REMARKS OF CONGRESSMAN (D-NY, USA) GREGORY W. MEEKS DURING THE NIGERIAN LAWYERS ASSOCIATION ANNUAL DINNER at IN  NEW YORK, SATURDAY, MAY 24, 2003

I want to thank you very much for the inviting me to take part in this festive occasion. I want to congratulate the Nigerian Lawyers Association and its president, Shamsey Oloko, and its Executive Board, for their tremendous efforts to articulate and advance the professional needs of lawyers of Nigerian descent and to give voice to the democratic aspirations of the Nigerian people.

I would also like to commend the NLA for helping to involve its members in the civic and political life of the United States. Although most of your members are of Nigerian descent, your organization correctly recognizes that its members live and work here, pay taxes here, obey the laws and defend the law here, and therefore have an abiding interest in what transpires here.

The NLA has come a long way in the four short years since its founding in 1999. It has established important priorities that will help the organization become a force for the professionalism of Nigerian lawyers throughout the world and for strengthening democracy not only in Nigeria but in every country in which NLA members practice law.

You are providing effective legal advocacy for Nigerians here in the United States, in Nigeria, and around the world. You are making a very important contribution to inculcating the principle of the rule of law in both the national and international context.

In doing this you have displayed remarkable courage in condemning arbitrary action against law-abiding Nigerian citizens, including death threats against women who assert their rights. You have spoken out against the assassination of law enforcement officers. And, you have boldly issued a call for a major conference to debate Sharia laws in Nigeria. All of this reflects the NLA’s commitment to “give voice to the voiceless and lend your strength to the weak.”

The Nigerian Lawyers Association is becoming a bridge of understanding, interaction, and dialogue between the Nigerian community and the America people in general, African Americans in particular. This is a very important contribution to developing deep mutually beneficial relations between the United States and Nigeria.

While it may be true that many African Americans and Africans feel an affinity toward each other, it is equally true that Americans of African descent, let alone Americans in general, on the one hand, and Africans from the continent on the other hand, have a long ways to go in developing realistic, respectful, and resourceful relations with each other. Yet, this is an interdependent world. And the legacy of the slave trade, slavery, and colonialism, still plague us. We need each other. We need to cooperate and reinforce each other.

African Americans need Africa to assert itself on the world stage. Africa needs America to treat all countries on the continent fairly, equitably, and respectfully. African Americans and Africans living in America are key to that happening.

Those of those of us who live in the African diaspora have a special role to play. Africans who live and work in the United States and are active in its civic life can be a bridge between the United States and Africa, as well as between African Americans and Africa.

But we have to face facts. Although African Americans share the same skin color with Africans, most of us don’t understand contemporary Africa. Often we don’t understand Africans living among us. True, over the decades, African Americans were an indispensable source of solidarity with the struggle against apartheid, with African liberation movements, and with African anti-colonial struggles for national independence. But, now that these goals have been attained, now that Africa has entered the post-apartheid era, now that all African countries have gained their independence, most African Americans are at a lost as to how to help Africa and how Africa can help us.

The Nigerian Lawyers Association is helping to bridge this gap. So is the Congressional Black Caucus. The CBC made great progress during the Clinton years. Although the going is much tougher now, the CBC nevertheless continually lobbies the Bush Administration on issues ranging from trade to peace keeping to HIV/AIDS. The CBC has repeatedly met with Secretary of State Colin Powell and other senior administration officials on questions of assistance to Africa.

Indeed, CBC members are making a strenuous effort to ensure that Africa is a priority item on our nation’s foreign policy agenda. Many of us have been involved in efforts to mediate civil wars in individual African countries. We have participated in the monitoring of elections.

We have used our positions on the Africa Subcommittee of the House International Relations Committee and other congressional committees to advocate for Africa. We have introduced and passed legislation in that regard, most recently the African Growth and Trade Act.

For my part, I have been working practically since the day I took office six years ago to make Africa a factor in the economic development of the Sixth Congressional District which I represent. I want to facilitate the development of well-rounded, multi-faceted relations between my district and the African continent. A few years ago, I organized a trade delegation to West African, including to Nigeria. I accompanied President Clinton on his historic trip to Africa.
In my view, there are three keys to opening the door to Africa’s progress. One is South Africa. One is Nigeria. The other is America.

When I say the United States is one of the keys to Africa’s progress I don’t mean this in the way that Bush Administration officials seem to mean it. They refer to the growing importance of Nigeria’s vast oil resources to American strategic economic and political interests. But, saying that Nigeria is important to America because of her oil harkens back to colonialism and revives neo-colonialism. It suggests that if Nigeria had no oil it would not be important to America.

