Continued……. Sources

https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/realtime/2024-08-26-agency-explains-haiti-police-salary-delays-pledges-to-pay-this-week

https://edition.cnn.com/2024/08/26/americas/kenyan-police-haiti-delayed-pay-intl-latam/index.html

https://www.capitalfm.co.ke/news/2025/02/kenya-reports-first-casualty-in-haiti-anti-gang-operation/

https://www.latintimes.com/kenyan-police-officers-haiti-resign-over-pay-delays-increased-danger-gangs-continue-dominate-568454

https://mg.co.za/thought-leader/opinion/2024-12-06-haitis-democracy-crushed-by-a-coup/

https://haitisupportgroup.org/haitian-sweatshops-made-in-the-usa/

https://orinocotribune.com/us-apparel-industry-endorses-looming-haiti-invasion/

https://archive.ph/6WHer#selection-1311.19-1311.83

https://archive.ph/x5WFV#selection-1489.43-1489.165

https://edition.cnn.com/2025/03/26/americas/haiti-mss-kenya-officer-missing-gangs-intl-latam/index.html

ALGERIA BANS MALI FLIGHTS!

Algeria has banned flights from Mali over ‘repeated violations’ of Algerian airspace. It deepens the diplomatic crisis triggered by the shooting down of a Malian drone, which Algiers claims had entered 2 km into its territory - but which Bamako says was 10 km into its side of the border. Mali branded the incident an act of aggression, and, in response, recalled its ambassador - as did Bamako’s Alliance-of-Sahel-States (AES) allies Burkina Faso and Niger.

Mali’s foreign office accused Algeria of supporting terrorism by preventing the ‘neutralisation of a terrorist group that was planning terrorist acts against the AES.’ Mali has also previously accused Algeria of meddling in its internal affairs - for example, by meeting Turaeg rebel leaders in 2023 - and, in January 2025, accused Algiers of supporting and sheltering terrorists.

Continued……This is bad news for pan-Africanism, and very good news for France, two of whose main African adversaries are now pitted against each other. AES members - including Mali - have expelled French troops and are decoupling from French influence and exploitation following popular revolutionary coups, while Algeria is still seeking justice over Paris’ colonial crimes, including the testing of nuclear weapons. The spat between Mali (and the wider AES) and Algeria means they are now less likely to join forces in their efforts to stand up to France.

How do you think Bamako and Algiers should resolve the current tensions?

Sources

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/4/7/alliance-of-sahel-states-recall-ambassadors-as-tension-with-algeria-rises

https://apnews.com/article/mali-algeria-ambassador-recall-tuareg-c5a3c71db2d3f1df9dd94b094fb20494

https://www.rfi.fr/en/africa/20250103-mali-accuses-algeria-of-fuelling-insecurity-in-the-sahel-by-supporting-tuareg-rebels

MICROSOFT TERMINATES EMPLOYEES PROTESTING ITS ISRAEL DEALS

On 7 April, Microsoft terminated—with immediate effect—two employees, Ibtihal Aboussad and Vaniya Agrawal, after they disrupted its 50th-anniversary celebrations on 4 April in protest of the company providing technical capacities that enable Israel to maintain its apartheid system in the Occupied Palestinian Territories and its onslaught in Gaza. 

Some Microsoft employees have repeatedly asked the company to terminate its relationship with Israel to no avail. In 2018, a group of employees in an open letter declared that ‘as the people who build the technologies that Microsoft profits from, we refuse to be complicit.’

Continued…….. After the event, Agrawal publicly handed in her resignation letter, effective 11 April. Following the protests, LinkedIn, the career and employment-based social network, also suspended Aboussad’s account, causing an uproar as many demanded LinkedIn reinstate her account.

The two engineers are part of a pro-Palestine group, ‘No Azure For Apartheid,’ comprising technology workers within Microsoft and its subsidiaries who have committed to publicly expose and oppose the tech giant’s ‘complicity in Israeli apartheid and gen*cide against the people of Palestine.’ Azure is Microsoft’s cloud computing technology that Israel uses.

Microsoft’s software partnerships with the Israeli government to support surveillance, among other functions, dates back to a $35-million contract in 2002 to provide technical support to Israel’s military and security apparatus. Despite Microsoft losing a 2021 bid for a $1.2-billion contract, Israel’s Ministry of Defence and other departments have used Microsoft’s Azure. Microsoft also offers its cloud and consulting services to the Israel Prison Service (IPS), which is accused of grave inhumane atrocities against Palestinian prisoners, including children as young as the 14- to 16-year range. Additionally, controversial companies like Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest arms maker, also use Microsoft’s services. Elbit’s profits have surged 14 per cent since Tel Aviv’s onslaught in Gaza began.

