For Africans and diasporans, learning about their heritage is important. But it remains to be seen how this will translate into a sustained continental and diasporan engagement.
Barack Obama was asked to give the Mandela Lecture because he represents what the global liberation struggle icon stood for. He struck the right chord.
The transformation of the EU-Africa summit series into the EU-AU summit is more than just a change of name. It reflects the increasing recognition of the AU as an international actor.
The National Question cannot be resolved solely through South Africa’s constitution. There’s potential for a far more radical transformative project than traditional liberalism.
Namibian hero and former Robben Island prisoner Toivo ya Toivo was part of a generation who contributed to the struggles against apartheid and colonialism in the region.
For real integration to happen, the Pan African Parliament needs to be imbued with supranational law-making powers. But national sovereignty is something that many states are reluctant to give up.
South Africa’s newest trade union federation, Saftu, comes at a time of declining political influence by unions, compared to during the struggle against apartheid. They are also seen as elitist.
Ghana is very much the African rising star 60 years after independence with an exemplary record in health and education. But it’s struggling like many of its peers to meet social and economic targets.
The African Union sees Africa as a sealed off geographic entity. Yet it remains remarkably quiet about the many bits of Africa that are geographically part of it but do not consider it their home.
Hopeton Dunn, University of the West Indies, Mona Campus
South African-Jamaican intellectual, activist and author Peter Abrahams died in January 2017. He will be revered for his contributions to the anti-colonial struggles in Africa and the Caribbean.
Mahatma Gandhi is one of the most influential personalities in history, celebrated for his advocacy of non-violent resistance. But his dark side is now receiving increased attention.
The growing revolt against South Africa’s president, amid state capture allegations, is not an isolated event, but part of a much wider pan-African uprising led by the continent’s disaffected youth.
University authorities in South Africa have agreed to most fees protesters’ demands. Yet, the protesters keep moving the goalposts. Do they want more than fees to fall?
The foundation founded by Nelson Mandela in 1999 has done a major revision - it has written off most of his reign as comprising “grand symbolic gestures”.
Leo Zeilig, School of Advanced Study, University of London
For the revolutionary Frantz Fanon it was not enough to celebrate the achievements of decolonisation. It was necessary to educate, to strain at the limits of national freedom and to provoke debate.