Continued….. Additionally, Biden was not interested in solving the root cause of the problem, his simplistic answer being: take ‘offenders’ off the streets. This encouraged states to build more prisons, ramp up cop recruitment and back programmes that promoted increasing drug-related arrests.

It is therefore both ironic and insulting for President Biden to save his son from the same law he created, which broke many families through the prison industrial-complex pipeline.

Sources:

Video
https://x.com/brixwe/status/1662832564837441541?t=4Dts5iq6yA7by0zVfgHIcw

Hunter drug related charges
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cw55ngde0qwo

Harsh terms
https://x.com/brixwe/status/1662832564837441541?t=4Dts5iq6yA7by0zVfgHIcw
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/6/20/18677998/joe-biden-1994-crime-bill-law-mass-incarceration

Sentencing disparity
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/6/20/18677998/joe-biden-1994-crime-bill-law-mass-incarceration

Crime bill effect on Black communities
https://www.americanprogress.org/article/3-ways-1994-crime-bill-continues-hurt-communities-color/

WATCHING GAZA G*NOCIDE IN REAL-TIME FROM ISRAEL’S OBSERVATION DECK

During a 19 November livestream with US judge Andrew Napolitano (@judgenap on X), a former US Marine recounted a chilling moment from his recent trip to Israel.

Matthew Hoh (@MatthewPHoh on X), now an Eisenhower Media Network (@MediaEisenhower on X) associate director, told of visiting an observation deck in Israel overlooking Gaza, where Israel’s military onslaught since 8 October 2023 has k*lled more than 186,000 people as of early July, according to the Lancet medical journal. 

Continued……Hoh said the observation deck is so far removed from the horrors of Palestinian suffering in Gaza, such that one cannot hear the muffled screams and cries as buildings filled with people fall to the ground or bullets rip through humans. It is a place where g*nocide is transformed into a ‘picturesque’ sight, the equivalent of an action movie at the cinemas.

While there, he saw Israeli schoolchildren on a field trip celebrating the scene.

Video credit: Judge Napolitano - Judging Freedom (YouTube)

UGANDA HAS NO JURISDICTION IN KENYA - KIZZA BESIGYE'S LAWYER

On 2 December, Kenyan lawyer Martha Karua announced she has gathered a ‘Pan-African’ group of lawyers to defend Ugandan opposition leader Kizza Besigye (@kizzabesigye1 of @FDCOfficial1 on X), whom Ugandan operatives abducted on 16 November in Nairobi while attending a book launch hosted by Kenyan politician @MarthaKarua (X). 

The legal team has condemned the lack of due process and questioned Uganda’s jurisdiction over alleged offences committed in Kenya, Greece and Switzerland. 

Kenya initially denied involvement, stating its security agencies were not responsible, though Uganda later claimed the operation was a joint effort. 

The abduction adds to Kenya’s growing reputation for controversial cross-border actions, including deporting four Turkish nationals and Kenyan police killing Pakistani journalist Arshad Sharif in 2022.

S ources:

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cp8x3vr6zj2o
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cp8x3vr6zj2o
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cp8x3vr6zj2o

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xAAqxAZ-Nxk

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cp8x3vr6zj2o

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cvgwg5n0y0lo
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/12/7/killing-of-pakistani-journalist-arshad-sharif-kenya-planned-assasination

During his famous 3 August 1857 address on 'West India Emancipation' in Canandaigua, New York, abolitionist, orator and author Frederick Douglass (1818-95) emphasised that we must obtain systemic change through collective organisation. Douglass noted that both moral and physical dilemmas require struggle and 'if there is no struggle, there is no progress'.

In this week’s Wednesday Wisdom, his words reiterate that as long as the oppressed 'hug their chains,' the oppressors will never relinquish power. Douglass echoes the sentiments of many of our predecessors that we, as Africans, will only gain our freedom when our collective demand for liberation becomes too powerful to be ignored by those who wield power.

