Continued........The 20,000-person city's 8,000 Black men were a political force, exercising their voting rights after the 15th amendment was added in 1870 to the US Constitution. In the 1890s, Black voters helped elect a rare biracial 'fusion' alliance of candidates. However, influential white leaders, including the Wilmington Cotton Mills Company's president, the Raleigh News and Observer's editor, and the state Democratic Party chairman, set out to topple what the newspaper editor labelled 'Negro rule.' These white leaders created what they called the 'White Supremacy Campaign' by printing falsehoods about Black men preying on white women and stockpiling guns. And, so, in the days leading up to the 1898 elections, white groups, galvanised by the propaganda, were infuriated with the mixed-race government and set out to intimidate Black voters, k*lling 60 Black men. The mob of 500 white men swelled to 2,000 as they marched across the city and became known as 'Red Shirts,' wreaking a wave of terror against Black residents. Colonel Alfred Moore Waddell, a white former Confederate officer and congressman, told a gun-waving white audience he would 'choke the current of the Cape Fear River with Black bodies if he had to.'

Armed white rioters destroyed Black businesses, including the local Black newspaper office, and forced Black people to run into the woods. A 2006 study described the coup in detail, blaming all levels of government for not intervening, resulting in Black merchants and workers suffering losses 'in terms of job status, income, and access to capital.' Black businesses moved or closed, about 2,100 Black residents fled, and Black literacy rates plunged.

Historians and Equal Justice Initiative researchers have documented at least 34 instances of mass violence, when white mobs k*lled scores of Black people during the Reconstruction period (1865-77), during which the southern United States was re-built following the destruction of the US Civil War (1861-65).

SOURCES:

https://calendar.eji.org/racial-injustice/nov/10

https://www.dncr.nc.gov/1898-wilmington-coup

https://eji.org/report/reconstruction-in-america/documenting-reconstruction-violence/#34-documented-mass-lynchings-during-the-reconstruction-era

https://www.loc.gov/classroom-materials/elections/voters/african-americans

AIME CESAIRE : EUROPE IS INDEFENSIBLE

Martiniquan poet and politician Aimé Césaire reading from his brilliant Discourse on Colonialism (1950).

The essay explores the damning implications of colonialism - for the coloniser. Césaire wanted to think through the consequences of building a civilisation based on exploitation and oppression. The essay came at a time when Europeans were still reeling from the horrors of WWII. Césaire reminds us that these shouldn’t have come as a surprise to anyone with a nodding acquaintance of colonial atrocities. The real shock was that it was inflicted on fellow Europeans.

Continued.....SOURCES:

https://files.libcom.org/files/zz_aime_cesaire_robin_d.g._kelley_discourse_on_colbook4me.org_.pdf

https://violencespolicieres.fr/signalement/8197/#martinique-une-enquete-pour-violences-ouverte-contre-la-crs-8

https://www.la-croix.com/france/vie-chere-en-martinique-des-policiers-blesses-lors-d-affrontements-avec-des-manifestants-20241008#:~:text=Onze%20policiers%20ont%20été%20blessés%20lundi%207%20octobre%20en%20Martinique,île%2C%20a%20indiqué%20la%20préfecture.

https://www.palestineiseverywhere.com

How important is leadership? Will a great people under a lesser leader succumb to weaker forces led by someone great? We might want to take this week's African Proverb seriously, considering our leaders' quality (or lack thereof) outside the Sahel and a few other notable exceptions. Can we achieve what we need to accomplish in our countries, offices and elsewhere if sheep lead us?

MALCOLM X: ENTERTAINERS ARE
PUPPETS OF WHITE-SUPREMACY

The failed Kamala Harris campaign wheeled out a string of Black celebrities to sway the community’s vote, which reminded us of this Malcolm X gem. As he says, entertainers are not political leaders. Worse, more often than not, they’re simply puppets - used by the White-supremacist system to keep Black people distracted from the real issues.

SOURCES:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n88ONdIISV4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oozaVp5M93g

IS BOTSWANA'S NEW PRESIDENT UNDER THE CONTROL OF FOREIGN INTERESTS?

After nearly 60 years of being governed by one political party, Botswana has a new president and ruling party. Amid the euphoria that the change-of-guard has brought to the diamond-rich nation, there are concerns that the new president, Duma Boko, has ties to some not-so-progressive forces - including right-wing liaisons and links to controversial business people. African Stream's William Sakawa dives deeper.

