No African state made the cut for the 2025 US visa waiver programme, which allows travellers from certain countries to enter the United States without a visa for up to 90 days.

This news comes amidst US President Donald Trump ramping up strict border policies and deportations, with African and other immigrants often feeling the heat. Thousands of undocumented Africans in the US are now staring down the barrel of deportation.

The move mirrors US systemic discrimination against Black people and reminds us of Trump's alleged 2018 remark that he didn't want people migrating into the US from 'sh*thole' countries in Africa.
Visa restrictions imposed on Africans not only discriminate, but make it more difficult for scientists, business people, and other professionals from Africa to attend seminars and other gatherings they require to further their practices.

Continued….. But it's a bit rich, isn’t it? Evidence has shown the US has meddled in African affairs, with shocking reports revealing that it has indirectly supported extremist groups like Boko Haram in Nigeria and Al-Shabaab in Somalia. The resulting conflict, economic despair and persecution have led many Africans to seek asylum in the US.

And let’s not forget this: The US doesn't refund visa rejects. Considering a study from the Higher Ed Immigration Portal found that in 2023, the US denied 57 per cent of African student visa applications, these rejections may be a clever way to fund consular services!

While some might lament the hurdles Africans face in entering the US, as Pan-Africanists, we say good riddance! Those of us passionate about our homeland see this as a chance to double down on the commitment to liberating Africa. And the inability to easily travel to the US may be a hidden blessing, keeping our people from heading to a country with the highest incarceration rate in the world, where seven out of 10 of its nearly 2 million prisoners are Black, and where Black people face a disproportionate risk of police brutality and a long history of racial discrimination and violence.

Sources

https://africa.businessinsider.com/local/lifestyle/all-54-african-countries-excluded-from-us-2025-visa-waiver-list/h4f1mrg

https://www.getaway.co.za/travel-news/african-countries-excluded-from-newly-released-u-s-visa-waiver-list/

https://www.higheredimmigrationportal.org/research/the-interview-of-a-lifetime-an-analysis-of-visa-denials-and-international-student-flows-to-the-u-s/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLQc2dYikyU

https://www.firstpost.com/web-show/firstpostafrica/usaid-funding-boko-haram-isis-firstpost-africa-subscribe-to-firstpost-n18g-vd922504-shorts.html

https://www.prb.org/resources/u-s-has-worlds-highest-incarceration-rate/

https://www.sentencingproject.org/reports/mass-incarceration-trends/

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/report-black-people-are-still-killed-police-higher-rate-groups-rcna17169

https://www.semafor.com/article/07/28/2024/us-rejects-african-students-visas-rising

https://www.theelephant.info/opinion/2022/06/10/africans-not-welcome-the-punitive-us-visa-application-process/

20TH CENTURY’S POWERFUL WOMEN.

It’s International Women’s Day, so we’re celebrating a selection of extraordinary African women who made significant contributions and advancements throughout the 20th century.

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

‘NIGERIAN PRINCE’ SCAMMER WAS A WHITE 67-YEAR-OLD

Police say a white 67-year-old Louisiana resident named Michael Neu managed to con people out of thousands of dollars by posing as the beneficiary of a Nigerian prince’s will.

However, if you skim the headline, you almost might mistake Neu for the victim. Ah, the wonders of Western media! Once again, we see the art of sloppy (and sometimes misinforming) journalism at play, crafting headlines that obscure the role of white wrongdoers while painting people of colour as guilty before proven innocent.

Many times, the media have smeared our brothers and sisters in the US when they were victims of police brutality or other crimes against their humanity.

Continued….. We remember that the press dug up 17-year-old Trayvon Martin’s school suspension records after a vigilante shot him in 2012, kicking off the Black Lives Matter movement of protests against state violence. We also cannot forget how the media called Black teen Michael Brown ‘no angel’ after police k*lled him in 2014 in Ferguson, Missouri. 

For this reason, we rightfully raise our eyebrows when we skim headlines.

Video credit: @auntiebuffie (TikTok)

Sources

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-johnson-black-victim-20170330-story.html

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/nigerian-prince-scammer-was-67-year-old-louisiana-police-say-n833801

AFRICANS BROUGHT CIVILISATION TO EUROPE

Decades of indoctrination by school history books spinning a narrative that has the West as the origin of all things good and civilised means many Westerners have no idea that it’s actually Africans who gave them some of the greatest cultural and intellectual achievements known to humanity. We’re talking advances in farming, agriculture, astronomy, mathematics, geography, hygiene, architecture, art and philosophy. Much of this was brought up from North Africa by the Moors, who conquered and ruled what is now Spain and Portugal for 700 odd years.

Continued……The lady in this video says that’s something even many Africans are unaware of. (If anyone knows who she is, please tag us in the replies so we can attribute the content to her properly.) She argues that the Western historical narrative wilfully ignores the African contribution to ‘European’ civilisation because doing otherwise would legitimise the idea that Black people can dominate - militarily and culturally - on what White people see as ‘their’ territory, thus shattering the myth of White supremacy. And it erases the chief colonial ‘justification’ for our historical subjugation: our ancestors’ supposed primitiveness.

Whether the ‘ignorance’ she attributes to us is a fact or not, she’s surely spot on about what motivated the Western writers of history. What do you think?

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

NAMING DRC MINERAL-WAR PROFITEERS

Many often speak of the three-decade-long, Western-backed proxy war over natural resources in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) in vague terms, leaving the public confused about why it’s happening, the players and the funders. 

