the “moral

confusion and political chaos that beset African states” (Chinua Achebe: Novelist of Cultural

Conflict, 1996). Colonization has thus achieved its purpose of changing the way a people think.

Olawale Awosika, professor at Ambrose Alli University, tells us that “the African community

may still have to wait”. Achebe’s masterpiece proves that colonizer’s ideas were not after all

“civilized”, but rather dysfunctional and destructive to a society’s people and culture.
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Reference:

Aristotle: The Politics and the Constitution of Athens. 1996 Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press. Cambridge.

Plato: The Republic. London. Pinguin, 1987

Achebe, Chinua. A Man of the People. Oxford: Heinemann, AWS, 1988

Bernth Lindfors: Chinua Achebe: Novelist of Cultural Conflict. July 20 1996.

University of Texas. Austin. November 12 2009

Olawale Awosika: The Educated Elite and the Leadership Initiative in Post-Colonial West
Africa. A Reading of Chinua Achebe’s A Man of the People. Ambrose Alli University