To the American Baha'i Community, the chief executor of 'Abdu'l-Baha's
Divine Plan; to the British Baha'i Community, destined to play in future
decades a predominating role in opening to the Faith of Baha'u'llah not
only the British territories throughout the African continent, but the
divers dependencies of the British Crown scattered on the surface of the
globe; to the Persian Baha'i Community, at once the most venerable and
most consistently persecuted among its sister communities in both the East
and the West; to the Egyptian Baha'i Community that may well boast of
having erected in that continent the first pillar of the Universal House
of Justice; to the Indian Baha'i Community, fated to contribute, to a
marked degree, to the spiritual quickening of the Indians constituting a
noble element of the population of Africa--to these communities I feel I
must acknowledge my deep sense of thankfulness for the strenuous efforts
exerted by their pioneers to raise aloft the standard of the Faith in the
territories allocated to them in Liberia, Uganda, Tanganyika, the Gold
Coast, Kenya, Somaliland, Nyasaland, Northern Rhodesia, Libya, Algeria,
Zanzibar and Madagascar. To others who, though not following the fixed
pattern of the plan initiated for the present African campaign, have
arisen to introduce the Faith in the territories of Sierra Leone, Angola,
Mozambique and Southern Rhodesia I feel, moreover, a debt of gratitude is
due for their share in extending the range of Baha'i pioneer activity in
that continent.