Angola gained independence on this day in 1975 after centuries of Portuguese colonialism. The Portuguese presence in the Southern African nation of goes as far back as 1448, explorers arrived on the country's coast. They established settlements and moved inland to exploit natural resources and enslave Africans, shipping them off to Brazil and other colonies.

In the mid-20th century, the anti-colonial movement gained traction and became formalised with the emergence of organisations such as the leftist Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola. Continued suppression led the MPLA and other groups to launch an armed struggle against the Portuguese in 1961. This lasted until 1974, when Portugal's military dictatorship was overthrown by young military officers who were more open to freeing the country's African colonies.

Continued......In January 1975, MPLA and other liberation groups met with the new Portuguese government and signed the Alvor Agreement, paving way for the country's independence. Ideological differences between the three independence movements led to decades of civil war.

The country is still healing from this conflict but is trying to build itself up on the back of significant oil resources. Alas, in recent years, the ruling MPLA, which has governed the country since independence, has been accused of abandoning its revolutionary roots and transforming into a kleptocratic organisation serving the interests of Western governments and oil companies.

SOURCES:

https://nasseryouthmovement.net/AngolaDay-3306

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2023/11/30/fact-sheet-the-u-s-angola-partnership/#:~:text=Angola%20is%20a%20strategic%20partner,in%20Africa%20and%20the%20Atlantic.

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2023/may/25/kissinger-at-100-the-bloody-dreadful-filthy-angolan-civil-war-in-pictures
https://thediplomaticinsight.com/angola-celebrates-independence-day-2/
https://www.britannica.com/place/Angola/History

WHAT IS PAN-AFRICAN VETERANS DAY?

Every year since 1954, Veterans Day (11 November) has honoured military veterans who have served in the US armed forces. However, it is crucial to examine the role of patriotic celebrations in the world's largest empire built on unceded land and through the labour of enslaved people. 

In the case of the United States, the military serves imperialism, a system that benefits a small group of wealthy individuals through military domination.

At African Stream, we instead choose to honour revolutionary African heroes worldwide by celebrating Pan-African Veterans Day. From the Black Liberation Army in the US to Afro-Cuban revolutionary Victor Emilio Cruz, our fighters sacrificed their lives to combat the dehumanisation of African people everywhere and the exploitation of our people and natural resources.

Check out this video we published on 11 November 2023 featuring Salifu Mack (@pititlafrik) and let us know your thoughts on Pan-African Veterans Day.

END THE GENOCIDE! IT'S NOT A WAR - UN EXPERT

Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories, recently summed up Israel's 76-year occupation of Palestine as a 'settler-colonial conflict' and a g*nocide, not a 'war between two armies.'

Speaking before the UN's Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People, Albanese (@franceskalbs on X) described Israel's ongoing military onslaught on Palestinians in Gaza as the most 'basic infringement of the law of self-determination.' She argued that the Palestine question must be seen through the framework of settler colonialism to employ a proper application of international law.

Continued......In 'Bad News from Israel,' a 2011 book documenting the findings of extensive research on the BBC's coverage of Israel's occupation of Palestine, authors @greg_philo (X) and Mike Berry showed that the broadcaster did not provide viewers with in-depth context or include the perspective of Palestinians. International media has continued to publish this skewed portrayal.

Let us know your thoughts in the comments

SOURCES:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/45243578_Bad_News_from_Israel

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2024/jul/08/greg-philo-obituary

https://www.plutobooks.com/author/greg-philo/

https://profiles.cardiff.ac.uk/staff/berrym1

https://www.aa.com.tr/en/world/western-media-frames-events-of-oct-7-as-having-triggered-israeli-palestinian-conflict-expert/3371128

https://news.un.org/en/story/2024/09/1154496

MEDIA DOWNPLAYS ISRAELI FANS’ BEHAVIOUR

The mainstream media’s reporting on the recent attacks on Israeli football fans in Amsterdam has been criticised not only for failing to provide the full context but also for its condemnation of a pogrom that never happened. While picking up American and European leaders’ allegation of anti-Semitism, outlets downplayed the behaviour of Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters in the lead-up to, and during, the match.

For example, Sky News retracted and re-edited a report posted on the network’s social-media pages that had depicted Israeli fans as instigators - alleging they’d shouted racist chants. This report had also noted that “Israeli far-right ultras are notorious for their racism and physical violence.” Meanwhile, Reuters used double standards when describing the abuse shouted by Israelis and Arabs - using ‘slurs’ in the one case, and simply ‘slogans’ in the other.