8th June 2023 - The Elephant's Weekly Digest
Welcome to this week’s letter from the Editor’s Desk. It has been another eventful week with the continued economic debates, the origins of eugenics in Kenya, Harare’s activism, Fidel Castro in Africa, and revisiting Pan-Africanism. These are some of the key themes that grace the pages of this recent week’s publication.?
In?Race and Empire: How Scientific Racism Shaped Kenya, Owaah opines that while eugenics concepts did not directly shape policy, they formed a part of the larger racist ideologies that informed many laws of the colonial era, a good number of which survive to date. In July 1933, 60 white men and women gathered in a boardroom at the New Stanley Hotel in Nairobi. Of the 60 people in that room, two emerged as the mouthpieces of the group. Gordon was in charge of Mathari Mental Hospital, the only mental health institution in the country at the time.
In?Crush and Grind Them Like Lice: Harare Old Guard Feeling Threatened. With the launch of the Citizens Coalition for Change, Zimbabwe’s political landscape has undergone a significant shift, with a younger activist generation increasingly impatient with the unfulfilled promises of liberation. But they are not alone in this; even the opposition has often overlooked the fact that “all politics is local” and it has also created a “Harare Bubble” of yesterday’s heroes and gatekeepers who, armed with undynamic analyses, continue to cast their shadows into the arena long after their expiry date.
Fidel Castro and the African Dream. Under Fidel Castro’s leadership, Cuba found its mission and played its part in the African continent’s struggle for freedom and independence. Fidel Castro’s imprint is on almost every major revolutionary effort in Africa after 1959. To him, the anti-colonial dream was “the most beautiful cause of mankind”. Several African states had to first battle colonial powers and then fight Cold War and regional proxy wars. In these chaotic theatres of war, Castro made allies, and in turn, Cuba became a key player in Africa’s future through military and humanitarian help.
In?The Continued Relevance of Pan-African Marxism in a Time of Crisis,?we look back to the Pan-African Marxism of the moment of flag independence to address contemporary challenges to Pan-African liberation or do we need new ideas and new guiding insights in order to truly usher in the promised liberation that is yet to deliver? For Marxist thinkers such as Cheikh Anta Diop and Walter Rodney, recovering pre-colonial histories and culture was an important assertion of national identity and a way to overcome the colonial mentality that lingered after flag independence.
We also look forward to more conversations around these issues; and a revisit of these and other pertinent issues facing Kenyans and countries of the Horn for this new month of May.
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Under Fidel Castro’s leadership, Cuba found its mission and played its part in the African continent’s struggle for freedom and independence.
By?Owaahh
With the launch of the Citizens Coalition for Change, Zimbabwe’s political landscape has undergone a significant shift, with a younger activist generation increasingly impatient with the unfulfilled promises of liberation.
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