ONG Wa Afriki · Project · Ouidah, Benin
For 6,263 years, the heliacal rising of Sirius has opened the African year. China, Israel, the Arab world and India have each kept their marker. Africa remains the only great civilisational bloc that does not collectively celebrate its own beginning of year.
Status of the project
The founding edition is fully designed, documented and costed to the franc. It has not yet been able to take place, for lack of means. We therefore set no date until the funding is gathered, and we would rather say so than let someone buy a ticket for nothing.
The foundation
At the heart of the system: the heliacal rising of Sirius. A precise, immutable and observable astronomical phenomenon. After some seventy days of invisibility, the reappearance of the star on the eastern horizon at sunrise marked the beginning of the year and coincided with the flooding of the Nile.
The figure 6263 follows from the African reckoning of time, founded on the continuity of the civil calendar of Kemet, recalibrated from the first heliacal rising formally recorded in history. This is no recent invention: it is one of the oldest calendar systems known to humanity.
References
This anchorage is established by the work of Egyptology and archaeoastronomy: Lepsius in 1849, Oppolzer in 1887, Clagett in 1995. We cite these sources because a project of this nature must be defensible before an academic institution.
And yet a great many Africans still do not know that their ancestors measured time with such precision. The gradual imposition of foreign calendars caused a deep rupture, one that touches identity, collective memory and cultural sovereignty.
The movement
Ethiopia opened the way with the institutional precedent of Enkutatash. Editions of the African New Year have been carried in Burkina Faso, at the Thomas Sankara Memorial. The Kamite community celebrates every year in Côte d'Ivoire, and the diaspora in Lyon as in Paris.
Following the recommendations of the ninth Pan-African Congress of Lomé, in December 2025, the Togolese government announced an international colloquium to define an endogenous calendar and to raise the celebration of the African New Year to the rank of world heritage.
Togo raises the institutional question. Ouidah can provide the empirical, sacred and historical anchorage.
The dignitaries of Ouidah maintain, generation after generation, the real cycles of purification and connection to the cosmos.
The Door of No Return is the symbolic epicentre of the reunification of the black world. The return of diaspora figures, such as Claudy Siar named Kodjovi within the Zossoungbo collectivity, bears witness to it.
In August, the event takes cultural tourism out of its usual season and offers a more intimate and pedagogical immersion than January.
August captures the diaspora and visitors, complementing the JISTNA, the Ouidah Arts Biennial and the Festival of Masks.
Togo raises the institutional question. Ouidah can provide the empirical, sacred and historical anchorage.
The project builds on the heritage investments of the Beninese state and on the skills of the local cultural institutions.
The programme as designed
The morning at the Maison de la Culture, the afternoon and evening on the esplanade of the French Fort. Entry entirely free.
10:00
Official words from the authorities, then libation and sacred opening by the Sages of the Tradition. A theatrical fresco of African Time and dances of welcome.
Maison de la Culture
10:40
An open, trilingual panel in French, English and Fongbé on what temporal sovereignty is at stake. Then debate with the room, questions and contributions from the public.
Maison de la Culture
12:10
Reading of the resolutions, announcement of the 2027 edition, final blessings and the festive outing of the masks. Then a shared meal, Ouidah gastronomy only.
Maison de la Culture
16:00
Cultural and craft mini-fair, parade of the troupes and folk groups of Ouidah, and the Great Quiz of African Time with prizes for the children.
Esplanade of the French Fort
20:00
An evening entirely given to tales: stellar accounts, legends of the lineages, transmission of the memory of the sky. Official closing and blessing.
Esplanade of the French Fort
A project that touches time and the sacred can go wrong in two ways: folklorisation and instrumentalisation. We set the safeguards first.
Access is entirely free. Taking part confers no spiritual or initiatory status.
Priority to explanation, to understanding and to transmission between generations.
Astronomical knowledge and the traditional reckoning of time, brought together.
Systematic translation into Fongbé, so that the traditional authorities and the local public take full part.
Ethical supervision belongs to the Sages of the Tradition. The spiritual protocol remains under the exclusive control of the dignitaries, and no rite is commercialised.
What it costs
Most organisations hide their figures. We display ours, because a serious partner has the right to know exactly what they are funding before answering us.
4,330,000 FCFA
Viability threshold
Below this, the event cannot be held in decent conditions. It covers both sites, sound, security, the artists and the shared meal.
5,490,000 FCFA
Median scenario
Full heritage catering, communication that actually reaches people, and the video documentation that will make the event exist beyond 9 August.
7,080,000 FCFA
Optimal scenario
Hosting the diaspora delegations, a professional-grade teaser, and the technical means for a vigil that holds through the night without incident.
To place these figures: the viability threshold is roughly six thousand six hundred euros. That is the price of a documented and irreversible cultural fact.
The guarantee of the Sages, access to the crowned heads, the legitimacy of the place, a team that lives here and knows every quarter: none of that is found with money. We have it.
What we lack is more ordinary, and happily easier to solve. A sound system. A generator. Tarpaulins. Trilingual leaflets. Enough to feed those who come. That, and only that, is why the project is still waiting.
Three ways to help
Fund a tier or a line
You choose the line: sound, catering, video documentation. You know exactly what your contribution pays for.
Give your name to a sequence
The Quiz of African Time and the mini-fair can be named. Family visibility, photographed, in a moment people will not forget.
Bring something other than money
A hotel partnership for the guests, technical equipment, media coverage, an institutional introduction. All of it counts as much.
And if you can fund nothing, you can still do the most useful thing of all: pass this dossier to someone who can.
The African reckoning of time rests on the continuity of the civil calendar of ancient Egypt, Kemet, recalibrated from the first heliacal rising of the star Sirius formally recorded in history. After some seventy days of invisibility, the reappearance of Sirius on the eastern horizon at sunrise marked the beginning of the year and coincided with the flooding of the Nile. This anchorage is established by the work of Lepsius in 1849, Oppolzer in 1887 and Clagett in 1995.
No. The founding edition is fully designed, documented and costed, but it has not yet been able to be held for lack of means. The dossier is ready and the programme can be deployed as soon as the funding is gathered.
No. It is a cultural and civilisational celebration, open to all and free of charge. The Sages of the Tradition provide the ethical guarantee and the sacred opening, but taking part confers no spiritual status and commits no one to any practice.
China, Israel, the Arab world and India have each kept their own temporal marker. Africa remains the only great civilisational bloc that does not collectively celebrate its beginning of year, even though its ancestors measured time with remarkable precision.
Yes, and that is what makes the moment favourable. Ethiopia opened the way with Enkutatash. Editions have been carried in Burkina Faso at the Thomas Sankara Memorial, in Côte d’Ivoire by the Kamite community, and in the diaspora in Lyon and Paris. After the 9th Pan-African Congress of Lomé in December 2025, Togo announced an international colloquium to define an endogenous calendar.
The budget is published on this page, in three tiers. You can fund a tier, a specific line, or give your name to a sequence: the Quiz of African Time and the mini-fair can be co-branded. Write to us saying simply what you can offer and what you would want in return.
“The African New Year is not a simple event. It is a permanent annual appointment. A date that Africa and its diaspora will from now on take together, every year, to celebrate what has belonged to them for 6,263 years.”