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Ugandan pop star singer and politician, Robert Kyagulanyi aka Bobi Wine, has generated an unprecedented political buzz around the world. Exploring the background to the country’s crisis, Moses Khisa writes how Uganda is a country with endemic socioeconomic problems and exists in a distorted and parasitic capitalist economy. Khisa writes how the government is presided over by the visibly tired president, Yoweri Museveni, who claims weird and even messianic powers.

In the latest installment of the protest and social movement project on roape.net, David Seddon writes about recent developments in Burundi. He argues that President Pierre Nkurunziza’s brutal efforts to extend his rule have temporarily swept aside internal dissent and unrest. Across the continent the effectiveness of those struggling against such anti-democratic moves has varied considerably.

Yohannes Woldemariam discusses the major challenges confronting Ethiopia’s new Prime Minister, Abiy Ahmed. Tackling the deep structural weaknesses at the heart of Ethiopia’s economy and its so-called ‘revolutionary developmentalism’, will be a key test. Woldemariam also considers the country’s new relationship with Eritrea and the regional and international pressures playing out in Ethiopia’s new political landscape.

In ground-breaking new research Torben Gülstorff argues that after 1945 both German states were involved in the events of decolonization and the Cold War in Africa and the rest of the 'Third World.' In the Central African region, they played a role in all major conflicts but neither state pursued high-minded policy but crude economic interests. Gülstorff argues that we must look beyond the typical powerhouses of Washington, Moscow, Peking, Paris or London to fill out the blank spaces on the map of world history.

Laura Mann writes about a workshop on Africa’s growing youth populations. Participants discussed the challenge that African societies face in reimagining their economies and social policies in light of this demographic pressure. These pressures were not relieved by the recent economic boom within African countries which has been resource-intensive and “jobless”.

John Pilger exposes how the West is both fighting Islamic jihadist terrorism and using it for its own foreign policy objectives. The Manchester bomb was the result. Pilger shows how the British and French-led 2011 Nato offensive in Libya has strengthened Islamic terrorism in the region, spreading mayhem across many parts of Africa.

In the forth in a series of blogs for roape.net, writer and activist Lee Wengraf explores China’s recent investment and engagement in Africa. China, she argues, is no kinder, gentler imperial option: just like 19th century colonialists, when the Chinese build roads and schools, the goal is to facilitate resource extraction and build allegiances.

In the first of two blog-pieces, Gary Littlejohn looks at the issues behind western intervention in Libya in 2011. It is part of a long history of Western involvement, he writes, within and beyond Libya and the MENA region.

In this far-reaching interview, ROAPE’s Ray Bush argues that the products and commodities that rural people produce must sustain local demand and local needs, rather than produce export crops to generate foreign exchange on the international markets. The foundation of any modern society has to be the basis of generating sufficiently and appropriately priced food stuffs from local markets. This is the path, he argues, to a real alternative for societies in the Global South.

In the first in a series of blogs for roape.net, writer and activist Lee Wengraf describes Obama’s bloody legacy in Africa. Over eight years the continent has seen an intensification of US aerial campaigns, proxy warfare, and imperial competition.