Moreover, many in the imperialist-backed media frame it as a ‘complex’ war, obscuring that it is a resource war that would not be happening—at least not at its alarming scale—if the DRC wasn’t the world’s most resource-rich country with an estimated $24 trillion of minerals underfoot to power global technological advancements.

In Episode 18 of our ‘Pan-African Attitude’ podcast, African Stream journalist Erick Gavala (@ErickGavala on Instagram) asked Maurice Carney, Friends of the Congo (@congofriends) co-founder and executive director, to break it all down. As you hear in this clip, a wide range of players, from individuals in the Great Lakes region to corporations on other continents, seek financial gain.

Continued……All the while, the war had k*lled more than 6 million Congolese by 2010 and internally displaced over 7 million by 2024, with a shocking 700,000 people displaced in eastern DRC since January.

If you are interested in hearing more, watch the whole episode on our X and Rumble accounts, and on YouTube (search for @ahmedkaballo4170).

Sources

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/12/17/tech/apple-microsoft-tesla-dell-congo-cobalt-mining/index.html

https://www.business-humanrights.org/en/latest-news/are-these-tech-companies-complicit-in-human-rights-abuses-of-child-cobalt-miners-in-congo/

https://thehill.com/opinion/international/4829844-ending-africas-longest-and-deadliest-war/

https://www.cfr.org/global-conflict-tracker/conflict/violence-democratic-republic-congo

GREAT FEMALE FIGURES OF AFRICA

The significant contributions and pivotal roles of women in Africa’s liberation struggle are often under-emphasised. Today, on International Women’s Day, we reflect on the rich history of the Kongo Kingdom and honour the extraordinary leadership of two remarkable women - Queen Nzinga and Kimpa Vita. These courageous figures were not just warriors, they were powerful leaders who guided their communities in resisting foreign oppression.

The Kongo Kingdom extended far beyond the borders of present-day DR Congo. Initially, the Portuguese arrived as missionaries, introducing Christianity - but they soon turned into slave traders. In response, King Manikongo rose to defend his people and, following his death, Nzinga and Vita bravely carried on the struggle. This is their inspiring legacy.

Happy International Women’s Day!

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

A HISTORY OF ANTI-HAITIAN DISCRIMINATION IN THE U.S.

Anti-Haitian discrimination in the US has a long history, rooted in events that date back to the Haitian Revolution of 1804. After Haiti became the first Black republic by overthrowing French enslavers, the US refused to recognise the nation until the Civil War, driven by fears that its enslaved population might be inspired to revolt. 

Over time, this initial fear evolved into broader exploitation and economic control, including military occupations and political interference. These actions set the stage for decades of hardship, sparking mass exodus.

Continued……Racist stereotypes have compounded the discrimination against Haitians by linking them with disease and crime, exemplified by derogatory labels used during the early days of the HIV/AIDS crisis and the using public-health laws like Title 42 during the COVID-19 pandemic to turn them away. 

The US created the conditions that have forced Haitians to seek refuge and, to this day, Washington continues to bar Haitians from entering.

SOURCES

https://www.vox.com/politics/371855/trump-vance-springfield-ohio-racist-conspiracy-theories-haitian-immigrants

https://theconversation.com/what-is-temporary-protected-status-a-global-migration-expert-explains-why-the-us-offers-some-foreign-nationals-temporary-protection-240525

https://www.workers.org/2015/08/21241

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/20/world/haiti-wall-street-us-banks.html

https://exhibits.uflib.ufl.edu/HaitianAmericanDream

BLACK POWER BABY!

Kids can soak up knowledge at any age! Rapper and activist Vic Mensa is making sure his son is well-informed and on the right side of history. In this video, he dives into the tale of the Congo - from its independence to the assassination of revolutionary leader Patrice Lumumba and the ongoing, decades-long war fuelled by Western interests in Congolese minerals. Talk about a captivating and cute audience! The future is definitely in the hands of the younger generation!

Video Credit: @vicmensa (Instagram)

REACTION: BLACK PEOPLE ‘NOT NATIVE’ TO SOUTHERN AFRICA?

We have all come across a lot of ridiculous attempts to justify the European colonisation of Africa, from the lie that colonisers helped civilise the continent to exaggerated claims that they increased life expectancy via Western medicine. 

But, just when you think it can’t get any more absurd, it does. For instance, Eric Louw, a South African-born former journalist and academic, now based in Australia, claims Europeans did not steal land from Black people in his country of birth because the Bantu people, who make up the majority of Africa’s Black people, are ‘not indigenous’ to it.

Louw’s claims are the work of a myth that has circulated in South Africa’s right-wing circles since the 19th century.

Continued……The so-called ‘Vacant Land’ theory asserts that European settlers arrived in what is now South Africa almost at the same time as Africans, who were (per the theory) still migrating from central Africa at that point. Therefore, according to these right-wingers, the two groups have equal claim to South Africa’s land.

This theory was also used by the apartheid regime to grab land from Black people, insisting that it didn’t belong to them in the first place. However, archaeological and historical evidence debunks such claims. For instance, artefacts discovered at the Mapungumbwe heritage site in the country’s north show that Bantu societies existed in South Africa as far back as the 9th century.

In this clip, African Stream’s Wambura Mwai explains why this Vacant Land theory could be making a comeback in South African right-wing social-media groups.

Video credit: British-Australian Community (YouTube)

Sources

https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/empty-land-myth#:~:text=The%20Empty%20or%20Vacant%20Land,land%2Downership%20in%20the%20country.
https://theexpeditionproject.com/the-importance-of-mapungubwe/