Pan African Review: Recent Episodes
PanAfrican Review
Pan African Review is a platform that challenges assumptions about Africa and a space for introspective perspectives on matters of concern to Africans.
In this episode, Dr Chidinma Okolo discusses the challenges women face in African societies, especially in their working environments
In this episode, Malawian journalist and political analyst Levi Kabwato discusses the need to decolonise International Justice
In this episode, Dr Chika Esiobu discusses the steady collapse of Africa's ill-fitting European foundations and its implications for the continent's liberation
In this episode, Dr Gateka Ndayisaba discusses the taboos preventing a healthy debate about abortion in Africa
In this episode, Zimbabwean political analyst Kelvin Jakachira discusses the implications of SADC's intervention in the DRC
In this episode, Dr Yusuf Serunkuma discusses the lessons to learn from the ongoing settler colonialism violence in Palestine
In this episode, Dr Mohamed Kheir Omer discusses the unfinished business of state formation in the Horn of Africa and the dangers of state disintegration as a result of incessant conflicts.
In this episode, Soha Benchekroun, an independent researcher in sustainable development, explains why these questions ought to be handled in light of the continent’s socio-economic development challenges
In this episode, our guest Dr. Bojana Coulibaly explains how the UN peacekeeping mission in DRC, MONUSCO, has been working with the very negative forces it was supposed to disarm.
In this conversation with Dr Jude Kagoro, we explore the history of conflicts in Somalia, the reasons behind the failure to build a national army, and border tensions with Kenya and Ethiopia
In this podcast, Panafrican Review's Mahatma Ulimwengu discusses with Dr. Chika Esiobu the problematic aspects of using pejorative and derogatory terms such as "Ghetto" to name African talents.
In this episode, Panafrican Review's Mahatma and author Suzie Ndaundika Shefeni discuss the implications of Africa's non-alignment in the context of global geopolitical upheavals.
In this Podcast, Dr. Frederick Golooba-Mutebi discusses the responsibility of the DRC government in resolving the unending crises in the Kivus once and for all.
Panafrican Review's guest Dr Yusuf Serunkuma discusses the insidious ways in which colonialism fetishizes itself and endlessly mutates, oftentimes, appearing to align with the colonised and the “performatively friendlier” ways through which pillage of Africa is disguised and executed
The ECOWAS is contemplating an armed intervention following the coup in Niger. Professor Chikodiri Nwangwu and Mahatma Ulimwengu discuss the dangers of such action.
In this episode, we delve into the remarkable life and enduring impact of Julius Kambarage Nyerere, an iconic figure whose visionary leadership shaped the destiny of a continent. Nyerere, often referred to as "Mwalimu," meaning "teacher" in Swahili, was not only the founding father and first President of Tanzania but also a statesman, philosopher, and advocate for African unity.
This is a conversation on the pan African payment settlement system with the CEO of PAPSS, Mike Ogbalu.
Webiste: https://papss.com/
Penser les problèmes d’une société dans une langue qui est non seulement étrangère mais aussi non maîtrisée par la majorité des locuteurs du pays conduit inévitablement à proposer des solutions décalées des réalités vécues et ressenties par les gens du commun.
Penser des solutions endogènes qui feront sens pour l’ensemble de la communauté invite non seulement à renouer avec son histoire, mais aussi avec sa langue et les valeurs qu’elle a incorporée dans la longue durée. Se réconcilier avec l’une et l’autre permettra sans nul doute de puiser en elles des héritages féconds pour le temps présent.
Par Jean Luc Galabert, Psychologue et Anthropologue
Since the 1970s many African nations have missed out on the most important economic policy of them all. Export-oriented industrial policy has been essential to the success of most high-income and rapidly emerging nations. Whether in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Israel, Japan, China, Costa Rica, Chile, India, Morocco, Mauritius or Vietnam, this policy tool has been indispensable, and the evidence on the critical importance of what you export to your development trajectory is clear.
Export-led industrial policy comes across to many as highly technical and complicated, including many well-versed global leaders and development practitioners. Yet actually it is a simple concept: it is merely the coordination of policies across governments to ensure the facilitation of investment in sectors that have the greatest potential to develop an economy by growing the number of value-adding, job-creating, foreign exchange-earning businesses. Whether Chilean wine, Vietnamese electronics, British textiles in the 1600s, Israeli agriculture or UAE’s tourism, these all required the coordination of enablers like energy, land, roads, market development, technology, investor facilitation and regulations.
At the surface level, Africa copies and longs for what the West has today: the technology, the economic power, the political system and the educational infrastructure and resources. However, as far as following the principles that earned the Western world its place in the global comity of nations, Africa appears to be going in the opposite direction.
