Matunda Ya Kwanza: Our “California Grown” Pan African Celebration of Life

Globally, Kwanzaa is our holiday season, celebrating root cultures that established our unique Pan African experience. 2019 marks the 400+ Year of Return and the dawn of African Continental Free Trade Market that will unite the entire continent of Africa and extended family throughout the Diaspora, well over 1.5 billion children, women and men on planet Earth.

“First Fruits of the Harvest” is the heart of Kwanzaa, acknowledging a wholistic approach to Agriculture as the fundamental foundation of a people. In order for a deeper understanding of 7 symbols, 7 principles over 7 days of Kwanzaa parents, teachers, principals, ministers, business people and community activists must begin preparation for a special season, immediately.

100 years after the US Civil War, marked by US Colored Troops who provided the decisive difference on the battlefield in the fight for freedom, led to the ratification of the 13th Amendment to the US Constitution, ending slavery in America, unless convicted of a crime. Freedom is never free.

In 1960’s, brave men and women of Pan African ancestry embraced Black Power and shook up America. The call for Black Power, “by any means necessary,” was a natural addition, building upon the “non violent” principles of the Modern Civil Rights Movement.

Together, the ongoing dismantling of the American legal system of racial segregation in the courts, was sparked by the Montgomery Boycott, ignited by the Patron Saint of the Women’s Political Council, Rosa Louise McCauley Parks.

After desegregation of the Federal Transportation System, Voting Rights Act and Civil Rights Act riots broke out all across America, when the smoke cleared from the Watts Rebellion in 1965, an organization in the Los Angeles, California area called US, under the leadership of Maulana Karenga, established Kwanzaa as a Pan African Holiday.

In Dr. Karenga’s own words he says, “The origin of Kwanzaa on the African continent are in the agricultural celebrations called the ‘first fruits’ celebrations and to a lesser degree the full or general harvest celebration. It is from these first fruit celebrations that Kwanzaa gets its name which comes from the Swahili phrase Matunda Ya Kwanza.” The extra “a” was added for the 7th child that attended the first Kwanzaa Celebration.

Kwanzaa, our Pan African Global Holiday is officially celebrated December 26th to January 1st, a beginning first step for people of Pan African Ancestry to unite, with a common set of experiences that lead us toward a common set of goals and objectives for freedom, independence, and liberation.