PAUL T. SHIPALE (with inputs by Folito Nghitongovali Diawara Gaspar)
Why are African leaders so silent?
Why, at a moment when the continent’s dignity is being tested, do so many African Heads of State seem content to look away, turning a deaf ear as if nothing is happening? Why is there no united front, no public indignation, no clear voice defending the sovereignty of Africa’s people?
These questions are not asked to provoke disrespect but to expose a painful truth: African leadership risks becoming complicit through silence.
Steve Biko warned us about this long ago. “The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.” — Steve Biko
Biko understood that domination is not sustained by chains or armies, but by the psychological submission of a people trained to doubt themselves and their own power.
And today, that battlefield, the African mind, is again under assault.
Biko’s warning echoes into 2025
Biko taught that liberation without mental emancipation is incomplete. Political flags can be raised, constitutions rewritten, and elections held, but if the African mind still seeks validation from external powers, the continent remains vulnerable.
His ideology of black consciousness offers Africa a timeless blueprint, insisting on three pillars:
• Self-definition: Our worth is not granted by global powers.
• Mental liberation: Freedom begins internally.
• Collective dignity: A people confident in themselves cannot be easily manipulated.
Today, this message is not only relevant, it is urgent.
South Africa: The mirror Africa does not want to face
South Africa has become the epicentre of the continent’s geopolitical tensions. Not because it is weak, but because its strength threatens global systems built on African subordination.
What appears to be ordinary diplomacy – trade disputes, political disagreements, public comments – reveals a deeper pattern.
Africa is still treated as a pawn in global power games.
The recent tensions involving former U.S. President Donald Trump and South Africa are not random outbursts. They expose a well-practiced strategy of coercion, punishment, and intimidation aimed at forcing African nations to align with foreign interests.
Trump’s threats and hostility were not mere harsh words. They were warnings of how markets, aid, and narratives can be weaponised to discipline a sovereign nation. This is not diplomacy. It is pressure disguised as partnership.
Coercion disguised as diplomacy: Four clear examples
1. Humanitarian Aid Turned Into Leverage
The 2025 suspension of programmes like PEPFAR harmed health systems and vulnerable communities.
Aid supposedly offered to save lives was used as a bargaining chip for political compliance.
2. Interference in Land Reform
U.S. rhetoric framing land reform as “discrimination” ignores the historical trauma of land dispossession.
Pressuring a nation on such an existential issue is a direct attack on sovereignty.
3. Ending AGOA as Punishment
The termination of AGOA in September 2025 brought job losses and economic instability.
Trade became not a tool of partnership, but of retaliation.
4. Demonising South Africa’s BRICS Alignment
Calling South Africa’s participation in BRICS “rebellion” reveals how threatened some powers feel when Africa seeks multipolar partnerships.
The pattern is unmistakable: African nations are penalised for asserting independence.
The crisis is bigger than South Africa
This geopolitical moment is a continental alarm bell.
If Africa continues responding as 54 isolated nations, the coercion will continue.
But if Africa unites, no power bloc can dictate its destiny.
Five pillars for true African sovereignty
1. Self-Reliance
Africa must build its own pharmaceutical, industrial, technological, and energy capacities. Dependency invites manipulation.
2. Continental Unity
Fragmentation is weakness.
Unity is power.
3. Control of the Narrative
Africa must tell its own story.
Foreign media cannot remain the default interpreter of African events.
4. Partnerships based on respect, not submission
Africa can engage East, West, North, and South, but never at the cost of dignity.
5. Social and Historical Justice
Land reform, reparative justice, and redress of historical inequities are not optional; they are foundational for long-term peace.
Africa’s choice: Pawn or power?
This moment forces the continent to choose:
• Will African leaders continue to whisper in the shadows, afraid to offend global superpowers?
• Or will they speak with the clarity, unity, and courage that Steve Biko dreamed of?
The next generation is watching. The world is shifting. The old balance of power is crumbling.
Africa can no longer afford to be silent, reactive, or divided.
It must rise not with arrogance, but with confidence. Not as a pawn, but as a player, a partner, and ultimately, a power.
The dignity of the continent demands nothing less. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of our employers or this newspaper but are solely our personal views as citizens and Pan-Africanists.