In instances where a parent stays home longer than the average few months of parental leave, they are often in a hurry to enroll their children in “nursery” schools in order for them to “start learning early.” These well-meaning parents are often unaware that the most important education for a child under the age of 3 is social-emotional learning, which is best provided within the family setting. Fidgety at the fact that their child is lagging behind the working mother’s child,
In order to holistically address the safety, security, and health needs of young learners, we need to have supportive services/systems in every environment that they interact with, i.e., the home, community, and school. Take a look at teenage pregnancy as an example. If we want to address the alarming rates of school attrition due to teen pregnancy, we must support families with the information, capacity, and time to discuss sexual and reproductive health with the children in their care. Writes Alice Bayingana.
''Education systems in Africa, not unlike its health systems, were built to reinforce hierarchies and indoctrinate indigenous people into participating in their own oppression. It is not so crazy, then, that after the end of formal colonization, Africans were left with institutions that were centred around colonial activity both in their physical locations and in their goals and methods''.
Thank you for taking the time to listen to this pan African conversation with Alice Bayingana.
This is the second part of the Pan African Review conversation that Cynthia Umurungi had with Veronique Nyiramongi Mbaye on her article titled: Panafrican Feminism: A Case Against False Female Liberation.
This Panafrican conversation features Véronique Nyiramongi Mbaye, a copywriter and cultural commentator. She is a feminist who loves telling African stories. Her work principally critiques West and East African post-colonial political movements.
In this episode, Veronique explains how Afro-feminism is a fundamental feature of Panafricanism.
In this episode, Levi Kabwato explains how the African Union and African states have failed to say NO to imperialism.
In this episode, Levi Kabwato explains how colonialism manifests itself around culture.
''Success for a liberation movement does not lie simply in measuring up to international standards of anything or turning the country they inherit into an instant liberal democracy or run-away economic success.''
In this episode, Dr. Golooba explains that success for a liberation movement lies in the consistent pursuit of its original goals; inclusion, as much as possible, of groups that might otherwise foment instability and even of ordinary citizens, in decision making; and pursuit of self-reliance.
The term ‘liberation movement’ has been part of the political lexicon in Africa since the emergence of organised groups, usually armed, to free African countries or societies from the yoke of colonial rule. Interestingly, those that sought to achieve independence through peaceful means never qualified for the label. Instead, they became ‘independence movements’. Liberation movements usually sprang up in countries where the colonial powers were so determined to frustrate calls for independence that they could kill to preserve the status quo.
In this episode, Dr. Golooba explains how the first-generation independence warriors or liberators made such extravagant promises that in the end, they were generally eventually unable to deliver.
Many African governments have remained in the service of imperialistic goals and activities. These best represent the tragedy we face where leaders speak big but act the opposite, denounce the West but keep Africa tied to Western imperatives.
In this episode, Dr Moses Khisa mentioned the case of Uganda’s economic transformation that over the last three decades has done little to fundamentally turnaround the fate of the majority poor Ugandans because the bulk of the economy remains out of reach for the vast majority of citizens. He asks...whose Africa is rising?
Without ownership of the means of production and active participation in meaningful productive economic activities, which is precisely the problem with Uganda’s economy today, and indeed other African countries, true liberation and social emancipation are a distant dream.
In this episode, he talks about those key things that Africans should do to save themselves from the arrogance, disrespect and demeaning paternalism of their ostensible Western benefactors.
The African continent remains hostage to myriad forces, both internally generated and externally produced. True Uhuru has eluded the continent for more than half-century now. The agenda for genuine liberation, for self-determination and the freedom to chart a path that assures the full dignity of the African people is not some abstract and academic ideal; it is a real and concrete goal.
In this episode, Dr Moses Khisa explains why he says that : 'Africa is captive, a beaten continent, available for the taking'.
This conversation was inspired by the ideas expressed in this article: A Pan-Africanist believes the African way of life is valid.
''Some, like those who resisted slavery and colonialism, had fought and were defeated—or so it seems. Yet, others – like the African nationalists who agitated for independence and the civil rights activists who demanded full citizenship rights – had gained a partial victory. But it was the resistance and courage of those who had been considered defeated that inspired those who won partial victories. It is also the moral obligation of those who came after them to pick up from where they left in the quest for the dignity of Africans – the idea of the African way of life as valid. Pan-Africanism is, therefore, a constant quest to perfect the dignity of Africans: where the end of slavery never delivered full citizenship rights, to agitate; and where independence remained in form rather than substance, to take up the struggle and make it meaningful''
Part of the problem facing Africa is that the agency to articulate the trials and tribulations of Africans has for long been usurped by foreigners. As a principle, everyone should get involved in debates on Africa, of course. However, rather than seek to understand Africa, these foreigners prefer to legislate for Africans how their societies should be, mostly based on how their own home countries are politically organised. Until Africans, who are primarily faced with the consequences of the thinking around governance, take control and relegate foreigners to subordinate roles, the clarity we seek to confront our challenges will continue to elude us.
This podcast and other platforms by the Pan-African Review will contribute to that purpose.