INTRO: While George Padmore’s contribution to Pan-African ideals had been widely acknowledged, to the extent that he’s often called “The Father of African Emancipation”, it is rarely recognised that Padmore obtained
his inspiration from Edward Wilmot Blyden. Blyden himself was preceded, in his perception of the task that faced educated Black people all over the world, by Sylvester Williams, who organised the first-ever Pan-African Conference in London in 1900. This second part of the article on Edward Blyden concentrates on his analysis of the failure of nations that called themselves “Christian”, to accord Africa any value, other than the sum total of the commodities secured fro Africa for commercial purposes.