SSI from ancestral African Lenses

[GENERAL] Summarize your solution to the problem.

Create a space for a deep conversations on the perception of identity viewed through African lenses, incorporating the complexities of an individual's identity and its ties to cultural group identity.

[GENERAL] Summarize your relevant experience.

DITC, Wada Cameroon Hub

• Team member (Manfo) undertaking initiation through Kimuntu School
• 1 Subject Matter Expert support from Kimuntu School (Ntumwa)
• Local Artist and Cultural Expert Partnership (Mermoz and the Ufulu Cultural Center)

[IMPACT] Please describe your proposed solution.

Context

Nowadays we tend to introduce ourselves through a multitude of roles we have played or persona we have assumed either during our education journey or work experience. I am a math teacher, I am a singer …etc is what we hear very often. This has limited the perception of who we really are and we see it translated into the current implementations of SSI which are mainly based on the western world paradigm. In the traditional African view, we are a portion of the unique divine source experimenting itself in all fields of knowledge: Education, Agriculture, Physics and so on. We do not live, we are lived through and we come to this reality with a mission: a mission that defines our identity. This leaves no place for the ego and brings us to the table to re-open the debate about the very important notion of self sovereign identity.

Our proposed solution

Our approach is to leverage our personal initiatory experience in order to create both a content and a safe space, where we can debate and exchange responsibly around these complex notions. We hope through this action to share valuable information about a lost paradigm in such a way that we can spark deep interest in the community to reconsider the very important and key notion of identity / self sovereign identity through a different and more holistic paradigm.

Conversations Space:

Africa now has a town hall (ATH) which we believe is the right space to start this conversation. We plan on securing a breakout room in which we will regularly meet once every two weeks (at each ATH session) to discuss identity within the local African context. Subject matter experts will be invited throughout these conversations to provide attendees with deeper understanding of some complex notions. Concretely we will invite guest speakers once per month and use the other one or two meetings that month to discuss as a community the content brought up at the lecture. The subject matter experts we have identified are francophone, therefore we will offer professional translation (to English) for each of the main presentations.

Conversations content:

The main themes we anticipate are organized in three chapters that each focuses on one piece of the big puzzle. We also plan on introducing the conversation with an introduction to the solutions that are currently available so that we appropriately set the context for the debate.

Kongolo dia Ntente.

The goal here is to start with the cosmos, the universe and the environment in which we all live. We will be discussing its origin, components, what they mean symbolically and how they connect to each other. We will spent a great deal of time talking about their functional aspect. Specifically the following subjects will be introduced:

• Bumuntu (humans horizontal connections)
• Kintagulu dia Nza
• Disu-Mu au Masu-Mu (Re-incarnation, Soul, Past lives and Debts)
• Introduction to Kisono
• Ntinu
• Kisono dia Nza
• Kongo Cosmogony
• Introduction to colors

Kongolo dia Zole

Next we will move on with debates geared toward self. Our structure, the parts of our body and their meaning. We will spent sometime understanding the meaning and functions of cells in our body. The science behind our names, our bodies, where we come from, what we are made of and why we are here. We will inspect our vertical connection to the cosmos (unique divine source ) and our horizontal connection to the cosmos (to other human beings). This point will consist of the following topics:

• Biseliya Mysteries
• Muntu: a multidimensional being
• Kimuntu (humans vertical connections)
• Bi-Mwelo

Kongolo dia Ntatu

Lastly we will make the bridge between the cosmos structure and that of our body paying attention to what that entails. We will then analysed nature laws and principles . We will conclude this phase by providing potential outlets to those willing to deepen their understanding on these subjects. The topics for this point are:

• Principles, Laws of the Cosmos, ki-Ndoki: nature science
• Ki-Ndoki science
• Spiritual laws
• Ndosi (The meaning of our dreams)
• Munu kia Nsi - Munu dia Zulu
• The 5 common senses
• Hypnosis
• Astral trip
• Tatu techniques

Only after we cover all these topics, we can suggest a specific path and design for a MVP SSI / DID solution that fits the African context.

=>Click here for more information on our ongoing research work!

[IMPACT] Please describe how your proposed solution will address the Challenge that you have submitted it in.

Equity and inclusion is the direction our proposal is aiming to follow with this challenge category. The fact that we are still in the early stages of SSI implementations gives us some open ground to explore other paradigms. This proposal is suggesting an entirely new direction to the notion of Identity and in so doing making sure we are promoting inclusion in our community.

Given that we are in the "Grow Africa, Grow Cardano" there could be any better place for such a project: The African perception of identity needs to be exposed.

[IMPACT] What are the main risks that could prevent you from delivering the project successfully and please explain how you will mitigate each risk?

