African Stream

‘AFRICANS, BE A SOLUTION FOR YOUR SUFFERING!’ Africanness has been a currency, and while in decades past being African was cause for scorn, African culture moves the world today. However, our guest Chakabars argues that there has to be more to being African than just being ‘cool.’ This is in the context of the numerous problems afflicting Africans today. Participating in solution-making for African problems should be a chief attribute of Africanness (in addition to good music and excellent food etc.) He argues that the indifference shown by Africans towards African problems is what gives leeway to other Africans in service of anti-Blackness. Have a listen - it’s an excerpt from a longer, round-table discussion we’ve put on our YouTube channel - and let us know in the comments if he’s right. Please follow us on Telegram, Link in Bio

Continued…. He also turns the tables on reporters who stigmatise favela residents who do what they do to survive. Mano asks how journalists would act if their life suddenly changed and forced them into slum living? He offers a masterclass on what the media so conveniently loves to ignore. Favelas are systematically oppressed, poor communities, subjected not only to police and special tactical unit violence but ferocious double standards in Brazil’s war on drugs. This interview remains one of the classic public debates for the rap movement in Brazil. The current affairs talk-show Roda Viva (Living Circle) is a serious battle of ideas that's hosted world leaders including Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez, Luís Inácio Lula da Silva and Jair Bolsonaro. Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie has also made their list. Mano offers a vital outlook that hardly gets airtime in the media. Worth a watch. Please follow us on Telegram, Link in Bio

BRAZILIAN RAPPER: DON’T JUDGE THE FAVELA Brazilian favelas sprawl across the country’s cities and towns. And right now, the image in your head is probably that of narcotics, drug dealers and criminality. It’s a one-dimensional description pushed by media and gives security forces a virtual blameless pretext to do as they please to residents in these communities. Heavy-handed policing and the excessive use of lethal force are the norm. In 2022, a total of 1,042 Black people were killed by police in Rio de Janeiro alone. In this clip, Brazilian rapper Mano Brown gives a rare TV interview and goes toe-to-toe with journalists to explain the complexities of favela life. Why, he asks, are drug dealers called drug dealers and not vendors like someone who sells alcohol? Why do dealers get criminal records, while White owners of multinational alcoholic drinks companies get a free pass?

WHY?! QUEUES AT THE PUMP IN OIL-RICH NIGERIA Cost of living-hit Nigerians have been facing petrol-price hikes amid widespread fuel shortages in the country, which have led to long queues at gas stations. And yet Nigeria’s got oodles of oil. An attempt by the Tinubu government to stimulate the private-sector oil market by cutting subsidies for state firms has failed, and promises to put the country’s refineries into action are sounding increasingly hollow. African Stream’s Nigeria correspondent Poloum David reports from Abuja. Please follow us on Telegram, Link in Bio

WHY ARE WHITES ‘MZUNGU’ IN SWAHILI? In East Africa, locals often refer to White visitors from Europe and the US as ‘mzungu’ - and it occasionally prompts concern among non-Swahili speakers that it could be derogatory. But as our Ethiopian sister Weyni Tesfai here explains, the word is no slur. She says it originated in the 19th century, when European explorers landed on the continent. Among them was Scotsman David Livingstone, who was looking for the source of the river Nile. Locals on the island of Zanzibar wondered about this visitor, who seemed to be ‘spinning’ (Swahili ‘zunguka’), or wandering, around the area in search of something. Hence was formed 'mzungu' - meaning one who spins around or wanders. Since then, 'mzungu' has evolved to mean any White person. Do you know any interesting African word etymologies? Please share in the comments. Please follow us on Telegram, Link in Bio

Continued…. Further, African Stream takes a Pan-Africanist perspective, which acknowledges that European colonisers created the borders of African states and that Matinyarare, as an African, has the right to live in any part of the continent. Matinyarare, leader of the Zimbabwe Anti-Sanctions Movement, recently posted this video on his X (formerly Twitter) account, saying five years after this fiery interview, the US lifted two-decade-long sanctions. Zimbabwean Vice President Constantino Chiwenga had said last year that US and EU sanctions have cost the landlocked southern African country more than $150 billion. However, after removing the 2003 sanctions, the US imposed new restrictions on Zimbabwean officials and entities in March. What do you make of this exchange? Let us know in the comments. Please follow us on Telegram, Link in Bio

WHITE SOUTH AFRICAN TV PRESENTER TELLS ZIMBABWEAN TO GO HOME In this bizarre and heated interaction, Leanne Manas (@leannemanas), a white South African TV presenter, asked South African-based Zimbabwean political activist Rutendo Matinyarare (@matinyarare) why he does not want to 'go home.' The exchange occurred on 19 December 2018 during a live TV programme (@SABCnewsonline) reflecting on the legacy of Zimbabwe's first post-independence leader, Robert Mugabe. Matinyarare highlighted that, despite the challenges Western sanctions have caused, Zimbabwe was on the rise, owing to its immense natural resources. Manas responded to this by saying that if the country had such great resources, Matinyarare should leave South Africa and return to Zimbabwe, a line that right-wing xenophobes commonly use. However, the Zimbabwean activist was equal to the task and quickly reminded the anchor that her ancestors had migrated from Europe to South Africa.

ANTI-ZIONIST JEW: ZIONISM BENEFITS EUROPE & U.S. In this @thepeoplesbubbiefilm clip, @jvpny member Esther Farmer reads from a piece she wrote published in a 2021 book she co-edited, ‘A Land With a People: Palestinians and Jews Confront Zi*nism.’ She describes her father predicting Zi*nism’s settler-colonial project in the form of the state of Israel would backfire on all Jewish people. For Africans, Israel has unfortunately played a detrimental role on the continent, arming groups and states, while an Israeli cyber-arms company, Pegasus, has allegedly spied on South African President Cyril Ramaphosa. During apartheid, Israel supplied South Africa with weapons to combat freedom-fighting Africans. Israel even gave South Africa the information it needed to build nuclear bombs. What do you think about Esther Farmer’s remarks and how they relate to Israel’s modern-day role in Africa? Let us know in the comments. Please follow us on Telegram, Link in Bio

Continued….. Hamer later joined the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), one of the earliest Black Power organisations in the United States. She then travelled to Guinea to meet with President Ahmed Sékou Touré on a SNCC delegation alongside Stokely Carmichael, who would later go by Kwame Ture. This trip would be pivotal in the movement’s turn from Black Power to Pan-Africanism. In this 1968 clip from the documentary, ‘The Heritage of Slavery,’ Mama Hamer tells the truth about what the US flag represents: Blood, sweat, and tears of enslaved Africans and their descendants. Please follow us on Telegram, Link in Bio

U.S. FLAG DRENCHED IN BLACK PEOPLE'S BLOOD Known for her courage and refusal to compromise, Fannie Lou Hamer helped found and became vice-chairperson of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party in 1964. This predominantly Black party challenged the white-run Democratic Party.  Hamer helped transition the Civil Rights Movement to the Black Power Movement in the United States, as she understood that Black people could not achieve liberation by integrating into inherently White supremacist institutions.