I have sculpted for many years although ironically, I studied painting in university but after I finished and lived at the town called Nsukka University Town, I developed the joy for sculpting and I have been sculpting since then. My sculpture has, unlike other sculptures, where you would get a massive piece of wood or stone and cut away from it to form something, I work from pieces. This work has about 500 pieces and is very detailed when you get to see it in person. Then, University students started coming to my workshop to learn how to do this form of art. I have also made pieces for the likes of Nelson Mandela, Prince Charles and Lady Diana and various presidents.
My sculpt piece is all types of wood added together and it signifies the fact that when you have a large group of people come together as a force to form one unity, they are stronger and binding which is able to defend the foe more than if they were separated in pieces in which it came, because in their single pieces they are basically meaningless. For me, the fist is a signal of daring the bully to get off our backs. The fist which was used by Jessie Owens and Angela Davis, also for the Black Power, has since then transcended to mean plenty of things for different oppressed people who now find themselves suddenly in a situation where Black people have found themselves for centuries, a situation which they felt would never happen to them.
Those who said that Black Lives Matter has no relevance in Wales might not have seen the video that started this whole issue. Anybody who saw that video of a human being kneeling on another man’s neck and that one screaming that he could not breathe, anybody who thought that was okay belongs to a mental institution, because that makes you a dangerous member of the society.
If there is a man, just because he is Black and is walking on the street, the police see him doing something that they believe is a crime, and their response is to kneel on his back, on his neck, and his friends watch long enough for someone to video the incident, long enough for the policeman to be so consumed in what he’s doing that he doesn’t even notice he’s being filmed and documented, then this act is a grave violation of basic human rights and reflects a deeply rooted issue that demands urgent attention and systemic change. Nobody rules with hatred forever. The truth always waits, fairness always waits even if it takes a century, it always comes back to fairness.
I have come to this country for years in my early 20s, there has been a massive clear positive difference. One of the main differences is the fact that there are many laws or sub laws against discrimination. What used to happen then was that it was an accepted norm in the society that ‘’no Black person comes here, no Black person sits on this bus, no Black person can go to this pub, no Black person can do that’’ but it is not acceptable now.
I believe in the minister’s positivity but I would not put a date to any behavioural manner or act. There has to be a document, it has to be abbreviated to a portion of time and life so I agree. Like I said, I have seen a change in society already. There is a positive improvement about relationships and how younger people will take over as they grow older and become more open.
They should come together. Just come together and be strong. Do not lose faith.
