Organizations Globally Condemn the Fascism of the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM): Launch of A Month of Action

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Organizations Globally Condemn the Fascism of the 

U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) 

Launch Annual Month of Action to Shut Down AFRICOM

SEPTEMBER 26, 2024 — October 1, 2024, marks the start of the 4th International Month of Action Against AFRICOM (U.S. Africa Command), organized by the Black Alliance for Peace (BAP). Every year, hundreds of organizations around the world endorse and participate in this Month of Action, standing united against the United States’ ongoing military presence in African nations across the continent.

International Month of Action Against AFRICOM will kick off with an international webinar featuring voices from the African continent and diaspora expressing the need for the complete withdrawal of U.S. troops and a complete end to the combatant command. Following the webinar individuals and organizations will engage in a month of autonomous and semi-autonomous actions and events designed to elevate this issue in the public consciousness around the world and encourage the continuation of the resistance against U.S. imperialism.

AFRICOM is the brainchild of the Heritage Foundation, the think tank also known for the creation of Project 2025. The plan was incubated twenty-one years ago, with an eye towards low-priced natural resources and control over African security affairs under the guise of the “Global War on Terror.” Launched by the George W. Bush administration and brought to full operation by the Barack Obama administration, AFRICOM is most known for the destruction of Libya resulting in tens of thousands dead, and millions displaced. The U.S. continues to refine and expand the tactics employed in Libya across the continent.

This year’s Month of Action Against AFRICOM comes at a pivotal geopolitical moment for Africa. The continent is experiencing widespread anti-neocolonialist movements including: (1) the successful expelling of AFRICOM from Niger, (2) admission and evidence that U.S. ally Ukraine has supported terrorism in Mali, and (3) popular mass mobilizations against governments propped up by the U.S. that are facing state repression, ie. Kenya, Nigeria, Uganda etc.

The Month of Action Against AFRICOM does not represent the full extent of BAP’s work against the neocolonial occupation of Africa. BAP continues to call for the dismantling of NATO, AFRICOM and all imperialist structures. Africa and the rest of the world cannot be free until all Peoples can exercise their sovereignty and the right to live free of domination.

BAP’s Demands include:

• The complete withdrawal of U.S. forces from Africa;

• The demilitarization of the African Continent;

• The closure of U.S. bases throughout the world; and

• The Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) oppose the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) and conduct hearings on AFRICOM’s impact on the African continent, with the full participation of members of U.S. and African civil society.

To learn more about BAP’s International Month of Action Against AFRICOM, please visit our web page. You can also see informational materials about the Month of Action in our media kit.

Responsibility for the Kenya Crisis Lies At the Feet of US Neo-Colonialism

Responsibility for the Kenya Crisis Lies At the Feet of US Neo-Colonialism

The excessive support and public adoration the U.S. government has given to Kenya’s President William Ruto represents the racist contempt this settler state has for all of Africa and for the domestic population of descendants from the continent. Two days before African Liberation Day on May 25th and one month before the Kenyan police’s brutal crackdown on protests against the US-IMF backed Finance Act that increases taxes up to 35% on essential goods, U.S. President Biden rolled out a red carpet for Ruto at a White House state dinner.

The debt that this bill is supposed to address only exists because of the incessant and indiscriminate borrowing by the previous government of Kenya, for which Ruto was vice-president. Ruto is a Grade A lackey for U.S. interests reminiscent of the dictator Mobutu of the Democratic Republic of Congo (then Zaire) who U.S. imperialism supported for 32 years in order to plunder the Congo.

U.S. neo-colonialism praised as an “endearing” and “enduring” democracy, the Ruto presidency, a puppet government that unleashed its notoriously vicious police to reportedly arrest more than 300, kill as many as 23 and injure dozens of Kenyan citizens in the demonstrations over the past week. These police are the same force U.S. imperialism has maneuvered into being dispatched to Haiti to contain the people’s resistance against imperialism in that Caribbean nation.

An elevation in the parlance of U.S. statecraft is the paternalistic promise of granting Kenya the status of a “Major Non-NATO Ally,” a role granted to the African Union’s African Standby Force. This designation is in sharp contrast to the Alliance of Sahel States newly formed confederation which is a declaration of African self-determination.

The Africa Team of the Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) and the organizing arm U.S. Out of Africa Network (USOAN) stands in uncompromising solidarity with the masses of Kenyans fighting against the proposed Finance Bill 2024. We denounce in the strongest terms the complicity of the U.S., especially its Black misleaders in Congress, in passing this legislation. In fact the day the bill was introduced in the Kenyan parliament, members of the  U.S congress were present including Barbara Lee. 

Ruto must go! U.S. Out of Africa! BAP and USOAN salute the courage and determination of the masses of youth throughout Kenya "Gen Z"! The blood spilled will not be in vain. Our martyrs are alive along-side of the living. We stand unwaveringly with the Gen Z Movement, our people of Kenya!

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Banner photo: A police officer with a walkie-talkie confronting a protest against the Finance Bill 2024. courtesy: Mathare Justice Center

The Facts about ECOWAS by The Black Alliance for Peace Africa Team

The US and EU states work with intergovernmental regional organizations like the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) as a geo-strategy to give cover for neo-colonialist interests. As developments in Africa have reached a crucial point, it becomes more important to critically understanding the origin of ECOWAS and its current essential function.

The people have protested against ECOWAS sanctions in response to the military transitional governments in the new Alliance of Sahelian States (AES) viewed by many as a step towards African self-determination. In turn, the leaders of Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger have decided to leave ECOWAS, declaring that it has deviated from its original purpose and is now an impediment to their sovereignty.

