CONSTRUCTION VEHICLES POUR INTO BURKINA FASO?

People on social media are cheering for Burkina Faso as internet users post videos of new road-construction vehicles pouring into the country via Ghana.

Featuring the world’s youngest president, 36-year-old Ibrahim Traoré, Burkina Faso has gained a positive reputation across the region and the continent for charting a development plan independent of former coloniser France and the West.

In recent years, the country opened two tomato-paste factories and began constructing a gold refinery and a mining-residue treatment facility. Recently, the Alliance of Sahel States (AES), to which Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger belong, revealed a plan to develop roads and railways to connect the countries’ major cities as part of its goal of free movement within the AES. The ultimate goal is to create a federated country.

Video credits: inous TV au Faso 🇧🇫 (YouTube) / @the_kandas (TikTok)

Continued……Sources:

https://www.lemonde.fr/afrique/article/2023/11/23/le-burkina-faso-lancement-la-construction-de-sa-premiere-raffinerie-d-or_6201923_3212.html

https://burkina24.com/2024/11/29/usine-de-transformation-de-tomates-de-bobo-dioulasso-le-capitaine-ibrahim-traore-procedera-a-linauguration-le-samedi-30-novembre-2024/

https://burkina24.com/2024/12/16/inauguration-de-lusine-de-sofato-le-president-du-faso-est-arrive-a-yako/

https://www.barrons.com/articles/burkina-faso-launches-first-mine-residue-treatment-facility-46ccaa8c

https://primature.ml/communique-du-conseil-des-ministres-du-mercredi-22-janvier-2025-cm-n2025-04-sgg

https://www.tiktok.com/@the_kandas/video/7466783603943296261

THE U.S IS THE MOST VIOLENT COUNTRY IN THE WORLD

Economist and public-policy analyst Jeffrey Sachs was interrupted during a democracy forum in Greece (in 2022) while discussing the atrocities committed by the US and the UK.

First, he highlighted Britain’s imperial violence across the globe, pointing out that while it presented itself as a democratic nation, it engaged in ruthless colonialism. Britain’s colonial footprint was left in India, Egypt and many other countries throughout Africa, Asia and the Caribbean.

Sachs also branded the US as the most violent country since the 1950s, noting its long history of using both covert and overt methods to overthrow governments that are considered unfriendly to US interests. Washington’s military operations have been employed to undermine economies worldwide.

Continued….. Furthermore, violent actions by the US and the UK have not ceased. Recently, Washington and London both aided and abetted Israel as it killed tens of thousands of Palestinians.

Video Credit: Athens Democracy Forum

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

Continued……. These recommendations are widely considered to have laid the groundwork for the apartheid policies adopted in 1948. The wealth enjoyed by Afrikaners (descendants of Dutch settlers) in South Africa largely originated from this systemic change. It’s something that the country’s new Land Expropriation Law seeks to address, though some critics say it doesn’t go far enough.

Sources:

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00358533308450637

https://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/digital/collections/oral_hist/carnegie/special-features/

https://www.wikiwand.com/en/articles/Carnegie_Commission_of_Investigation_on_the_Poor_White_Question_in_South_Africa

AFRICA WAS MORE ADVANCED THAN EUROPE

Since the 17th century, European academics have tried to justify White supremacy and racism, promoting narratives that ‘other’ people of the Global South - presenting them as uncivilised and intellectually inferior.

For example, star of German Enlightenment philosophy Immanuel Kant argued for slavery and colonialism on the grounds of constructed racial hierarchies (though he did finally renounce these views in old age).

In the 19th century, US ethnologist George Morton tried to demonstrate that skull size correlates meaningfully with intelligence, hoping thereby to show that White people are by nature brainier than Black people.

Continued……European anthropologists and scholars, when confronted with some of the wonders of African civilisation, simply lied - pretending outside cultures (even extraterrestrial ones!) were the true originators.

In this clip, pan-African scholar PLO Lumumba dispels these myths, listing examples - from astronomy to medicine - of African civilisation that he says outshone anything the Europeans were doing at the time.

What else would you add to his list?

Sources:

https://philarchive.org/archive/KLEODW

https://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-africa/walls-benin-0016222

https://media.bloomsbury.com/rep/files/primary-source-131-gobineau-the-inequality-of-the-human-races.pdf

https://en.prothomalo.com/science-technology/8w2obhliyk

https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000081475

NIGERIA’S DANGOTE SCORES JET-FUEL EXPORT DEAL WITH SAUDI GIANT

There’s a new player shaking things up on the energy-export scene - Nigeria’s Dangote refinery.

In early February 2025, the Lagos-based facility reportedly shipped 130-million litres of jet fuel to Saudi Aramco, the world’s biggest oil company.