The importance of Nigeria’s oil is obvious. But, what may be less evident — at least to an administration that seems incapable of viewing any country outside of access to its oil — is Nigeria’s enormous potential for using its large and diverse population, its sizeable professional class, its egalitarian traditions, and its immense natural resources, including oil, for self-development.

Africa is just as interdependent as the world. A modernized Nigeria that achieves equitable internal development that benefits all sectors of Nigerian society would be an engine that drives the economic independence of Africa and elevates the well-being of Africans throughout the diaspora. The mix of Nigeria’s resources, its talent, and its egalitarian values would be a potent brew that could help the entire continent rise to a new level of social and economic development. Wherever Nigerian oil goes national social and economic development that benefits all Nigerians should come back in return.

We in the African diaspora must support such a process. We should seek business opportunities in Nigeria with the objective of mutual benefit in mind. But, for this to happen, we African Americans in particular need to better understand Nigeria and other African countries. We need to be full informed about the development plans and processes in Nigeria and other African countries.

For this to happen, African American elected officials, businesses, academics, and cultural figures need to engage in a broad dialogue with Africans on the continent. Above all, we need to listen to our brothers and sisters on the continent and learn.

We also need to recognize that there are diasporas within the broader African diaspora. There is, for instance, a specific Nigeria diaspora. The Nigerian Lawyers Association is a manifestation of this reality. We see this not only in New York City, but also in Washington, D.C., Atlanta, and other cities that are experiencing substantial immigration from Africa. African immigrants are setting up all kinds of organizations and institutions and enterprises, often by country of origin.

I believe this adds to the potential power of the African diaspora as a whole. Organization, as long as it is not factionalism, always makes us stronger. For one thing, these organizations create structures with which African American policy makers can hold the kind of dialogue I just talked about. They create cultural forums at which we can learn more about Africa.

For another thing, these organizations, institutions, and establishments help all members of the African diaspora defend our interests and sometimes our person. Remember, although Africans may come from different countries and cultures and religions, once in the United States the larger society regards them a Black and therefore a target of racism and discrimination. We must never forget that Amadou Diallo wasn’t asked whether he was an immigrant or native born. Add to that the fact that many Africans are also Muslims and therefore subjects to post 9/11 religious and racial profiling.

My hope is that Nigerians and other Africans who come to America to make a better life for themselves, who intend to make the United States home, will become American citizens, register to vote and, above all, become actively engaged in civic and political life. Even if you don’t intend to stay in America, I urge you to become actively involved in the democratic struggles not only of Black America, but of the American people as a whole.

Engagement in the democratic process is the best way to learn about the strengths and flaws of democracy in America. If you plan to someday return to Nigeria, what you learn here in the United States and particularly in New York City with its incredible racial, ethnic, and religious diversity may enrich the contribution you will make once you return to Nigeria.

This is especially true for lawyers. Nigeria is trying to establish the rule of law and a strong civil society, the United States is a good case study in having too many laws and too few laws, too many poorly enforced laws and not enough good law.

There are bound to be things in our experience that will prove useful to constructing a law-governed society in Nigeria. I don’t mean that the way you are probably used to hearing about American democracy. It is not that America is a paragon of virtue that the rest of the world must emulate or be subjected to preemption or regime change.

My point is that starting with the Bill of Rights, extending through the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments, embracing the regulatory acts that reformed banking and the stock market, as well as established the minimum wage, the right to unionize, and social security in 1930, then the 1954 Brown decision which overthrew legal segregation, the Civil Rights, Voting Rights, and Fair Housing Acts of the 1960s that opened the way to fuller minority participation in politics and public accommodations, then the Roe v Wade decision establishing a woman’s right to choose, and on through the Occupational Health and Safety Act, the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, which together erected a structure of environmental protection, a whole body of legislation and judicial decisions came into being that expanded democracy by virtue of restraining government and corporate abuse. Each measure was a product of unrelenting struggle involving millions of people. This is what forced America to become a more inclusive society.

Propagandists boast about American democracy, but they seldom mention the struggle of Americans for democracy. I am of the view that democracy is a universal construct. It is not the exclusive property of America or the West. People in every country thirst for democracy and social justice. But each community will have to come to democracy by the path and with the means and in pursuit of the goals that they themselves define.

If there in anything in the American experience that is helpful, please put it to use. I invite you to study not only our laws, but also how they came into being and how equitably are they enforced.

At the same time, I am sure that Nigerians in the diaspora have many insights that could be helpful to our continuing struggle for equal opportunity and democratic progress. So let the dialogue proceed. Again, I urge to be fully involved in political, economic, professional, and civic life. Engage the issues as you find them. Above all, continue to be a bridge of understanding between Nigerians and African Americans, between Nigeria and America. Here and abroad, whether in New York City and Lagos, continue to provide a voice for the voiceless and strength for the weak.
Thank you.

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