Sources

https://medium.com/@noazureforapartheid/why-im-leaving-microsoft-our-moral-responsibility-a-letter-by-vaniya-agrawal-3cbfe25dc1e2

https://medium.com/@notechforapartheid/a-marriage-made-in-hell-an-introduction-to-microsofts-complicity-in-apartheid-and-genocide-d7dfad65a196

https://investigate.afsc.org/company/microsoft

https://www.business-standard.com/world-news/gaza-violence-indian-origin-vaniya-agrawal-protests-quits-microsoft-125040700503_1.html

https://indianexpress.com/article/world/vaniya-agarwal-microsoft-employee-pro-palestine-protest-9930566/

https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/microsoft-workers-fired-after-50th-anniversary-protest-israel-120572412

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/technology/tech-news/who-is-indian-american-vaniya-agrawal-who-shamed-microsoft-ceos-at-the-companys-50th-anniversary-celebrations-and-sent-company-wide-email-announcing-resignation/articleshow/120040143.cms

https://www.thenationalnews.com/business/2024/12/02/israeli-arms-makers-break-records-for-weapons-sales-amid-gaza-war/

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jan/23/israeli-military-gaza-war-microsoft

https://www.btselem.org/statistics/minors_in_custody

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/elbit-systems-fourth-quarter-profit-revenue-rise-amid-israels-war-vs-hamas-2025-03-18

https://www.moroccoworldnews.com/2025/04/189566/calls-grow-to-reinstate-moroccan-engineers-linkedin-after-protest-over-gaza-genocide

ISRAELI AMBASSADOR EXPELLED FROM AFRICAN UNION SUMMIT

At the 31st annual African Union (AU) summit commemorating the victims of the Rwandan g*nocide on 7 April, Israeli Ambassador to Ethiopia Abraham Nigusse was expelled from the AU headquarters in Addis Ababa and not from Ethiopia as reported in certain quarters. Several AU member states had objected to the ambassador’s presence at the event. Israeli Foreign Minister Oren Marmorstein condemned the action, calling it ‘shameful.’

However, this was not the first diplomatic clash between Israel and the AU. In February 2023, the AU expelled uninvited Israeli diplomats from a summit amidst protests from member states after learning the Israeli delegation lacked accreditation. The move resulted in the AU revoking Israel’s observer status, granted in 2021, to the uproar of many member states. 

In February 2024, the AU also condemned Israel’s occupation and atrocities committed in Palestine. 

Continued……The African country of Libya applied to join South Africa’s December 2023 g*nocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice, while Egypt has expressed its intention to join.

The solidarity is not an anomaly as Africa also shares historical ties with Palestine, with South African leader Nelson Mandela (1918-2013) quoted saying, ‘Our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of Palestinians.’

Israel’s presence at the g*nocide commemoration is also ironic considering its ongoing massacres in Gaza, which the ICJ ruled as ‘plausible’ g*nocide.

In July 2024, the British medical journal Lancet put the death toll in Gaza since 7 October 2023 at over 186,000.

Image Credit: Ohad Zwigenberg / Ynetnews.com

Sources

https://ethionegari.com/2025/04/07/israeli-ambassador-expelled-from-african-union/

https://unric.org/en/south-africa-vs-israel-14-other-countries-intend-to-join-the-icj-case

https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/africasource/why-israels-ties-with-africa-will-survive-the-war-in-gaza

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(24)01169-3/fulltext

https://apnews.com/article/african-union-israel-gaza-85c4b497463fe29c59fca5ffd987dd53

http://www.mandela.gov.za/mandela_speeches/1997/971204_palestinian.htm

Africa’s colonial exploitation and division were cemented when Europeans met in 1884-85 for the infamous Berlin conference. With no consideration for the continent’s diverse cultures, societies or political structures, the colonialists drew up artificial borders that laid the foundation for the instability and conflict that shapes the continent today. This fragmentation allows foreigners to exploit Africa through neocolonialism, whereby African leaders sell out their people and ecosystems for crumbs from their foreign masters.

While European states ease the movement of people and goods through cooperative efforts, Africa remains divided and exploited. Zimbabwe’s late leader, Robert Mugabe (1924-2019), remained adamant that the key to African progress involves dismantling European-imposed borders. As Pan-Africanists, we must work toward reverting to Africa’s pre-colonial unity, where our collective strength lies.

Continued…….. Sources

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/9/6/robert-mugabes-most-famous-quotes

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/2/26/colonising-africa-what-happened-at-the-berlin-conference-of-1884-1885

WHITES-ONLY TOWN IN SOUTH AFRICA SEEKS U.S. SUPPORT

White South Africans may not have been overly enthusiastic about Trump’s recent offer of asylum (knowing full well where their privilege lies), but that doesn’t mean they aren’t hoping to get the US president’s support in furthering their interests. The notorious Whites-only town of Orania - a post-apartheid anomaly - has dispatched a delegation stateside, to see if Washington might put its weight behind its bid to secede from South Africa and become a self-governing micro state. Our video breaks it down.