Sources:

https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/1857-frederick-douglass-if-there-no-struggle-there-no-progress/

Namibia has made history by electing its first-ever female president. Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah secured 57% of the vote, according to the country's electoral commission. Her victory reinforces the South West Africa People's Organisation (SWAPO) party's 34-year dominance since Namibia gained independence from apartheid South Africa in 1990.

The 72-year-old's decisive victory proved wrong predictions that she would have to enter a run-off race. Polls suggested younger Namibians had become disillusioned with SWAPO, despite the party's historical significance and past achievements in the fight against apartheid. There were concerns that the election results might mirror those of neighbouring South Africa, where the African National Congress lost its majority; and those in Botswana, whose long-standing ruling party was defeated.

Continued.........Opposition parties have contested the results, citing technical issues such as a shortage of ballot papers, which prompted election officials to extend voting hours. Nandi-Ndaitwah's chief rival, Panduleni Itula from the Independent Patriots for Change party, finished second - with approximately 25.5% of the vote. His rising popularity can be traced back to the 2019 elections, when he managed win over swathers of SWAPO supporters.

Nandi-Ndaitwah has been a member of SWAPO since the 1970s, during the struggle for independence, and has held various senior positions within the party. In February, she was promoted from foreign minister to vice president following the death of President Hage Geingob in office. She’s built a reputation as a steady leader and experienced diplomat, not associated with the corruption scandals that have affected other SWAPO members.

BIDEN’S OWN-GOAL ‘JOKE’ IN ANGOLA

Jokes often contain more than a hint of truth. US president Joe Biden just gave a classic example during his visit to Angola. Thinking he was being funny, he ‘quipped’ that his family (read: the US and especially its military) like to visit people uninvited, eat them out of house and home and generally outstay their welcome. Well, Africa and the Global South at large have been the butt of this joke for too long: what’s so funny about invading us, looting us and then refusing to pull your soldiers out or stop your drone strikes?

Credit: CNN-News18/YouTube

'WE GOT 10,000 ACRES FOR FREE' - 3RD-GENERATION BRITISH SETTLER

In this clip from a viral video, Mike Harris, 86, a third-generation British settler in Kenya, admitted to Kenyan journalist and YouTuber Lynn Ngugi that his family got 10,000 acres of land for free.

Beginning with the Crown Lands Ordinance of 1902, the British reserved at least 10 million acres of Kenya's most fertile land for British and European settlers, who would acquire vast ranches by paying a few coins to the colonial surveyor. These plots came to be known collectively as the 'White Highlands.'

Continued……All of Kenya became ‘Crown land,' meaning that it was the property of the British Crown. With the stroke of a pen, British colonialists rendered Kenya’s Africans landless, pushing them off to less fertile lands and forcing them to slave for settlers to pay the colonial administration’s 'hut tax.’

The consequences of this historical injustice are felt today, with Kenyans suffering under the weight of landlessness, wealth inequality, slum dwellings, poverty and pro-elite politics.

Video credit: @lynn_ngugi1 (X)

Sources:

https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Historical-timeline-of-Kenyas-land-based-policies-During-the-pre-colonial-period-there_fig3_385975735

https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/kenya/history-colonial-4.htm

https://archive.gazettes.africa/archive/ke/1924/ke-government-gazette-dated-1924-02-27-no-932.pdf

https://www.declassifieduk.org/britain-stole-their-land-to-plant-tea-now-they-want-it-back/

https://www.theelephant.info/analysis/2021/09/04/white-settlers-black-colonialists-and-the-landless-majority/

https://ijisset.org/storage/Volume5/Issue6/IJISSET-050511.pdf

BIDEN'S REAL AGENDA IN ANGOLA

Biden's gone to Angola for the loot, specifically for minerals like cobalt and copper necessary for powering devices and electric vehicles. That's educator George Lee Jr's blunt assessment of US President Joe Biden's 11th-hour visit to Angola on 2 December. 

The outgoing president’s tour will include the $5 billion Lobito Corridor, a key infrastructure project co-funded by the United States and the European Union that connects Angola's port of Lobito on the Atlantic coast to the mineral-rich Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Zambia via a 1,300-kilometre railway. Lee argues the project will only hasten the exploitation of Angola and the DRC. It's part of Washington's effort to counter China's economic clout in Africa.

