Host Adesoji Iginla is joined by Aya Fubara Eneli and Milton Allimadi to look at the 2026 US midterm elections and why their effects reach Africa.

The panel also covers the US decision to remove South Africa and Rwanda from AGOA trade preferences, and Kemi Badenoch's claim that African nations should apologise for slavery.

Takeaways

*Aya Fubara Eneli says Black voter turnout in her community was lower than hoped, despite a blue wave nationally and in Texas. She discusses local races, representation, and the work that follows elections.
*Milton Allimadi discusses the Michigan Senate race, AIPAC, Gaza, Islamophobia and racism, and the electoral rejection of attacks on the candidate.
*Money in politics: Milton says wealth did not always prevail. Aya discusses Citizens United and deep divisions in the US electorate.
*Immigration: Aya says it is too early to know whether Texas results reflect rejection of immigration enforcement or mainly concerns about affordability and corruption.
*Every vote counts: Aya cites a Pennsylvania race decided by 40 votes and ballot validation challenges in Mississippi.
*AGOA: The panel discusses the removal of South Africa and Rwanda, including the political context, eastern Congo, and Congress's possible role.
*Trade strategy: Aya argues for less dependence on any single outside market, more intra-African trade, African payment systems, and more local processing of raw materials.
*Slavery and responsibility: The panel discusses the European-created slave-trading system, African collaboration and resistance, chattel slavery, King Jaja of Opobo, and reparations.
*Youth and politics: Aya urges young people who find politics unappealing to get involved and informed, because politics affects daily life.

Chapters

00:00 - Introducing the panel and the midterms' reach to Africa
01:51 - Black voter turnout, local races, and post-election work
07:12 - Michigan Senate race, AIPAC, Gaza, and Islamophobia
10:01 - Grassroots organising and voter suppression history
13:35 - Financial Times takeaways and money's influence
15:29 - Why wealth did not always win: young voters and grassroots campaigns
19:08 - What Texas results say about immigration
21:24 - Every vote counts: Pennsylvania and Mississippi examples
22:43 - US divisions, money in politics, and Citizens United
26:51 - Republican party identity questions
28:15 - US removal of South Africa and Rwanda from AGOA
29:13 - Political context, eastern Congo, and Congress's role
32:41 - Reducing dependence on outside markets and building intra-African trade
36:20 - Africa's share of world trade and raw material exports
37:19 - Kemi Badenoch's slavery apology claim
39:56 - The slave-trading system, collaboration, resistance, and reparations
45:45 - King Jaja of Opobo, European laws, and efforts to stop the trade
54:19 - Eric Williams's Capitalism and Slavery and reparations
57:03 - Continuing African liberation and stolen resources
1:00:39 - Senegal's Youth Olympics opening ceremony
1:02:10 - What young people can do about politics
1:06:28 - Program announcements and closing call to organise

Recommended reading
Milton recommends Eric Williams's Capitalism and Slavery.

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Africa is not a story of victims. It is a story of resistance, resilience and reclamation. That is the story we tell here — every single week.

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This week’s episode of African News Review covers the week's African and diaspora news.

Topics include a Ghanaian student's killing in the Bronx, South Africa's anti-foreigner protests, Algeria's troop deployment to Niger, and a US-backed miner's bid to survey DR Congo.

Host, Adesoji Iginla, was joined by Aya Fubara Eneli, Esq., an author and host of Rethinking Freedom and Women in Resistance, and later by Comrade Milton Allimadi.

Takeaways

*US election eve: heavy political advertising, early voting turnout, and a Reuters report that administration officials are planning ways around Congress
*Caribbean news: King Charles's reported slavery apology and Jamaica's abstention on a UN vote against the Cuba blockade
*A WSJ report that Trump officials discussed Hungary's Viktor Orban as a UN Secretary General candidate, which the administration denies authorising
*The killing of a Ghanaian student in New York, and how anti-African attitudes among diaspora groups feed such violence
*South Africa's temporary ban on March and March protests, the 500 soldiers sent to KwaZulu-Natal, and the panel's criticism of Financial Times framing
*The history of Buthelezi and Inkatha in the 1990s, and the panel's view that it parallels today's violence
*Algeria's first foreign deployment since 1973, to protect energy sites in Niger, plus the competing pipeline routes and Algeria's expulsions of migrants into Niger
*Cobalt Metals, backed by Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos, seeking US help over UN clearance for aerial surveys in DR Congo
*Chartered companies from the Royal African Company to today's mineral deals