Continued……Sources

https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/south-africas-white-afrikaner-separatists-want-trumps-help-become-state-2025-04-03/?taid=67eeefcf897a3b00016ab113&utm_campaign=trueAnthem:+Trending+Content&utm_medium=trueAnthem&utm_source=twitter

https://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/northern-cape/were-not-racists-say-orania-residents-1512098

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/2/9/no-thanks-white-south-africans-turn-down-trumps-us-immigration-offer

https://apnews.com/article/south-africa-trump-musk-afrikaners-0f58dfe1651671d30fcbe16d00c3d99c

TRAORÉ: ‘MOST IMPORTANT MAN IN AFRICA’

There is nothing innately African about the continent’s underdevelopment. Instead, an intentional campaign to subjugate the land and its people has led to Africa’s predicament. 

That’s what Ian Dunlap (@themasterinvestor on IG / @_masterinvestor on X) and Rashad Bilal (@rashadbilal on IG) discussed on an episode of the ‘Black Out’ podcast in January.

Continued……The West exploiting Africa prompted people-backed military coups d’état led by Mali’s Assimi Goïta (@goitaassimi on X) in 2021, followed by Burkina Faso President Ibrahim Traoré (@capitaineib226 on X) in 2022 and Niger’s Abdourahamane Tiani in 2023. Thus, a nucleus for Pan-Africanism formed, with the three countries announcing in September 2023 that they’d establish a confederation called the Alliance of Sahel States (AES). Launched on 6 July 2024, the confederation has been making bold moves, such as Niger kicking out French mining giant Orano and Mali enacting a new mining code that gives the country more control over its resources. It also is launching its own AES currency after issuing AES passports and coordinating on security, economics, transportation and communications.

Video credit: ‘Black Out,’ Earn Your Leisure (@earnyourleisure on X)

Sources

https://www.dw.com/en/africa-and-france-an-unfulfilled-dream-of-independence/a-54418511

https://unherd.com/2023/08/niger-and-the-collapse-of-frances-empire/

https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/news/8-out-of-the-10-biggest-tax-havens-are-british-territories-134075/

https://www.nytimes.com/1978/05/09/archives/cia-said-to-have-aided-plotters-who-overthrew-nkrumah-in-ghana.html

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/tooth-patrice-lumumba-congo-independence-returned-familly-belgium-rcna33270

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-57239805

https://noirpress.org/burkina-fasos-rapid-progress-under-africas-youngest-president/

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c241e115161o

https://www.africanews.com/2023/08/31/mali-adopts-new-mining-code-to-raise-gold-concessions-ownership/

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/6/21/niger-revokes-french-nuclear-groups-licence-at-major-uranium-mine

https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EG.ELC.ACCS.ZS

https://www.crisisgroup.org/africa/sahel/mali/mali-un-coup-dans-le-coup

PAUL ROBESON RESISTING McCARTHYISM

On this day, actor, athlete and activist Paul Robeson (1898-1976) was born in New Jersey, USA. He played a significant role as a pan-Africanist organiser during the anti-communist McCarthyist era, running the anti-imperialist Council on African Affairs, which called for an end to colonialism on the African continent.

In the mid-20th century, the US government investigated Robeson for being a member of the Communist Party, stripping him of his passport. He argued that his work for African emancipation, both on the continent and in the diaspora, prompted his persecution. In other words, the ‘Red Scare’ over his alleged communist affiliation was a pretext to shut down his struggle for African people worldwide.

Continued……African Stream can relate to what Robeson went through. Though no government has stripped us of our right to travel, we know what it’s like to have the US government seek to shut down one’s agitation for Africa’s freedom. When YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Threads, TikTok and Gmail closed our accounts in September 2023 (after the State Department accused us of peddling propaganda), African Stream boasted 2.5-million subscribers and hundreds of millions of viewers thanks to our uncompromising pan-Africanist, anti-imperialist agenda. And Washington didn’t like that. Just like they didn’t like Robenson’s.

Thank you Paul Robeson for your powerful example.

Hear Us Roar: https://news.1rj.ru/str/AfricanStream

NIGER FM: CURRENCY 1ST TOOL OF SOVEREIGNTY

On 3 April, Nigerien Minister of Foreign Affairs Bakary Yaou Sangaré sat down in Moscow with RT France journalist Daria Vaganova to discuss the present and future of the Alliance of Sahel States (AES). Among the questions raised was that of financial and monetary sovereignty.

The AES—comprised of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger—and 11 West and Central African countries use a currency called the CFA franc. It is printed in France and anchored to the Euro at a fixed exchange rate determined by France.

