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Great gift: Africa, a continent of contradiction, where conflict and innovation, fragility and possibility, poverty
and resilience live side by side.

Africa has a gift the world still needs

The demographic case is equally striking. More than 60% of Africans are under 25. By 2050, one in three people aged 15 to 24 anywhere on Earth will be African. A continent this…

Africa does not lack ideals; it has proclaimed them often and well. What it now requires is discipline, execution and political courage on a continental scale. The most fitting tribute to the founders will not be remembrance. It will be readiness.

Africa must rise, for good

Our simple argument is that the Second Scramble for Africa shouldn’t happen on our watch when we have so much at our disposal to avert this age-old plunder. It is a shameful…

Professor Eka Ikpe – the director of the African Leadership Centre at King’s College London and professor of Development Economics at the African Public Square Global Edition open debate. Photo: Supplied

Innovation, preparedness and African agency in a multipolar world

African public intellectuals have repeatedly concerned themselves about how African societies can act with purpose and autonomy in a global system that has historically limited…

At the heart of any effort to resource African agency lies the concept of dignity—both individual and collective. This was part of the discussion at the African Public Square Global Edition open debate hosted at King’s College London.  Photo: APS

Africa’s voice and power must be underpinned by dignity

For many African public intellectuals such as Steve Biko, Leopold Senghor, Kenneth Kaunda, Julius Nyerere and Kwame Nkrumah, political independence represented more than the…

Sham sovereignty: The United States and its allies do not practise democracy as a principle; they wield it as an instrument of control, especially in Africa.  Photo: Evan Parker/Navy

US role in Africa delivers fake democracies

The lesson is clear: democracy in Washington’s playbook is not a universal value but a lever, invoked when nations resist economic control, claim authority over their own…

Timeless: The ideas expressed in the book are not relics of a bygone era
but a blueprint for the continent’s unfinished agenda.

Why Kwame Nkrumah still matters

Decades on, Kwame Nkrumah’s speeches read like a roadmap for Africa’s present challenges, from trade and unity to economic independence

New empire: US President Donald Trump has threatened to grab Greenland. Photo: Doctor Dave

Angst about Trump’s Greenland threat

When coercion is directed outward from the West toward the Global South it is normalised, bureaucratised and framed as responsible governance

American academic Ali Mazrui said that the US, Secretary of State Marco Rubio in particular, should be saying ‘what is good for the world is good for my country’.

Could Ali Mazrui’s nuclear pragmatism inspire practical policies?

The Kenyan American political scientist argued that the Global South acquiring nuclear weapons would lead to universal nuclear disarmament

People’s hero: A mural depicting Amílcar Cabral who was the foremost leader of the struggle for the independence of Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde from Portugal. (Photo by GUIZIOU Franck / hemis.fr / hemis.fr / Hemis via AFP)

How Cabral, Fanon and Freire shaped the struggle against apartheid South Africa — and still inspire

Amílcar Cabral was assassinated 50 years ago today. His thought, which sometimes arrived in South Africa via a circuitous route, speaks to our current crisis with undiminished…

Cover of It’s a continent book. Photo: Joseph Osayande

One Book, Two Takes: It’s a Continent

Astrid Madimba and Chinny Ukata’s impressive African history book by non-historians

President of Ghana, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo. (Photo by Riccardo Savi/Getty Images for Concordia Summit)

Why Ghana allows US military base on its soil

The current government is adhering to an old policy of appeasement of Western interests

Zimbabwe President Emmerson Mnangagwa. Photo: Supplied

OPINION | What value does Zimbabwe’s Emmerson Mnangagwa bring to Davos?

Contemporary African intellectuals, historians, self-styled Pan-Africanists, patriots and good old liberal political commentators such as myself carry divergent opinions of why…

Taking advantage of local communities’ despair and desperation, the politicians agitate by blaming foreigners for stealing jobs (Getty)

We were separated by colonial borders and lost our ubuntu

Afrophobia is an imported anti-African sentiment that internalises colonialism because current state borders never existed in African societies

Samuel Fosso. ‘Untitled’ (Kwame Nkrumah) from the series ‘African Spirits’, 2008. Photo. rue du Port (tunnel). Fosso’s participation in neuf-3 was made possible in partnership with the musée du quai Branly-Jacques Chirac. (Photo: Gustavo Gelmini, © Riason Naidoo.)

The Portfolio: ‘neuf-3’ — a public art project in Saint-Denis, Paris

The ‘neuf-3’ art project, curated by Riason Naidoo, aims to pay tribute to the African communities of Saint-Denis — and of Paris

Forty years after its adoption Africa is nowhere near achieving the promises of the African Charter. (Ziyange Auntony/AFP)

Evaluating the African Charter, 40 years on

Africa is nowhere near achieving the promises of the African Charter, which only underscores its importance

Kenneth Kaunda, Zambia’s “founding father” and first president, has died in a military hospital in Lusaka where he was being treated for pneumonia. (Photo by Vladimir Akimov / Sputnik / Sputnik via AFP)

Zambia’s Kenneth Kaunda was the last of Africa’s ‘philosopher kings’

The liberation legend died on Thursday at a military hospital in Lusaka, aged 97

Pan Africanist Congress founder Robert Sobukwe. Without ideology and theory it would be impossible to interpret the past, anticipate the future and understand the present.
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Who is an Africanist, really?

Pan-Africanism is an ever-evolving ideology, without a set rubric, and is dependent on one’s interpretation

K.Y. Amoako, founder and president of African Center, speaks during a forum on African energy and innovation at the Newseum in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Monday, Aug. 4, 2014. A two-decade surge in growth in Africa suggests the poorest continent is starting to come to grips with its challenges and has raised the prospect of the “African lions” emulating the “Asian tiger” economies in the 21st century. Photographer: Drew Angerer/Bloomberg via Getty Images

Review: A masterful look at five decades of African development

‘Know The Beginning Well’ is an insightful peek into the life of KY Amoako and the fascinating work he has done on the continent

Kwame Nkrumah pictured with his wife Fathia Halim Ritzk. Along with other first ladies, she was the subject of Dorothy Masuka’s song Ghana. (Bettmann/Getty)
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The Nkrumahs’ marriage was no match made in heaven

This almost forgotten song, written at a time when many African countries had gained their independence, can provide hope during our era of persistent xenophobia

The likes of Thomas Sankara (Burkina Faso) and Kwame Nkrumah (Ghana) and many others laid a foundation. The onus is now on us, especially the youth, to continue what they began.
(Kambou Sia/AFP)

Africa’s youth must continue the struggle of great leaders

Our continent is not just united geographically, but also by our shared experiences and we should use that to build a bright future