The Politics of Loss: Grief and Resistance
This piece is dedicated to our dear comrade Wanjau Wanja who transitioned on 22/08/2025. He knew loss, the kind of loss brought about by poverty, the kind that haunts ghetto…
Finance Bill 2025: Poverty Does Not Fall from the Sky, it is Manufactured
I am seated in my house in Nairobi looking at this painting of a rustic bicycle on the wall to my left. This painting looked so huge when I bought…
A Dream Deferred: On African Liberation and Betrayal
What does African liberation mean to the poverty-stricken miner in Marikana, South Africa, as he drags himself out of a deep shaft, coughing blood and dust, while the platinum he mines enriches the foreign shareholders and local elites? What does it mean to the street vendor in Cairo’s Khan el‑Khalili, stripped of her livelihood because she can’t afford a bribe? What does it mean to farmers in the DRC, watching helplessly as multinationals and the militias they arm/control turn their lands into killing fields? What does it mean to the sugarcane cutters in Mauritius, whose sweat sweetens profits for others while they rot in poverty? What does African liberation mean to the people of Western Sahara, still held hostage under Moroccan occupation? What does it mean to the people of Sudan, caught between the bullets of a brutal, counter-revolutionary war waged by rival generals drawn from the Sudanese National Army(SNA) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF). What does it mean to the people of Somalia longing to rebuild their nation? What of the woman I saw crawling through Nairobi’s heat, her barefoot daughter gripping tightly on her dress?
To Farmers, Take Back Your Land!
Magdalene Idiang’"The land is our mother, and to take it from us is to take away our very breath” - Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’oThe small-scale village farmers are not farmers by…
To the Generation That Chose Fear and Silence, We Are Not You!
Kinuthia Ndung’uTo those who lived through the KANU dictatorship and now urge us to be silent - we hear you. We know your fear because we grew up watching it…
Atwoli’s Purple Politics: Empty Symbolism in the Face of Kenyan Workers Struggles
Photo credit: Gammz By Kinuthia Ndung'u In an astonishing display of misplaced priorities, Francis Atwoli, the long serving leader of the Central Organization of Trade Unions(COTU) since 2001, and The…
STATEMENT BY WOMEN COLLECTIVE KENYA AGAINST THE INSENSITIVE COMMENTS ON COMMUNITIES LIVING IN INFORMAL SETTLEMENTS
We reject the narrative that blames the most marginalized communities in Nairobi, especially those living in informal settlements, for the pollution of the Nairobi River. This narrative not only shifts…
Ken Saro Wiwa Did Not Die for This: The Legacies of Imperialism and Colonialism in the Niger Delta
Magdalene Idiang’The Niger Delta in Nigeria is a potent symbol of the broader legacy of imperialism across Africa. For over 67 years, multinational corporations - particularly the Royal Dutch Shell…
The Real Dragon: George Jackson and the Black August Tradition
By Alieu Bah "I don't want to die and leave a few sad songs and a hump in the ground as my only monument. I want to leave a world…
Memento Mori: On Death, Dying and Revolutionary Urgency
Image By Pawel Janiak By Alieu BahI have known loss. I have known grief. Immense loss that makes you forget how to grieve because the sadness and helplessness in the…