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Angela Chukunzira writes about a protest movement in Kenya that has changed the country. The current regime has constantly bowed to western imperialism and the Finance Bill was an effort to offset Kenya’s debt to the Bretton Woods Institutions by imposing heavy taxation and economic hardships on the poor. Armed with smartphones and dance moves, Gen-Z took to the streets to redefine Kenyan protest culture.

ROAPE’s Reg Cline-Cole introduces the first issue of the journal (Vol. 51, Issue 179) in the year of our 50th anniversary, and as a fully open access publication. Though this year, Reg explains, is a new beginning, it is also a return to ROAPE’s radical origins half a century ago. The entire new issue is available for the first time fully open access, with no paywall or barriers to access anywhere in the world. Each article, briefing and review is accessible through the links below.

For too long the subaltern world, and Africa, has relied on reporting of events in the world by outlets at the centre of empire. The stories that emerge from these institutions tell complicated lies, peddle myths, and repeat racist tropes about the Global South. Yusuf Serunkuma lauds the impact of Aljazeera, a major news network which was set-up in 2006 and has changed our understanding of the world. Africa too, Serunkuma concludes, must create its own media network to tell its story.

Colin Darch writes about attending the anniversary last month of the Portuguese revolution on 25 April 1974. This was the  “fourth revolution” alongside the anti-colonial transformations in Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique and Angola. Darch argues that it remains vital to remember that between 1974-1975 radical socialist transformation in a small country on the south-western edge of Europe was on the cards – and that it was African leaders such as Amílcar Cabral, Samora Machel and Agostinho Neto who were showing the way.

In January 2024, Makerere University in Kampala hosted a two-day conference to reflect on 40 years of neoliberalism in Uganda. Writing on the conference, Serunkuma reminds us that, 40 years on, Uganda remains an epicentre of neoliberalism - or what he terms the 'new colonialism' in Africa. Consequently, neoliberalism and its many ills must remain at the forefront of scholarly and activist discussion and analysis.

Pascal Bianchini interviews Ahmed Salem El Moctar, also known as Cheddad, who was a leader of the Mauritanian student movement in the early 1970s, as well as an underground activist with the Kadihines movement. Cheddad recounts his activism in Mauritania during the late 1960s and 1970s, providing insight into the period's school movements, strikes, and the fight against neocolonialism. He offers insight into the complexity of Mauritanian post-independence politics, the significance of the Kadihine movement, and the National Democratic Movement.

The connection between Israel and apartheid South Africa has been repeated and disputed since October last year, but this is not new argues Graham Harrison. The comparison of Israel to apartheid was debated in the 1970s over a denunciation of Israel’s removals, settlements, walls and border-posts crisscrossing the occupied territories. Harrison teases out some of the similarities, and important differences, in the relationship between two states, and two chosen people.

In his long-read, Husam Osman Mahjoub delves into the UAE and Saudi Arabia's influence in Sudan, emphasizing its impact on the war and democratic aspirations. He outlines the intricate relationships and interventions in Sudanese affairs, highlighting the pivotal roles played by both countries. Mahjoub discusses historical events and diplomatic maneuvers that shaped the region and its conflicts, shedding light on the complex dynamics. His analysis underscores the urgent need to address the UAE's involvement in supporting the RSF militia to halt the ongoing war in Sudan.

Last year, for the first time on roape.net, members of ROAPE’s Editorial Group offered some of our favourite radical reads from 2022, new and old, fiction and non-fiction. Here again, in what we hope will beome an annual offering, Editorial Group members provide a list of books that have served to educate, shock, move, and inspire over the last 12 months, in our 2023 offering of ROAPE's best reads for African radicals. Five of the ten books listed are available as free downloads.

South African human rights activist and academic, Salim Vally, discusses the Israel-Palestine conflict, asserting that it originates from 75 years of Israeli settler colonialism and ethnic cleansing. He calls for African support for Palestine against Israel's military-industrial complex, backed by Western imperialism. Vally also criticizes the shifting positions of African countries on the conflict and explores the parallels between the Israeli regime and South African Apartheid.