Continued….. Angola's strategic location on the southwest coast of Africa has long made it a key player in international affairs. It's a convenient export point for goods from Central Africa to the West. However, it's also been central to significant historical events, including a proxy war between Cold War rivals. Moscow backed the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) led by Agostinho Neto, while Washington supported the National Front for the Liberation of Angola (FNLA) and its offshoot, the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), led by Jonas Savimbi. The civil war began in 1975 and ended in 2002.

Following the war's end, China provided infrastructure development loans that sped up Angola's economic recovery. In turn, China gained access to Angola's oil industry, which now supplies 72 per cent of its output to China.

Given China's heavy investments in the region's mining industry, the jury is out on whether Washington can catch up with Beijing.

Video credit: @theconsciouslee (X)

Sources;


https://newscentral.africa/biden-in-angola-for-first-visit-to-sub-saharan-africa-as-us-president/

https://www.voanews.com/a/biden-to-spotlight-angola-s-lobito-corridor-his-legacy-to-counter-china-in-africa/7879407.html

https://www.aa.com.tr/en/africa/on-first-visit-to-angola-biden-says-future-of-the-world-is-in-africa/3412458

https://history.state.gov/milestones/1969-1976/angola

https://www.hrw.org/reports/1999/angola/Angl998-03.htm

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1137636/main-destinations-of-oil-crude-exports-from-angola

https://www.chathamhouse.org/2020/12/chinas-southern-africa-debt-deals-reveal-wider-plan

South African freedom fighter and pan-African intellectual Robert Mangaliso Sobukwe would have turned 100 today.

Sobukwe was born on 5 December 1924 in a Black township on the outskirts of Graaff-Reinet in today's Eastern Cape province. After a childhood marked by academic excellence, he enrolled at Fort Hare University in 1947, an institution whose alumni included many anti-colonial icons such as Robert Mugabe, Oliver Tambo and Nelson Mandela.

Continued….. Like many before him, it was at Fort Hare that Sobukwe's revolutionary flame was lit. Becoming a prominent figure on the university’s political scene, he'd serve as the president of the Students Representative Council and Secretary of the newly-formed African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL).

After University, Sobukwe briefly worked as a high school teacher before landing a job in the African Studies department at Witwatersrand University in Johannesburg.

In 1958, Sobukwe led members of the ANC, who, disgruntled by the party's ‘liberal-left multiracialist' policies, ceded from the organisation and formed the Pan-Africanist Congress (PAC).

On 21 March 1960, Sobukwe led hundreds of PAC members and citizens in a march to Orlando police station in Soweto in protest against the so-called Pass Law, which restricted the movement of Black South Africans. A similar protest also took place on the same day in the township of Sharpeville, where 69 people were gunned down in cold blood when apartheid forces opened fire on the peaceful rally. Sobukwe and other PAC leaders were arrested in the aftermath of the demonstrations. He was later sentenced to a three-year prison term.

After completing the prison sentence, Sobukwe was again detained under the so-called General Law Amendment Act, which allowed apartheid authorities to prolong the imprisonment of any political prisoner indefinitely. The law became infamous and was dubbed the 'Sobukwe clause.'

In 1969, Sobukwe was released from Robben Island and subsequently banished to Kimberly in the Northern Cape province, where he was placed under 12-hour house arrest and restricted from engaging in political activities.

While in Kimberly, he fell ill with lung cancer. Restrictions imposed on his movement complicated his attempts to receive timely medical care. By the time doctors treated him in Johannesburg and Cape Town, his condition had deteriorated and he succumbed to the disease on 27 February 1978.

By the time of his death, he had made a profound and lasting impression on the struggle against apartheid. Nearly five decades have passed since Sobukwe's death. However, his ideas for a united and prosperous Africa continue to resonate with many people on the continent and beyond who are committed to ridding it of all colonial and imperial vestiges.

