The denouement began soon after the end of the 2nd World War. First, the US Government formally granted Independence to Philippines on 4th July 1946.

A year later the British followed suit by withdrawing in a single sweep from India, Pakistan and, a sometime later Sri Lanka then called Ceylon. The deluge of decolonization engulfed other colonies and islands the world over.

A new phase began in the history of the non-European territories.

Yet, in a curious way, decolonization brought the realization to former European powers, that the world order had changed drastically and old colonies could not be governed in the old ways.

One immediate reason was the great losses Europeans had suffered during the War. In addition to the loss of some 20 million lives, a near famine situation stalked Europe and Russia.

Everywhere, from the Baltic to the Balkan Peninsula, Europe presented the ruins of a ruined civilization. Its great cities ands towns were no more than smouldering heaps, over and above broken houses, factories and communication links.

Its straggling population of men, women and children scrambling from place to place in search of food and shelter. Survival of Europe - and much less the restoration of imperial glory that became the foremost priority of a post-war agenda.

Of course no one expected imperial order to collapse so soon. In England Winston Churchill and many other Tory leaders opposed bitterly imperial withdrawal from India.

The idea of a French retreat from Africa and Asia did not even touch French consciousness until the war between French colons and Algerian nationalists threatened to disrupt the entire Francophone world. And, Belgian Government dismissed any attempt at even marginal liberalization in Belgian held Congo.

It was not consciousness of men or women that drove the Europeans out of their colonies. Few of them expected that the end to the colonial era would come so soon. French soldiers defended every inch of the ground in Algeria till Charles de Gaulle became President and proceeded at once to dismantle colonial bonds with Algeria and other African territories.

De Gaulle's sweep was breathtaking. Even the leaders of Franco-phone Africa were stupefied. Among them were Leopold Senghor of Senegal, Houphet Boigny of the Ivory Coast, and M Keita of Mali. By the close of l960, barring smaller territories and islands, France had plumbed back its troops from West and Central Africa.

The vast territories of the Belgian held Congo also achieved independence in 1960. But its fate got tied up with a bloody war between Congolese troops loyal to Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba and the rebel troops led by Col Mobutu.

The war attracted foreign adventurers like vultures. Some came in to seize Congo's valuable minerals, especially diamond, while others ventured in for strategic reasons. Under the cover of watching so-called Russian activities, the CIA poured in money and Arms to lend in an international dimension to the Congolese turmoil.

The peaceful phase of decolonization thus came to an end around 1962-3. Even Kenya, known as 'White Men's Paradise' was placed under an emergency until law and order could be restored by the turn of 1963.

Soon Rhodesia, now called Zimbabwe, zoomed into world headlines with the unilateral declaration of independence (UDI) by a minority of European settlers. For the next 15 years this illegal minority regime kept at bay the advancing tide of Black Nationalism.

Zimbabwe's formal admission to independence hastened the process dismantling Apartheid in South Africa. At the end of 1990 political power passed on from exclusive White control to a combination of political parties representing White, Brown and Black people of South Africa.

Symbolically - and historically- the liberation of the Black continent was over, but did this usher in the Promised African millennium? We shall try to tackle this question in a future instalment.