SUSU AND SUSUNOMICS: WHAT SUSU IS (c) 1997

Susu is the collective collaboration of people who pool their resources, finances and time together for the benefit of those in the pool, or for each participating member, when his or her time comes to purchase or acquire goods. For example, if a group of ten people decide to form a 'susu' so that members can have access to money for various reasons, they would follow these steps:


a) All members put in an equal amount of money in a pool per month, such as $100.00 per month.

b) A total of $100.00 dollars will be collected every month.

c) Susu member John, who is first on the list to receive the collected amont needs $2000 dollar amount to use.

d) Because John is first on the list of ten, he receives the two thousand dollars in two months.

e) John continues to put in one hundred dollars per month, while the next person on the list waits to receive two thousand dollars, two months after John has received his.

f) Mary, the second in line continues to put one hundred dollars in the pool and the third on the list gets his or her amount when his or her turn comes up. This goes on untill the last person on the list gets two thousand dollars.

g) After twenty months, John becomes first on the list again and his turn to use the money in the pool begains again.

The amount allotted to each member of the pool must be equal and may rise or decrease depending on how much each person puts in. For excample, if the amount is raised to two hundred dollars per month, then each member will receive two thousand dollars per month, or four thousand dollars every two months when each person times come to receive their share of the pool. It is essential that each member of a susu group continues to add to the pot even when it is not his or her turn to get the money collected in the pot.

Susu is trust and committment. Before a group of people decide to put their monies in a 'susu,' everyone must be certain that he or she will be true to the oath to be sincere, truthful, honest and dependable. In cases where a person cannot supply money (due to hardship or other reasons) to the pool but wantes to remain a member, an agreement must be made between himself and other members of the pool whereby each pays a portion for him or her till he or she can repay it and return to the susu as a paying member.

Members of a susu can agree to pay another's share in the pot if that person will pay it back as soon as he or she gets back on his or her feet. For example, if person number one cannot pay one hundred dollars per month for about four months, due to a lack of a job or money, each of the other nine members of th epool must add in at least eleven dollars and eleven cents to THEIR individual monthly amount of one hundred dollars per month to make up for the one who is unable to add to the pool. If that person leaves the pool, the money goes back to those who contributed to the pot.

The person who could not contribute to the pot because he or she was unable to do so, must pay back what was loaned to him or her. The more money a person or group adds to the pot, the more money each member will get when his or her turn comes to get what is in the susu pot. Susu is ORGANIZED SO THAT A PERSON IS MADE TREASURER AND KEEPS THE ACCOUNTS WHILE THE MONEY IS KEPT IN A 'SUSU BANK' or a reliable bank. Contracts are to be legal and prepared by an attorney, IF MEMBERS DEEM IT NECESSARY OR IF LARGE AMOUNTS OF MONEY ARE INVOLVED, or simply to make the process strong and efficient. ( 'Susu and Susunomics,' by PAB (c) 1997: pub. by http://www.iuniverse.com/ )

A HISTORY OF SUSU

The practice of 'susu' is as old as Africna culture and may have originated when Africans turned to the horticultural and agricultural way of life (about 30,000 years ago, in the Sahara- the same time that Papua-New Guineans, also of prehistoric African origins (dating to about 100,000 years ago), began their horticultural societies). The practice of susu or pooling the resources of people for their benefit and that of their community was practiced in Kush, Khem and many parts of Africa. Many massive monuments and temples built in the heartland of Black civilization, Kush and Khem, may have involved a form of 'collective capitalism' where the Pharoah got together with others to pool resources and manpower.

Susu in West Africa and the Congo Basin may have undergone a simulteanous practice and development about 3000 BC (when Manding-Congo Bantu and Manding-Cush people began a migration to Southern Africa and to the Americas)
when Africans from the Sahara and Northeast African civilizations brought their practiced version of susu to West Africa. The basic philosophy of susu which is community togetherness, pooling resources for the enrichment of the total community, trust and honor, dependability and dedication, continued to develop in West Africa among the agriculturists. (The Manding-Cush agricultural complex of West Africa/Sahara is over 10,000 years old).

Susu represents the most ancient African social, religious, economic and philosophical concents of African culture and economics. One of these concepts is that the people in a community should contribute their labor for the benefit of all.

