Rhodes Must Fall - search results

Writing about the Rhodes Must Fall movement Simukai Chigudu argues that the notion of decolonisation involves questioning the hegemony of white, western thought in fields of study as diverse as history, politics, philosophy, modern languages, and literature. Following Edward Said, he argues that we all share an intellectual obligation to push this endeavour forward.

Louis Faidherbe, one of the leading figures of the French colonial conquest of West Africa, still has statues celebrating him in Senegal and France. The Faidherbe Must Fall campaign is fighting for them to be removed. In this interview with Florian Bobin, Khadim Ndiaye and Salian Sylla argue for the emancipation of public spaces from the glorification of a hideous past.

Across the world statues connected with slavery, oppression and colonialism have been falling. Robin Cohen argues that opponents of removing statues fail to acknowledge the degree of commonality in moral standards between the past and the present. Looking at the case of Oxford, Cohen explains that the time has come for Cecil Rhodes to fall - everywhere

In this blogpost Zimbabwean socialist Munyaradzi Gwisai unpicks the situation in South Africa. He explains that the working class and poor must avoid the dangers of both Zuma’s ‘fake left-turn’ and the Zuma Must Fall protests. What are the lessons, Gwisai asks, for South Africa from the movement that rose-up against Mugabe in Zimbabwe in the late 1990s?

ROAPE’s Leo Zeilig talks to Trevor Ngwane about political developments in South Africa, the crisis in the ANC, the growth of new struggles on the left, in the universities and workplaces. Ngwane is a long-standing socialist activist, researcher and writer.

Since the middle of October 2015 students at universities across South Africa have been protesting over three issues. Ashley Fataar writes how by November universities across the country were witnessing protests unprecedented since the fall of racial apartheid in 1994. Listed here are some of the campaigns that have come out of these protests.

Roberto Sirvent interviews Koni Benson about her new book Crossroads: I Live Where I Like, that tells a sidelined story of the creation of the city of Cape Town, and the central role of movements led by African women in campaigning for public services. Benson speaks about how today there are over 2 million people in informal settlements, in a so-called ‘World Class’ city in the ‘Rainbow Nation’ - the great myth of the 1994 miracle.

The revolutionary work and activism of Walter Rodney was celebrated in Cape Town as workers and students gathered to read his work in the context of neocolonial capitalism in Azania. Joseph Mullen writes about a weeklong event in June which marked 50 years since the publication of Rodney’s How Europe Underdeveloped Africa.

#RhodesMustFall: Nibbling at Resilient Colonialism in South Africa is timely, balanced and informative, but aspects of the book will leave the reader craving more writes Simukai Chigudu.

A terrible myth has developed around the UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld, who died in a plane crash in 1961. Ludo De Witte explains that the UN chief was one of the architects of the Congo crisis that led to the removal and murder of the country’s first leader, Patrice Lumumba. De Witte reveals the true role of the UN, and Hammarskjöld, in the imperialist catastrophe that savaged the Congo in 1960.