The $20-billion refinery, created by Nigerian billionaire Aliko Dangote, was built to reduce Nigeria’s reliance on fuel imports. However, the deal with Aramco might just have opened the door to exports, earning Dangote around $75 million based on current jet-fuel prices.

But it hasn’t all been smooth sailing for Dangote. The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and some international oil companies have accused him of trying to monopolise the market. With a capacity of 650,000 barrels per day, the Dangote refinery poses a significant threat to local importers and European sellers of refined products, who have been benefiting from Nigeria’s economy.

Continued….. The effects of this development extend beyond Nigeria, impacting the African continent. Analysts suggest that Dangote could help reduce the annual $17-billion outflow from Africa to Europe for gasoline.

Could the success with Aramco be the spark that ignites energy independence and economic recovery across the continent?

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

CASTRO: WHY U.S. HATES CUBA

On this day, 16 February in 1959, Fidel Castro was sworn in as prime minister of revolutionary Cuba after leading a guerrilla campaign that forced US-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista into exile. Castro’s commitment to aiding liberation struggles in Africa earned him loyalty and love in Africa.

Two months after the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq, Castro visited Argentina, where he delivered a speech that highlighted Cuba's staunch opposition to Washington's destructive imperialist policies, a position that's earned Cuba a six-decade blockade. Castro compared the United States’ bombardments to Cuba's medical internationalism. Since 1963, more than 600,000 Cuban health workers have provided medical services in more than 160 countries. Cuba also provided free military support to the last of Africa's liberation struggles.

Why is Washington desperate to crush Cuba's revolution?

Continued….. Sources:

https://www.france24.com/en/americas/20220207-the-embargo-is-a-virus-too-cuba-marks-six-decades-under-us-sanctions

https://peoplesworld.org/article/brain-drain-senators-urge-revival-of-u-s-program-to-entice-cuban-doctor-defections

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8omjBhxR9W0

LUMUMBA VILLAGE: DRC’S SANCTUARY FOR CHILDREN

Violence against children in the Democratic Republic of the Congo has reached unprecedented levels. According to the UN, there are few (if any) worse places to be a child. The country has the world’s highest number of verified grave violations against children in armed conflict.

As of early 2025, more than 26.4-million people in DRC are in need of humanitarian assistance - that’s about one in every four people - including some 14.2-million children. In the first few weeks of this year, escalating violence in the east has displaced over 100,000 people - more than half of them children. Entire communities are on the move, running from a war they never started, hunted by militias and ignored by the world. Conflict has been raging in parts of the country for nearly three decades, with children killed, sexually assaulted, abducted and forcibly recruited for use by armed groups.

Continued……Natural disasters have made things worse. In 2021, Mount Nyiragongo - north of the regional capital Goma - erupted, displacing nearly half a million and killing 50. Some 2,000 children were separated from their parents amid the chaos.

But even in this darkness, there are glimmers of hope. A project called ‘I Heart Africa’ (@iheartafricadotorg - Instagram) has tried to provide a sanctuary for some of those impacted by the disaster. The group, which puts African concerns first, has built a small community called Lumumba Village. Our man Erick Gavala paid a visit to learn more.

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

WEST ALLOWS KAGAME IMPUNITY IN CONGO

Maurice Carney, co-founder and executive director of Friends of the Congo (@congofriends), argued on Episode 18 of our ‘Pan-African Attitude’ podcast that Rwanda’s president, Paul Kagame, is a puppet of the West, serving their interests. Therefore, Carney said, Kagame has operated with impunity as his government arms, trains and harbours the M23 militia, whose campaign to seize mineral-rich territories in eastern DRC led about 500,000 Congolese to flee their homes in January alone. As the militia continues its Western-backed effort to expand territories it controls, it has reaped $800,000 monthly in production taxes in the Rubaya region.

In a 3 February interview with CNN International’s Larry Madowo (@larrymadowo), Kagame claimed not to know if Rwandan troops are in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). This shocking denial comes amidst many reports indicating the opposite.

Continued……In this episode, we explore the three-decade-long, Western-backed proxy war over natural resources in the DRC that had k*lled about 6 million by 2010 and internally displaced about 7 million as of last year.

Watch the whole episode on our X and Rumble accounts, and on YouTube (search for @ahmedkaballo4170).

Sources:

https://www.aljazeera.com/gallery/2025/2/3/dr-congo-near-goma-displaced-people-begin-long-journey-home

https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2024/5/2/blood-minerals-what-are-the-hidden-costs-of-the-eu-rwanda-supply-deal

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2025/02/06/africa/dr-congo-goma-violence-deaths-intl-hnk

https://efe.com/en/latest-news/2025-02-07/dr-congo-conflict/

https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/afr62/9016/2025/en

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ckgyzl1mlkvo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qW36WN7q7cc

https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/congo-rebels-muddy-minerals-market-with-illegal-rwanda-exports-says-un-report-2025-01-08