Chapters

0:00:00 - Algeria's anti-intervention past, Congo's minerals, migrants turned scapegoats
0:01:54 - Panel welcome
0:02:38 - US election week: ads, early voting, fears of workarounds to Congress
0:07:30 - King Charles's Caribbean apology and reparations questions
0:08:21 - UN Cuba blockade vote and Jamaica's abstention
0:09:31 - Orban floated for UN Secretary General
0:12:27 - Comrade Milton joins; the Ghanaian student killed in the Bronx
0:16:27 - Why anti-African sentiment goes unchecked, and teaching African history
0:22:00 - South Africa bans anti-foreigner marches before local elections
0:24:46 - Critique of the Financial Times framing on jobs and crime
0:28:07 - Buthelezi, Inkatha, and 1990s violence in KwaZulu-Natal
0:36:32 - Algeria sends troops to Niger
0:43:36 - Trans-Saharan pipeline, rival Nigeria-Morocco route, Western Sahara
0:46:28 - Algeria's expulsions of migrants into Niger
0:48:34 - Cobalt Metals and China's UN Security Council leverage
0:53:03 - Aerial survey sovereignty and Congo's bargaining position
0:57:30 - The US-Congo agreement: security for minerals.
1:03:59 - Chartered companies, the Royal African Company, King James
1:08:00 - First right of refusal, from Berlin to French colonies
1:11:11 - Closing remarks and sourcing the Virginia charter
1:14:14 - Announcements and election-day reminder

Notable quote

"The tale of the hunt shall always glorify the hunter." - Chinua Achebe proverb, cited at the close

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Africa is not a story of victims. It is a story of resistance, resilience and reclamation. That is the story we tell here — every single week.

African News Review Subscribe. Share. Stay informed. Stay sovereign.

This episode is a wide-ranging news review anchored in African agency, decolonial history, and current events. Adesoji Iginla hosts Aya Fubara Eneli and Milton Allimadi for a sharply political conversation that moves from U.S. elections to East African cult abuse, Zimbabwe’s land question, and vaccine research ethics in Guinea-Bissau.

The discussion explores how colonial legacies, elite power, and economic desperation shape everything from religious exploitation to land ownership and medical research.

The guests return to a central message: Africans must read history critically, protect their communities, and resist narratives that erase their agency.

Takeaways

*Aya Fubara Eneli argues that U.S. elections are flooded with money, misinformation, and disinformation, and are driven by donor pressure, while ordinary people struggle with high food and fuel costs.
*Milton Allimadi links political obsession with bodies and image to deeper forms of racism, nationalism, and power maintenance, using Trump and MAGA culture as examples.
*The panel discusses protests in France and how the same events can be labelled “demonstrations,” “protests,” “uprisings,” or “riots,” depending on who is describing them and why.
*The conversation turns to the destruction of Hitler’s Bavarian retreat, framed as a symbolic blow against Nazi nostalgia and fascist memory.
*A major segment focuses on the Kenyan starvation cult led by Paul Mackenzie, who was found guilty in the deaths of 190 children and one adult; more than 400 bodies were recovered in total.
*Milton argues that the cult cannot be understood apart from colonial Christianity, African spiritual alienation, and the broader collapse of state legitimacy and traditional support systems.
*Aya connects Mackenzie’s behaviour to colonial methods of control, missionaries renaming identities, and the neglect of Kenya’s coast under both colonial and postcolonial rule.
*The Zimbabwe section examines an Economist article about white farmers returning to the land and unpacks land theft, Mugabe’s fast-track land reform, and the refusal to narrate colonial history honestly.
*Milton and Aya reject the framing that Africans “do not know how to farm,” pointing instead to the history of forced labour, land theft, and African agricultural productivity.
*The episode closes its major news discussion in Guinea-Bissau, where police raided offices tied to controversial vaccine research on African newborns, raising urgent questions about ethics, consent, and biomedical exploitation.

Chapters
00:00 - African farming and colonial narratives
01:34 - U.S. elections, campaign money, and disinformation
04:39 - Transphobic fear campaigns and body politics in Texas
06:22 - Trump, candidates’ bodies, and authoritarian politics
11:03 - France, protests, and who gets to define an uprising
12:01 - Hitler’s Bavarian retreat and Nazi nostalgia
13:29 - Kenya’s starvation cult and the Paul Mackenzie verdict
15:14 - Spiritual exploitation, tithing, and institutional religion
16:55 - Traditional African spirituality and colonial suppression
22:24 - Missionaries, colonialism, and poverty on Kenya’s coast
28:57 - Religious regulation and the protection of megachurches
34:29 - White Zimbabweans return to farming
37:18 - Nehanda, liberation history, and the Economist’s framing
41:47 - African farming knowledge and the colonial “lie”
45:05 - Land restitution, compensation, and stolen property
48:14 - “Willing buyer, willing seller” and unfinished land reform
50:21 - Credit, seeds, sanctions, and the limits of land reform
53:56 - Food systems, processing, irrigation, and national security
60:34 - Police raid tied to vaccine research in Guinea-Bissau
62:23 - Vaccines, research ethics, and equity
66:04 - Hepatitis B trials and African newborns
70:36 - Bandim Health research and the trial approval process
75:40 - Côte d’Ivoire’s forest restoration and agroforestry
79:05 - Keeping hope alive through small acts of resistance
81:04 - Teaching, knowledge, and helping students think critically
83:37 - What the Guardian left out about Guinea-Bissau’s ethics approval.

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Africa is not a story of victims. It is a story of resistance, resilience and reclamation. That is the story we tell here — every single week.

African News Review Subscribe. Share. Stay informed. Stay sovereign.