Continued……. Countries that use the Central African CFA franc must deposit 50 per cent of their national reserves in the French treasury, where they receive very low, and sometimes even negative, returns. All financial decisions regarding these reserves must thus pass through and obtain the approval of the French Ministry of the Economy and Finance. The currency was also historically overvalued, so the countries using it would purchase cheaper goods produced in France while simultaneously finding it more challenging to trade with other countries apart from France.

This interview was not the first time an official suggested that the AES would stop using the CFA franc. On 31 January 2024, Burkina Faso President Ibrahim Traoré stated, ‘Changes may yet surprise you. And, it’s not just about the currency. We’re going to break all the bonds that keep us in slavery.’ On 11 February 2025, Nigerien President Abdourahamane Tiani stated on local television that, ‘[a sovereign] currency is a step toward the end of colonisation.’ In that interview, he clarified that the AES’ financial experts are working on developing an independent monetary system.

Sources

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1z6HsLJ8mmAlObEosu96-yaCqBKdXuqXg/view?usp=sharing (pages 10,17, 28)

https://jacobin.com/2021/03/africa-colonies-france-cfa-franc-currency

https://www.francetvinfo.fr/monde/afrique/niger/le-niger-evoque-une-possible-monnaie-commune-avec-le-burkina-faso-et-le-mali-pour-sortir-de-la-colonisation_6360895.html

https://www.agenceecofin.com/actualites/0102-115775-le-burkina-faso-pourrait-s-attaquer-au-franc-cfa-et-quitter-l-uemoa-ibrahim-traore

https://www.brookings.edu/articles/how-the-france-backed-african-cfa-franc-works-as-an-enabler-and-barrier-to-development/#:~:text=Each%20central%20bank%20must%20maintain%20at%20least,that%20country%27s%20revenue%20from%20the%20previous%20year.

https://billmitchell.org/blog/?p=44027

https://mronline.org/2023/11/15/cfa-franc-system-in-francophone-africa-a-tool-of-french-financial-imperialism

https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/202323/1/1671513134.pdf

LESOTHO PUNISHED FOR TRADE SUCCESS

Picture facing penalties for your achievements!

That’s the predicament Lesotho finds itself in after US President Donald Trump imposed a staggering 50 per cent import tax on 2 April on this landlocked African country’s exports to the US, primarily affecting textiles and diamonds.

Many have hailed Lesotho as a success story under the African Growth and Opportunities Act (AGOA), a US trade initiative that allows 32 African states to export goods to the US without tariffs.

Lesotho has capitalised on AGOA by establishing garment factories that provide denim jeans to US retailers, such as Calvin Klein, GAP, Levi’s, Old Navy and Walmart. Approximately 30,000 factory workers, predominantly women, are employed, benefiting many of Lesotho’s 2.3 million citizens.

Continued……. According to the World Bank, with a GDP per capita of $1,106, Lesotho struggles to purchase many US products to satisfy Trump’s reciprocal trade demands. In 2024, it exported $237.3 million in goods to the US but only imported $2.8 million worth of US goods. This perceived trade imbalance has drawn Trump’s ire towards a nation he recently remarked ‘nobody has ever heard of.’

Sources

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c8dgmyzqr6do

https://www.africanews.com/2025/04/05/lesotho-textile-industry-hangs-in-the-balance-following-new-us-tariffs

https://archive.ph/kVXeH

https://archive.ph/OkSDs

https://agoa.info/data.html

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-67284812

https://ustr.gov/sites/default/files/2024%20List%20of%20AGOA%20Eligible%20and%20Ineligible%20Countries%2011162023.pdf

https://www.timeslive.co.za/lifestyle/2025-03-06-does-trump-really-not-know-about-lesotho-this-shirt-might-prove-otherwise

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2025/apr/04/lesotho-garment-workers-reel-trump-tariffs

https://www.worldbank.org/en/country/lesotho/overview#:~:text=Lesotho%20is%20a%20small%2C%20mountainous,from%20Britain%20in%20October%201966.

https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20250403-lesotho-hardest-hit-as-new-us-tariffs-rattle-africa

https://ustr.gov/sites/default/files/2024%20List%20of%20AGOA%20Eligible%20and%20Ineligible%20Countries%2011162023.pdf

Some situations are too easy to read.

On 8 April, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) handed over to US custody three US citizens jailed over a coup attempt, following high-level talks in Kinshasa between Massad Boulos, US State Department senior advisor for Africa and Trump’s son-in-law’s father, and DRC President Félix Tshisekedi, on mining and security deals.

Tshisekedi spokesperson Tina Salama said commuting the death sentences and releasing Tyler Thompson Jr, Benjamin Reuben Zalman-Polun, and Marcel Malanga ‘shows that the collaboration and cooperation between the two states is growing stronger and stronger.’

But make no mistake: This wasn't justice. It was negotiation. Washington wanted its men back, Kinshasa wanted a security guarantee and Congo's minerals were the price.