Welcome to the radio magazine that brings you news, commentary and
analysis from a Black Left perspective. I’m Margaret Kimberley, along with my co-host
Glen Ford. Coming up: The Black Alliance for Peace steps up its campaign to get the
U.S. military out of Africa; a scholar takes a look at Kwaito music and young people’s
politics in South Africa; and, a new article celebrates the life and work of James Cone,
the father of Black Liberation Theology.
But first – the U.S. political establishment is still reeling from the nationwide wave of
demonstrations that followed the police killing of George Floyd. We spoke with Monifa
Bandele, a veteran activist from Brooklyn, New York, who sits on the policy table of the
Movement for Black Lives. Bandele says the ongoing protests are the result of years of
organizing.
The United States military has a larger presence on the African continent than Britain
and France at the height of their colonial empires. The Black Alliance for Peace is
escalating its campaign against AFRICOM, the U.S. Military Command in Africa, which
is active in almost every nation on the continent. Alliance activist Tunde Osazua points
out that AFRICOM’s first big mission was the regime change attack on Libya, in 2011.
Dr. James Cone, the world-renowned theologian, died two years ago, but his work
continues to influence Black political thinking. Matt Harris is a PhD candidate at the
University of California, at Santa Barbara. Harris co-authored an article titled, "In the
Hope That They Can Make Their Own Future: James H. Cone and the Third World."
Harris says Cone is considered the father of Black liberation theology.
In South Africa, “kwaito” music is wildly popular with young people – just as is hip hop
among Black American youth. Xavier Livermon is a professor of African Diaspora
Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. He’s spent years studying the kwaito music
phenomenon, and written a book, titled ““Kwaito Bodies: Remastering Space and
Subjectivity in Post-Apartheid South Africa.” Professor Livermon says Kwaito music has
had a profound effect on South Afrian youth, whose 21 st century politics is quite different
than the young people who rose up against white minority rule in Soweto in 1976.