Africa Night- Come Let's Dance For Goodwill

The African Night On Saturday in Eisenberg Germany. The dance world (Tanzwelt) Movement GmbH, is a dance school in Eisenberg runs by Beate Wagner and Sascha Nickel. They help in organizing the Africa night, bringing together different dancer and singers to come and perform at the event for goodwill purpose. The Africa night show is a yearly programme in collaboration with NGOS who are working in Africa (German Volunteer Programs) working to save lives of sick children in Africa (Kenya and Ruanda). 

According to, Mr Manfred Lackmann the chairman of ZIGIRA Health care (Gesundheitshilfe) in Kenya, and Mrs Erika-Hauß-Delker the president for the hospital association (Ehrenamtliche Presidentin) who is also an ophthalmologist helping in Ruanda, they explained how they started the movement project to help sick and poor children in Africa (Kenya and Ruanda), eighteen years ago they started to build schools in Africa, even though the schools are own by the Kenyan government the large part is sponsored by this organizations. Seven years ago they start, to build health care centers in Mombasa Kenya to help the sick children who are dying from malaria and other diseases. Same in Ruanda. According to, Mrs Erika-Hauß-Delker in her speech, she said that, we are doing this for the African; so that the children can go to school, so that they can give them medicine against malaria and help them to live like every other normal person, to enable them to learn a profession in order for them to have a job in the future. She also talk about how they have been helping in fight against malaria and hepatitis in Africa (Ruanda). 

Seven acts performed during the events, including children. The first group from among these seven groups, was The Cross Over Choir from Ebertsheim, The Square Dance Club from Eisenberg, The Crazy Jumpers Dance, and among others was the Tolan Kadi Dance group. The Tolan Kadi Dance was led by Ibrahim Camara. Tolan Kadi is a traditional or cultural dance from West African country Togo. Ibrahim Camara is very artistic, and he is able to communicate with his dancing skills. One can see how he uses his dance to communicate with all the people present at the event, without speaking, he uses his body language to move nearly all the audience out of their seats to join him on the dance floor. By the way, the Tolan Kadi Dance is from Togo but this group also have some (Germans) European who are active member of the dance group. I am also a Nigerian, for the first time in my adult lifetime I participated actively at the show, even though I am not from Togo, I was able to use the drum. It can be said that the importance of drumming and dance in African culture is central. However, the importance of dance in any society which are traditionally based on oral and performance of art, skills and modes of communication and forms of message and information for transmission through performance, emotion and social behavior for example, Square Dance and Tolan Kadi dance groups proved this theory of dance codes.

They also take break between the shows, and during the break time the goodwill offering was collected. Some people gave money to support the project in Africa. The organizers of the events said that all the money generated from the Africa Night will be send to Africa to continue with their project. The dance world movement, has really used the Africa Night to fostered development and inspired Africa by gathering people every year for this event. And I think this legacy will move us forward in Africa, I hope it will be extended to other poor African countries. It is really terrible, and painful that some children have to suffer in this way, as it is in Africa today. In my own opinion I think all people deserve the good chance to live a good, healthy life, but unfortunately that is not how our world works seeing all this poor children dying in Africa and other third world countries. 

I have seen, read and watch in TV programs on how the Germans or Europeans And Americans are contributing towards various projects in Africa; such as to save the sick children, to produce medicine to combat the epidemic disease, to give the African children good and better life etc. But I do ponder on why some rich people in Africa are not contributing toward their own nation development. For example, in Nigeria a lot of rich people are living a luxurious lifestyle including the pastors. Most of this people have private jets and exotic cars, they live in mansions and wear designer clothes and some people are dying in their country for a problem that could be solve for small amount of money. The one that surprised me most are the churches or religious leaders in Africa (Nigeria), they collect tithes and offerings from the poor people and they use the money to build schools, that the poor people can not even afford to pay the fees of the school. Pastors are living in mansions and flying in private jets. The best government schools we have in Nigeria today, are schools built by the missionaries during the colonial rule. As a child I have always see the Europeans as the god of this world, seeing and reading about all the good things they have done in the world today. 

Another problem I will like to talk about, unlike in Germany where the people plan before they have one child, because they believe children are very expensive to take care of them in order to give them good quality of life, but the African mentality is such that the more they breed, the richer they are. Since they hope and believe the children will take care of them when they are older which is not bad though. The Germans know how costly it is to raise just one child, but the Africans do not believe child cares is expensive. It is really sad to see how children are dying in some African countries; it is not the fault of the children, but the nation they are born in. Unlike in Germany where the government make provision for children right from their birth. The Africans government do not have such system. In Germany a child receive 180 Euro in a month, this money can feed a family of five children in some African countries for a month or more. That is why some African people see Europe and America as a land of opportunity. Indeed Europe is a land of opportunity, but Africa is a land flowing with milk and honey, with bad leaders who lack knowledge on how to manage their own resources and help to give their people a better life. May I say this? God bless Germany! I am thankful for the privilege of living in Germany and I hope to bring everything I have see and learned here to my country some days. 

Queendaline Schneider.