"Susu and Susunomics," pub. by iUniverse.com, (c) 295 pages: 1997, 2001 by PAB:
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CHAPTER TWO: THE ATTITUDE OF THE SUSUIST


Those who developed susu in African from its embryonic states in the Lakes Region of East Africa, the Sahara, Kushand Khem, and West Africa where it developed fully, they had a particular type of attitude towards achieving thier goals of economic advancement and self sufficiency. The attitude was and still is, one must put his or her people first and one is merely a part of something greater, the people. Also, that those who belong to the immediate community, tribe or community comes first, and all business transactions must be carried out with capable business people in the community first and foremost as long as that is possible.

The attitude of the Susuist is to trade with those who are in his or her tribe or immediate community first and make his neighbor economically stable before he takes his business to another community to make the people over there better off,while his own community or tribe suffers economic stagnation. In other words, if a person lived in an African-American community like Watts he or she would spend his or her money there first, thus making his own people wealthy
so that those who are wealthy can put the money back into the community, and help towards its development.

To the susuist, trade and commerce is very important, and if trade is denied him or his community by others, then there is no trade from him with those who deny him or her trade. For instance, a movie houise owner in a city like Westwood, California compared to one in Baldwin Hills. While the people in Baldwin Hills (The Black 'Berverly Hills') may go to Westwood to movies and give their money to a theater or cinema owned or frequented by people who do not respect the Baldwin Hills community, hates them or do not do business in Black Baldwin Hills, then it makes bad economic sense for people in the Baldwin Hills, or Watts neighborhoods to go to Westwood or any part of town whose people do not do business in Baldwin Hills or any of the Black neighborhoods of Los Angeles. This unfair trade OF TAKING MONEY FROM THE BLACK COMMUNITY AND NOT INVESTING OR PATRONIZING BLACK BUSINESSES is no different from the type practiced by the Japanese against American manufacturers, as it is alleged.



The circulation of money in the community must continue until it has cemented itself there. Most money in the Black African-American communities of the United States is acquired by hard working people, through hard work. We all know what its's like to work hard for a living, risk our lives and good health to earn an income, go through all types of embarrassing situations to earn it, including racism and prejudice. Yet, as soon as we receive our paychecks, we run as far away from our own community and our own people to communities who care nothing about our well-being, remove their children from our schools where ours attend, practice economic and social racism against us, and contribute to our oppression. It is the money that Blacks spend in business of people in places like Signal Hill, California; Westwood, Beverly Hills, Simi Valley that keep their oppresion apparatus going. It is that same apparatus that contributes to the oppression of Black people and that must be realized.


ECONOMIC RACISM


The major force against the economic development of African-American people and African-Diaspora people globally is economic racism and domination by those who control the financial institutions and businesses that loan money to or hier Black people and Black nations. It can also be the closing of the markets of the economic racist to the products and businesses, or the loan applications of Black people.
To be refused a job one is qualified to do and to hamper that person's ability to earn an hones living is not only economic racism, if it is practiced against a person based on their race, but it is a declaration of economic war againt that person or persons like himself. Being refused employment because of the color of a person's skin, something that nature is responsible for is a direct attack against the person being refused, nature and God. One who refuses a Black person employment because of the color of skin is an enemy, and thus refuses that Black person the ability to feed himself or herself and his family. This is as bad an act of war as blockading the seaports of another nation to prevent them from trading with other nations. Hence the solution to that problem facing Black America today, IS TO BUILD A STRONG AND SEPARATE, SUPERIOR BLACK AFRICAN-AMERICAN ECONOMIC SYSTEM.

The refusal to loan Black people money to open businesses (or to ran tricky home-loan schemes that causes Blacks to loose their homes) is another act of economic racism. Some time ago, it was found out that many banks refused to loan Black people any mone, including some banks that were in he Black communities, with whom Black people banked and deposited their money. These banks adopted a system of 'redlining' whereby neighborhoods with populations of mainly Black people were marked out with a red pen, and were refused loans. The greatest insult was that Blacks who banked at a high rate in some of these banks did not get loans when they applied.

Some said that the problem to this particular type of situation could be solved by simply refusing to bank at any bank that continues these policies, and eventually refusing to bank at any non-Black bank and creating Black banks and other financial institutions to service the banking needs of the community.

"Susu and Susunomics," (c) 1997; 2001 by PAB http://www.iuniverse.com