West African Students' Union

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The West African Students' Union (WASU) was an association of students from different countries in West Africa who studied in Great Britain .

origin

WASU was founded on August 7, 1925 by 21 law students under the leadership of Lapido Solanke and Herbert Bankole-Bright in London . The year before, Solanke had founded the Nigerian Progress Union (NPU) for students living in London who came from Nigeria . With the support of Amy Ashwood Garvey , the NPU had started to work to improve the situation of all students who had come to London from Africa, while at the same time campaigning for changes in the British colonies in Africa.

As early as 1923, Solanke had demanded that the Union of Students of African Descent (USAD), a Christian-social organization shaped by students from the Caribbean , join the National Congress of British West Africa (NCBWA). In 1925, Bankole-Bright called on the NCBWA that the USAD, the NPU, the African Progress Union and the Gold Coast Students Association should unite in a joint organization of West African students along the lines of Indian students. The students followed this call and founded WASU, of which Solanke became the first General Secretary. JB Danquah became its president and JE Casely Hayford became its first official supporter.

The new organization made the abolition of racial barriers in the legal system its primary goal, it also supported political research and the NCBWA in its founding goals and campaigned for the construction of a student residence.

WASU began to publish a magazine "Wasu" in March 1926. Solanke and Julius Ojo-Cole wrote the majority of the articles in this publication, which was intended as an academic journal and was to be distributed both in Europe and Africa.

The goal of starting a dormitory had been taken over directly by the USAD and the NPU. Many students of African descent were unable to find adequate accommodation in Britain because of racism. The colonial administration responsible for Africa, the Colonial Office, had an interest in setting up such a dormitory, but WASU wanted it under their control. In 1929 Solanke went on a trip to West Africa to raise funds. In the meantime, the Colonial Office convened a secret commission to enable a dormitory under its control, and they started looking for private donors.

WASU was also politically active in Great Britain. In 1929 an African village exhibition in Newcastle was prevented because it was viewed as derogatory. The campaign against the exhibition was even carried into Parliament by Shapurji Saklatvala, who sat for the British Communist Party (CPGB) in the British House of Commons . During the 1930s, WASU developed various links with communist groups such as the League Against Imperialism (LAI) and the Negro Welfare Association . WASU and the communists also worked together in their efforts to oppose the lifting of racial barriers in the legal system and in protest against the Italian invasion of Ethiopia .

During his trip through Africa, Solanke founded more than 20 WASU agencies in the Gold Coast Colony , Nigeria , Sierra Leone and the Belgian Congo . Most of these groups existed for a short time, but they later became the Nigerian Youth Movement and the Gold Coast Youth Conference .

The activities of the 1930s

By the time Solanke returned to Britain in 1932, Wasu magazine had ceased publication and membership had fallen amid constant controversy between students from Nigeria and those from the Gold Coast. However, Solanke had raised so much money that in March 1933 a dormitory was opened in Camden called "Africa House". The dormitory not only offered students accommodation, it also offered accommodation to visitors from West Africa and there was also information material about West Africa. The dormitory could not end the disputes within WASU and Solanke was also accused of wasting money while in Africa trying to control the dormitory on his own. Almost all members of the GCSA left WASU and even the intervention of William Ofori Atta did not end the dispute.

The Colonial Office was still determined to open its own dormitory because it was there that it could oversee and direct the political discussion. WASU was against this dormitory and founded a committee, the "Africa House Defense Committee", for which it received the support of Reginald Bridgeman of the LAI and the National Council for Civil Liberties with Paul Robeson , who received the title of "Basale of the Union" . The "Aggrey House" dormitory of the Colonial Office opened in October 1934, but a boycott led by WASU left it empty until the Colonial Office offered to officially recognize WASU and provide financial support for the "Africa House" agreed. WASU was in financial difficulties and accepted the offer of support from the Colonial Office and other organizations such as the United African Company (UAC).

In 1937, the turned Gold Coast Farmers Union of Solanke and asked for support to the cocoa cartel of Cadbury to break and the UAC. Labor MPs Reginald Sorensen and Arthur Creech Jones supported WASU in its 1938 campaign to support small farmers on the Gold Coast who boycotted large companies. This campaign convinced most of the GCSA members to rejoin WASU.

In July 1938, WASU opened a student residence in Camden Square with support from various West African countries and British companies. This also solved the financial problems of the WASU and enabled it to intensify its political work. The WASU was increasingly perceived as an anti-colonial group. WASU demanded self-government ( Dominion status ) and universal suffrage in the West African colonies. Clement Attlee gave a speech at WASU, in which he stated that the Atlantic Charter applies to all nations, thus supporting the view of WASU. But Winston Churchill insisted that the right to self-determination applies only to European states.

The activities of the 1940s

In 1942, WASU established a "West African Parliamentary Committee", of which Reginald Sorensen was chairman. It was called for the internal self-government of the British colonies in West Africa to be established immediately and for the independence of the colonies to be achieved within five years of the end of the war. Harold Macmillan came personally to Africa House to present the UK Government's position on the matter.

WASU's influence in West Africa increased again when both the Nigerian Union of Students and the Sierra Leone Students' Union joined it. WASU also represented the Nigerian teachers' union in the UK. Through this connection with the Nigerian trade union movement, WASU became an important supporter of the general strike in Nigeria in 1945.

In the mid-1940s, Solanke traveled again to West Africa to solicit financial support and HO Davies became acting general secretary. WASU joined the world youth movement. In 1946 a conference was held jointly with the West African National Secretariat of Kwame Nkrumah . Nkrumah became the vice president of WASU and a joint declaration was passed in support of anti-imperialism and socialism . In 1947 WASU demanded the immediate independence of the West African colonies and criticized the Labor government for failing to implement it.

The activities of the 1950s

When Solanke returned from West Africa in the late 1940s, he had raised enough money to open a new residence on the Chelsea Embankment . But Solanke fell out with the WASU leadership on mutual allegations of wastefulness and resigned all his offices in 1949. During the election campaign to lead WASU in 1951, he appeared with an anti-communist group - but he did not manage to oust the largely communist leadership group around Joe Appiah and Ade Ademola . In 1952, WASU decided to close their Camden dormitory, but Solanke took it over instead.

WASU joined the International Union of Students (IUS) when it was founded and WASU members regularly took part in the World Youth Games. The National Union of Students of the United Kingdom resigned from the IUS in 1952, but the WASU remained a member.

In 1952, WASU began publishing the "WASU News Service", an openly Marxist replacement for the magazine "Wasu". After financial difficulties, WASU closed its dormitory on Chelsea Embankment and opened an easier-to-finance dormitory on Warrington Crescent in 1956. In the same year, WASU was fundamentally reorganized. WASU severed all ties to political organizations. In 1958 WASU joined the Committee of African Organizations and gradually lost its importance. WASU remained active until the early 1960s.

Succession organization

A new West African Students Union was founded in Ghana in 2004 . Its aim is to unite all students in West Africa. She sees herself as a direct successor to the old WASU.

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