KWAME TURE: WE CAN'T BE POLITICALLY IRRESPONSIBLE

In this video, revolutionary Pan-Africanist Kwame Ture emphasises that our political responsibility should extend beyond just voting in elections - which take years to come round. We need to show daily commitment to the revolutionary struggle. He encourages us to educate ourselves and stay informed about current events to better guide our activism.

Ture left the US in the late ‘60s after being targeted by the FBI (which had secretly identified him as the man who would succeed Malcolm X as the dominant Black leader) and moved to Africa, where he became a prominent figure in the pan-African movement. It was there he changed his name from ‘Stokely Standiford Churchill Carmichael’ and campaigned for revolutionary socialist pan-Africanism. He played a key role in founding the All-African People's Revolutionary Party. Today, the AAPRP has a presence across the continent, from Guinea-Bissau to Kenya. Ture died on 15 November 1998 in Guinea, aged 57.

'PALESTINE WILL NEVER DIE' - LOWKEY'S SONG FOR GAZA

British-Iraqi rapper Lowkey, one of the most vocal supporters of Palestine, has used his online platforms to highlight the shocking scale of human suffering in Gaza at the hands of Israel's Western-backed military onslaught. 

Here's a fan (@omar.sala78 on Instagram) in Deir Al-Balah, Central Gaza, showing children enjoying Lowkey's song ('Palestine Will Never Die') as it plays on a large projected screen. The children sit in rows like they are in a dark movie theatre, a respite from the destruction around them.

Lowkey's song refers to suffering Palestinian children, striking a particularly painful chord given a recent report by the UN Human Rights Office stated nearly 70 per cent of Gaza's casualties are women and children.

Continued........Meanwhile, in July, the British medical journal The Lancet reported Gaza's death toll could be over 186,000 and climbing, given Israel has not relented in the latest escalation of the 76-year-old occupation.

However, as Lowkey (@Lowkey0nline on X) powerfully reminds the world, Palestine will never die.

Video credit: @omar.sala78 on IG

Sources:

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn5wel11pgdo

https://www.thelancet.com/action/showPdf?pii=S0140-6736%2824%2901169-3

https://www.trtworld.com/middle-east/death-toll-in-gaza-could-exceed-186000-the-lancet-18181205

REACTION: U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL NOMINEE CALLED TO INVADE NIGER

African Stream journalist Inemesit Richardson called for Africans everywhere to defend Niger following then-US congress member Matt Gaetz calling in May for Washington to invade Niger over the African state's decision to boot US troops.

Gaetz has since been nominated for attorney general by US President-elect Donald Trump. The attorney general heads the US Department of Justice and is the US government’s chief law enforcement officer.

Continued.......During an August episode of 'This Week in Africa,' African Stream's livestream collaboration with @authentic_african, Richardson warned that while nothing came out of Gaetz's threats, US regime-change tactics may not be off the table for the Alliance of Sahel States (AES) confederation, made up of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger. In recent years, these three countries waged successful coups d’état against Western-aligned leaders and all three have expelled French troops.

Trump's nomination of warmongers like Gaetz should give us a reason to be more vigilant.

Sources:

https://www.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/3863464/us-completes-withdrawal-from-ab-201/#:~:text=The%20U.S.%20military%20completed%20its,both%20U.S.%20and%20Nigerien%20forces.

https://www.justice.gov/ag

'WOULD YOU SAY THAT TO A JEW?'

Britain not being forced to reckon with colonialism and slavery has helped sanitise British imperialism and dilute the historical scale of its destruction of societies. This video clip shows the cognitive dissonance of former British member of Parliament and GB News host @Jacob_Rees_Mogg, who argued with @AytonImarn that British imperialism was a force for good. He ignored the exploitative nature of colonialism, whereby the British empire imposed its systems primarily for its benefit, dispossessing colonised populations of natural-resource wealth.

The claim that Britain ‘gave’ the Caribbean rule of law, democracy, and capitalism is a selective historical narrative that downplays colonialism’s impact on millions of victims. These communities had working systems before the British imposed theirs, with British hegemony influencing generations of Global South people to erase from their collective minds the archives of knowledge and tradition.

Continued......By suggesting Caribbean nations should be grateful for British colonialism, Rees-Mogg minimises the devastating impacts of forced labour, resource extraction and systemic racism, creating inequalities still present to this day in formerly colonised countries. In 2023, as part of 'international reconciliation,' 15 Caribbean countries announced they sought $33 trillion in slavery reparations, with Britain alone billed for $19.6 trillion.

Have a watch, and please share your thoughts.

Video credit: @gbnews

SOURCES

Impact of British imperialism
https://www.historytools.org/stories/the-deadly-impact-of-british-rule-in-india-a-comparative-analysis

Indigenous community already had systems
https://fiveable.me/key-terms/environmental-biology/impact-of-colonialism-on-indigenous-communities#:~:text=Colonialism%20significantly%20disrupted%20the%20social,power%20dynamics%20to%20maintain%20control

The victims of capitalism
https://jacobin.com/2014/11/capitalisms-victims/

Amount owed
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/caribbean-countries-seek-trillion-slavery-reparations-b1106585.html

Anglican Church head Justin Welb resigned following a damning independent report detailing his church’s failure to act on a horrific case of abuse. 

An independent review led by social worker Keith Makin into how the Church of England handled allegations of severe abuse by the late John Smyth (1941-2018) revealed that the British lawyer and lay preacher abused 85 to 100 boys in Zimbabwe and South Africa for decades.

Continued.......The Iwerne Trust, a charity that organised summer youth camps, first published an abuse report in 1982. Smyth allegedly subjected boys at Winchester College, a boarding school in the UK, to sadistic beatings so severe the boys would bleed and suffer bruises for months. 

Senior church officials in the UK declined to inform authorities about Smyth, who moved to Zimbabwe in 1984. There, he set up Zambesi Ministries, a private charity organising elite summer camps for boys in the country's top schools. Smyth reportedly groomed the boys, joining them in nude showers and swims. Guide Nyachuru, 16, died in a swimming accident, for which authorities charged Smyth with culpable homicide. He then moved to South Africa in 2001 and was eventually ex-communicated in 2017, the year before he died. The Makin Review concludes that a criminal conviction would have befallen Smyth if the Anglican Church had promptly involved law enforcement.

The Archbishop of Canterbury and Smyth may be gone, but the African men he abused must live with these wrenching experiences.

Sources:

https://www.churchofengland.org/sites/default/files/2024-11/independent-learning-lessons-review-john-smyth-qc-november-2024.pdf

https://lawandreligionuk.com/2024/11/13/makin-review-summary-of-recommendations/

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/15/obituaries/john-smyth-christian-camp-leader-accused-of-beatings-dies-at-77.html
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cq6lzeel2e8o

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c62lr331lkzo

https://news.sky.com/story/who-was-john-smyth-the-barrister-at-the-centre-of-the-church-of-england-abuse-cover-up-13252818

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/justin-welby-church-of-england-abuse-john-smyth-b2646658.html

Cats and lions are related - though their last common ancestor existed over ten-million years ago. Long ago as that was, some cats still carry themselves like lions! People too can attain grandeur. But only if they’re open to new ways of doing things - so claims this week’s African idiom. Alas, not many cats or humans are…