• Culture

05.19.2025

Velvet rebellions

• Achille Tenkiang

The oppositional sartorial lens of Congolese sapeurs exposes the limits and frailties of representation work in New York’s Met Gala.

• Politics

05.16.2025

South Africa’s American refugees

• Oliver Layman

Cape Town’s digital nomads chase cheap luxury and scenic backdrops—but behind the matcha lattes and “social impact days” lies a deeper story of economic power, displacement, and global inequality.

• Politics

05.15.2025

The other route to the American dream

• Abdelkader Abderrahmane

With Europe increasingly closed, West African migrants are turning to the US—via Latin America. But the journey is long, dangerous, and brutally expensive, raising urgent questions about global responsibility.

• Politics

05.14.2025

The politics of class from above

• Michaela Collord

In Tanzania and beyond, political elites manage informal workers not by ignoring them—but by shaping their identities, dividing their ranks, and using class to tighten their hold on power.

• Politics

05.13.2025

Green hydrogen, old colonialism

• Saber Ammar

The EU’s hydrogen push in North Africa is sold as climate progress, but beneath the green gloss lies a familiar story of extraction, debt, and dispossession.

• Politics

05.12.2025

Trump tariffs and US Imperialism

• Gillian Hart

Trump’s April 2025 tariff blitz ignited market chaos and deepened rifts within his own coalition. Beneath the turmoil lies a battle between technocrats, ultranationalists, and anti-imperial populists, all vying to reshape—or destroy—American global power.

• Culture

05.09.2025

Cinema against silence

• Fatou Cissé

A new Malian film takes on the tradition of forced marriage with humor, intimacy, and defiance—reimagining African cinema as both tribute and rupture.

• Politics

05.08.2025

The end of US empire is not the end of the world

• Thapelo Tselapedi

As American hegemony unravels, the Global South must resist both nostalgia and passivity. Multipolarity won’t arrive on its own—it must be built through struggle.

• Culture

05.07.2025

Re-writing the rules of Tunisian rap

• Jyhene Kebsi

Blending Tunisian rap with Egyptian mahraganat, Lully Snake defies sexist norms, blurs borders, and opens a new space for feminist rebellion in North African popular culture.

• Politics

05.06.2025

Sanctions as civilizational warfare

• Peiman Salehi

Framed as hard diplomacy, economic sanctions are a subtler form of warfare—one that erodes sovereignty, punishes civilians, and extends colonial power under a new name.

• Politics

05.05.2025

Paul Biya, the last Kaiser

• Shuimo Trust Dohyee

A meditation on the oldest ruler in the world.

• Politics

05.02.2025

Pan Africanism under elite capture

• Naila Aroni

Recent celebrity investments in the continent raises the question: Who is it really for?

• Politics

05.01.2025

An undignified democracy

• Ali Ridha Khan

Three decades after apartheid, South Africans are still waiting for housing, land, and dignity—while elites ask for patience that serves only themselves.

• PODCASTS
• Politics

04.30.2025

What’s left of Nigeria’s feminist left?

• Hauwa Mustapha

Once anchored in mass struggle and socialist politics, the feminist movement in Nigeria now navigates the contradictions of donor dependency, digital activism, and elite capture. On the podcast, we unpack: what happened?

• Politics

04.29.2025

As aid ends, empire endures

• Marjorie Namara Rugunda

Western donors are cutting budgets, but the aid model they built—rooted in control, dependency, and depoliticization—still shapes Africa’s development.

• Culture

04.28.2025

Art is a place for rehearsal

• M’barek Bouhchichi

What happens when art steps into the gaps left by official history? A conversation on race, memory, and the unfinished work of making meaning.

• Politics

04.25.2025

Kenya’s vibe shift

• Achan Muga

From aesthetic cool to political confusion, a new generation in Kenya is navigating broken promises, borrowed styles, and the blurred lines between irony and ideology.

• Politics

04.24.2025

Zambia’s quiet diplomacy

• Kang-Chun Cheng

Long seen as a neutral player in global affairs, Zambia’s foreign policy is shifting under new pressures—from Western donors, Chinese investment, and its own strategic ambitions.

• Politics

04.23.2025

The un-African mechanisms of queer repression

• Ani Kayode Somtochukwu

Anti-queer laws in Africa are often framed as cultural defense—but their roots lie in colonial legacies, religious nationalism, and global reactionary alliances.

• Politics

04.22.2025

Africa and the AI race

• Daniel Ekonde

At summits and in speeches, African leaders promise to harness AI for development. But without investment in power, connectivity, and people, the continent risks replaying old failures in new code.