The biggest challenge is the status-quo observed. Most Africans today perceive themselves through the lenses of the dominant western world paradigm and in so doing have a perception of the world that does not always align with their ancestral patterns of life.

We intend to mitigate that through an open and frank conversation, conducted through the African town hall that will allow us to analyze the notion of identity through ancestral African lenses.

[FEASIBILITY] Please provide a detailed plan, including timeline and key milestones for delivering your proposal.

Our strategy will consist of 3 parallel phases:

Phase 1: ( 6 months ) Secure contract with subject expert matters:

We will focus on concluding conversations / contracts we started with subject matter experts to invite them to some of our debates. Note that our ongoing work on our funded proposal: Cardano Preserving Culture has triggered the need to dig deeper into the concept of SSI.

Phase 2: ( 6 months ) Conferences, Debates, Discussions and take away

This phase will be about leveraging the African town hall space to bring the community in for deep debates and discussions around the notion of Identity seen through the lenses of the African paradigm. We intend to set up a breakout room focusing on this specific subject. The end goal is to expose each of us to a completely new paradigm and perception of who we really are and what we are really doing here in the cosmos.

Phase 3  ( 6 months )

Phase 3 will be centered around leveraging the work executed in the previous phases, and the material created to conceptualized and implement an MVP DID solution that illustrates the concepts of DID in the local context of Africa.

[FEASIBILITY] Please provide a detailed budget breakdown.

Total Budget 12 months: $25k:

• 3 Subject Matter Experts consultation and speaker fees (4 appearances each--one per month) $7.5k
• Ntumwa Nswadi Kimbasi ($2.5K)
• Mbog Bassong ($2.5K)
• Philipe Omutunde ($2.5K)
• Research & Travel & Logistic $3.5k
• Team members to travel to Congo: $1.5k
• Travel within Cameroon: $1k
• Misc travel logistics: $1k
• Outreach Coordination & Core Team fees (1k ea): $4k
• 2 Software architect motivation
• Event coordinator motivation
• Local cultural expert motivation
• Translation: $4k
• Translating live presentations (French => English) (2 translators @ $150/hour, 1 hour/month x 12 months + misc additional content translation $400)
• Developer fees (Four Haskell interns @ $1.5K each--$250/month for 6 months)$6k

[FEASIBILITY] Please provide details of the people who will work on the project.

Manfo - Technical Lead @ Wada Cameroon Hub, DITC, interested in identity solutions and ownership with a deep passion for honoring traditional practices through the modernization of technology.

Manfo and Mermoz will be in charge of reaching out to subject expert maters(Ntumwa Nswadi Kimbasi, Mbog Bassong, Philipe Omutunde), organizing a work schedule and securing contracts with them. Manfo will also coordinate developer intern team in MVP solution.

Megan - Events and Education Lead @ Wada, Wada Cameroon Hub Lead

Megan will lead overall project coordination of various different activities and tasks as well as moderate the conversations conducted within the African town-hall.

Mermoz: Researcher in African Crypto communication, writer, farmer, poet and engineer. 

Mermoz in is charge of helping with research and elaboration of the content.

=>Click here for more context about Disruptive IT Cameroon, a Wada Hub

[FEASIBILITY] If you are funded, will you return to Catalyst in a later round for further funding? Please explain why / why not.

It will depend on how the community welcomes the proposal, and how the conversations advance. We will potentially return to Catalyst for our next phase which will be to develop an MVP identity solution incorporating notions that come out of these discussions.

[FEASIBILITY] Are you or any member of your team working on any other proposals in this Fund9?

[FEASIBILITY] Are you or your team working on any other proposals from previous Funds?

[AUDITABILITY] Please describe what you will measure to track your project's progress, and how will you measure these?

Our progress will be measured through the following item:

Bi-weekly town hall gatherings success we will measure through:

• Number of attendees at each town hall break out lecture session
• Number of attendees at each town hall break out discussion session
• Engagement with recordings for those who can not attend live such as number of views and comments on YouTube recordings

Progress on suggesting an SSI/DID solution for the African paradigm

• Regular content published on Wada and DITC YouTube Channels
• Documentation from consultations with subject matter experts

Completion of a functional MVP DID SSI solution fitting the African context

• Commit activity on GitHub

[AUDITABILITY] What does success for this project look like?

Our core goal with this proposal is really to open the debate about a totally new perception of what the notion of SSI is in the ancestral African circle, a dedicated attendance to the debate space will definitely be the first step to success.

At the end of our journey, we will develop an MVP conceptualizing this notion in such a way that we pave the ground for a more complete solution in next iterations.

[AUDITABILITY] Please provide information on whether this proposal is a continuation of a previously funded project in Catalyst or an entirely new one.

We intend to build on top of the ongoing work for our fund 6 funded proposal Cardano Preserving Culture.