Sources:

https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2024/11/30/robert-sobukwe-the-south-african-leader-once-as-revered-as-mandela

https://www.ufh.ac.za/news/News/UFHcommemorateRobertMangalisoSobukwe%E2%80%99scentenaryspecialMemorialLecture
https://www.unisa.ac.za/sites/corporate/default/Unisa-History-and-Memory-Project/Personalities/All-personalities/Robert-Sobukwe

https://southafrica-info.com/history/robert-sobukwe-one-race-human-race/0

MANDELA CALLS OUT THE US!

South African anti-apartheid icon Nelson Mandela died on this day in 2013 at the age of 95. Mandela is remembered as the man who helped lead South Africa out of the crimes and excesses of apartheid. Western mainstream media may portray him as a kindly grandfatherly figure who liked to dance and forgive his oppressors, but we remember him as an anti-imperialist until the end.

Continued..........In this video, Mandela calls out the United States as a warmonger - a country that supports carnage, consistently breaks the rules and is more than willing to go to any lengths, even at the expense of fundamental human rights, to push its hegemonic agenda.
He lambasts the US for its invasion of Iraq and the war it initiated 21 years ago. This unnecessary military campaign resulted in the deaths of anywhere between one- and two-million men, women and children.
When former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright was asked if US sanctions that claimed the lives of up to 500,000 Iraqi children were justified, she responded, 'We think the price is worth it.'
Mandela was instrumental in tearing down South Africa's oppressive apartheid regime, as well as speaking up for other oppressed peoples, such as the Palestinians. His commitment to the Palestinian cause was unwavering till the end. This commitment was on full display when he uttered these words: 'But we know too well that our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians.'
May he continue to rest in peace and power!
Video credit: Democracy Now

Sources:

https://www.newsweek.com/watch-madeleine-albright-saying-iraqi-kids-deaths-worth-it-resurfaces-1691193

AES AFRICANS FIND PAN-AFRICAN CONNECTIONS WITH CUBA, PT. 1

On 8 November, a delegation of 12 people from Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger arrived in Havana, Cuba. For the next seven days, they would travel to multiple Cuban cities, meet with many Cuban revolutionaries, and visit a string of historical sites to learn from Cuba's socialist model, Cuba’s ability to survive the 64-year US blockade and the island nation’s relationship to Africa to help move the Alliance of Sahel States (AES) forward.

The delegation was organised by the Thomas Sankara Centre in Burkina Faso (@burkinabooks on Instagram), with participation from the Union of Nigerien Students (USN) based out of Niger and the Headquarters of the Revolution based out of Mali. @AmisturCuba and @ICAP_cuba hosted the delegation throughout the country.

Continued….. In this video, you hear directly from some of the delegates. All three AES members—Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger—have had historically strong relationships with Cuba at one moment or another and continue to work with Cuba. Burkina Faso, in particular, had especially strong relations with Cuba during the 1983-87 popular and democratic Revolution led by Captain Thomas Sankara (1949-87). During Sankara's presidency, the national slogan of the country, ‘the homeland or death, we will succeed,’ came from one of Cuba's national slogans coined by Argentine doctor-turned-revolutionary Ernesto Che Guevara. Burkina Faso also created Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDRs) to serve as the most fundamental revolutionary organisation regrouping the grassroots of the country. These CDRs were inspired by a similar organisation with the same name in Cuba and which continue to exist to this day throughout the Caribbean nation.

Mali, too, had a close relationship with Cuba under Pan-Africanist independence leader and first President Modibo Keïta. Keïta welcomed Guevara in Bamako and Malian students and artists traveled to Cuba for training.

Despite this rich history of exchange, this delegation is the first time a group of Africans from the Sahel visited Cuba with the explicit purpose of learning about Cuban socialism and Cuban-African relations since the formation of the AES. Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger have charted a path of self-determination, sovereignty, anti-imperialism and economic development for their people. Cuba is a country that has been upholding and advancing its revolution since 1959. Furthermore, as the delegates learned during their trip to the island, the Cuban revolution is in many ways ontologically African in nature, as Cuba has an African national identity and a Pan-Africanist foreign policy.

For these reasons close relationships between the AES and Cuba are of utmost importance and exchanges of this kind may pave the way toward greater African emancipation.