On October 4, 1963, following the founding of the
Organization of African Unity in Addis Ababa a few weeks earlier in the
presence of almost every African head of state, His Imperial Majesty Haile
Selassie the First spoke at the United Nations' General Assembly in New York
City. In the fast changing world of the sixties, as many African nations were
struggling for independence, Selassie's historic utterance carried the full
weight of the OAU he had just founded in a masterful diplomatic operation, of
panafricanism on the rise and, more generally, of all the oppressed people
throughout the world, in the name of whom everyone felt he spoke.
Baptized Tafari Makonen, then given the rank of a Ras
(equivalent of a Duke), he belonged to the oldest dynasty in the world, which,
according to the ancient and sacred Ethiopian book the Kebra Nagast (The Glory
of Kings), was in power at least as far back as Menelik the First, son of
Solomon, King of Israel, and Makeda, Queen of Sheba. The Ras Tafari's
coronation/sacrament in 1930 as Haile Selassie I ("Power of the
Trinity") was seen by a small community of Jamaican Christians as the fulfillment
of a Biblical prophecy that Marcus Garvey, who was struggling for Black
emancipation, used frequently in his speeches.
These Christians recognized Selassie as the Divine leader referred
to in the prophecy and henceforth later began calling themselves Rastafarians,
as in Jah (one of many Hebrew names for God) Rastafari. This syncretic faith
has since grown to millions of followers, from Blacks to half-castes, like Bob
Marley, to people of all colours. As Selassie himself said at the United
Nations, "Until the colour of a man's skin is of no more significance than
the colour of his eyes", righteous Rastafarians will be struggling for
equal rights and justice throughout the world. In his 45 years of reign, the
mighty Lord of Lords sought to pull Ethiopia out of its feudal past and towards
democracy. Many think of Selassie as the Nelson Mandela of his time. The Negus
was also a key figure in the founding of the United Nations, where the
utterance heard on this record was spoken in Amharic, the Ethiopian language.
Part of this legendary peace speech by Selassie, then at the
zenith of his reign, was turned into the song War by Bob Marley who recorded it
for his fine 1976 Rastaman Vibration album. Thus Rastafarians, and above all
Bob Marley, are showing the way for mankind to finally recognize one of the
most overlooked civilizations in history -that of Ethiopia. It is in this
spirit that Bruno Blum produced this new version of War with surviving members
of Marley's extraordinary band, the Wailers, who can also be heard on the
original recording of the song. Haile Selassie's voice was then overdubbed on
it, as if he was posthumously "singing" this Bob Marley song. For the
first time, the sound of Jah's own voice can be heard on a reggae record, and Bob
Marley's voice was also added in the mix.
English translation as published in the 1972 book Important
Utterances of H.I.M. by the Imperial Ethiopian Ministry Of Information, Addis
Ababa, Ethiopia:
"On the question of racial discrimination, the Addis Ababa
summit conference taught, to those who will learn, this further lesson :
that until the philosophy which holds one race superior and
another inferior is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned;
that until there are no longer first class and second class
citizens of any nation;
that until the colour of a man's skin is of no more
significance than the colour of his eyes;
that until the basic human rights are equally guaranteed to
all, without regard to race;
that until that day, the dream of lasting peace and world
citizenship and the rule of international morality will remain but fleeting
illusions, to be pursued but never attained.
And until the ignoble and unhappy regimes that hold our
brothers in Angola, in Mozambique and in South Africa in sub-human bondage have
been toppled and destroyed; until bigotry and prejudice and malicious and
inhuman self-interest have been replaced by understanding and tolerance and
good-will; until all Africans stand and speak as free beings, equal in the eyes
of all men, as they are in the eyes of Heaven; until that day, the African
continent will not know peace.
We Africans will fight, if necessary and we know that we
shall win, as we are confident in the victory of good over evil.
The basis of racial discrimination and colonialism has been
economic, and it is with economic weapons that these evils have been and can be
overcome. In pursuance of resolutions adopted at the Addis Ababa summit
conference, African states have undertaken certain measures in the economic
field which, if adopted by all member states of the United Nations, would soon
reduce intransigence to reason.
I ask, today, for adherence to these measures by every
nation represented here which is truly devoted to the principles enunciated in
the charter.
We must act while we can, while the occasion exists to exert
those legitimate pressures available to us lest time run out and resort be had
to less happy means.
The great nations of the world would do well to remember
that in the modern age even their own fates are not wholly in their hands.
Peace demands the united efforts of us all. Who can foresee
what spark might ignite the fuse?
The stake of each one of us is identical-life or death.
We all wish to live. We all seek a world in which men are
freed of the burdens of ignorance, poverty, hunger and disease. And we shall
all be hard-pressed to escape the deadly rain of nuclear fall-out should
catastrophe overtake us.
The problems which confront us today are, equally,
unprecedented. They have no counterparts in human experience. Men search the
pages of history for solutions, for precedents, but there are none.
This then, is the ultimate challenge. Where are we to look
for our survival, for the answers to the questions which have never before been
posed? We must look, first, to the Almighty God, Who has raised man above the
animals and endowed him with intelligence and reason. We must put our faith in
Him, that He will not desert us or permit us to destroy humanity which He
created in His image.
And we must look into ourselves, into the depth of our
souls. We must become something we have never been and for which our education
and experience and environment have ill-prepared us.
We must become bigger than we have been: more courageous,
greater in spirit, larger in outlook. We must become members of a new race,
overcoming petty prejudice, owing our ultimate allegiance not to nations but to
our fellow men within the human community."
Haile Selassie I
4 October 1963
United Nations, New York.