In the interest of advancing a political education around the history and current role of ECOWAS the Africa Team of the Black Alliance for Peace has published this comprehensive FACT SHEET on ECOWAS.

Black Alliance for Peace’s U.S. Out of Africa Network Deplores Plans to Expand U.S. Drone Atrocities in West Africa

Black Alliance for Peace’s U.S. Out of Africa Network Deplores Plans to Expand U.S. Drone Atrocities in West Africa

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The Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) and the U.S. Out of Africa Network (USOAN) opposes in the strongest terms the U.S. plans, in collusion with West Africa’s comprador class, to further violate Africa’s sovereignty and right to self determination in the form of three new military drone bases in Ghana, Ivory Coast and Benin. Further, we condemn the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and the U.S. Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) for not publicly renouncing this proposal in particular, and the existence of the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) in general. Their silence around this development confirms their complicity and betrayal of Pan-Africanism and the interests of the African masses struggling against the ravages of neo-colonialism.

More U.S. drone bases in Africa spell more violence, vicious anonymity, and "collateral damage" from drone assassinations. It spells enhanced surveillance capabilities for imperialism to use against any threat to the neocolonial order. U.S. maneuvering to expand its already massive military drone operations is consistent with the U.S. incessant drive to wage war globally and its militarization of the planet. U.S. drone and air strikes in Africa have primarily been in Libya and Somalia with the numbers of confirmed civilian deaths from drones as high as 3,200 in these two countries, and studies have shown these conditions “have inadvertently aided the growth of terrorist groups in the region.” This is what the U.S. proposes now for West Africa.

There are clear and disturbing geostrategic implications regarding the countries they have chosen for these U.S. drone bases. The bases will form a border along the three countries of the Alliance of Sahel States – Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger – countries which have been adopting an anti-imperialist disposition. In fact, Burkina Faso’s entire southern flank would be surrounded by these U.S. drone bases. The last two administrations as well as members of Congress have clearly stated in policy declarations and legislation that the U.S.' primary objective in Africa is to counteract the presence and influence of China and Russia in order to maintain its full spectrum dominance of all regions of the world. This is also consistent with the Global Fragility Act that states the Biden administration’s first sites of focus would be Haiti, Libya, and "West African coastal states," where the U.S. seeks to place the drone bases.

The bases will not be there to end so-called terrorism of extremists in Africa; they will be there for the U.S. to terrorize the region. It is folly to believe that the settler criminals who rule the U.S. state, who can justify the genocidal assault on Gaza, and who systematically murder, sanction, and attack nations globally to maintain white supremacy and global capitalism, are spending hundreds of millions to “fight terrorism” in Africa.

Rather than “an urgent effort to stop the spread of al Qaeda and Islamic State in the region,” according to American and African officials, the USOAN contends that this is more likely a contingency plan to preserve drone capabilities in the event of losing their $110 million U.S. drone base in Agadez, Niger. Niger has also recently temporarily suspended the granting of new mining licenses and ordered an audit of the sector, a move that would invariably raise the eyebrows of the U.S.-EU-NATO axis of domination, concerned over the future of exploitative access to the mineral resources there, such as uranium. Resource sovereignty runs counter to the true colonialist objectives of U.S. foreign policy.

BAP and the USOAN call on all who support African sovereignty to denounce the U.S.’ latest imperialist moves in Western Africa as well as the neocolonial African governments and collaborators like the Ghanaian president Nana Akufo-Addo who, face-to-face with U.S. Secretary Antony Blinken, openly begged for the U.S. to violate the sovereignty of the countries in the Alliance of Sahel States.

BAP and the USOAN will continue to expose the puppets of neocolonialism in Africa and the misleaders masquerading as Black representatives in the legislative branches of the U.S. setter state. We maintain that the U.S. and its Western Europe progenitors are the root cause and primary sustenance for the poverty, displacement, despair, and violence in Africa, born from decades of colonialist plunder.

 #ShutDownAFRICOM!

#USOutofAfrica!

Banner photo: 3 U.S. drones docked on an airfield in Asia. Courtesy didpress.com

All Africans Should Condemn the Call for an ECOWAS-led Military Invasion of Niger

All Africans Should Condemn the Call for an ECOWAS-led Military Invasion of Niger

The Africa Team of the Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) and the U.S. Out of Africa Network (USOAN) condemn the threats of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to lead a military intervention into Niger. We believe this would be an act of subservience to U.S./EU/NATO interests. As Western imperialism seems to be losing its neo-colonialist grip on Africa, it is trying to expand its use of puppets and proxies to undermine resistance.

The military coup in Niger on July 26 deposed President Mohamed Bazoum and installed General Abdourahamane Tchiani as the country's new leader. In power since 2021, Bazoum and his party were reliable servants of French and U.S. imperialism. This may help explain why the United States and its NATO allies seemed overly concerned about this particular coup.

The West’s hypocritical claims of standing for “democracy” in Niger fall flat when compared to its response to the military coup in Sudan as well as the political repression faced by the popular movement in that country. The United States (and its Western partners) has had a hand in orchestrating countless coups in Africa, such as those against democratically elected leaders Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, Patrice Lumumba of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and Thomas Sankara of Burkina Faso, to name a few.

The objective of the U.S./EU/NATO Axis of Domination is colonial control of Niger and the Sahel region. France and other EU countries rely on Niger for 15-30 percent of their uranium imports, critical to Europe's nuclear energy sector. Meanwhile, the majority of Niger’s population doesn’t even have access to electricity. Furthermore, Niger is the last state in West Africa where a large number of Western soldiers are stationed under the U.S. “War on Terror” regime. The $100 million U.S. base in Agadez, Niger, is where the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) operates its drones, and is just one such AFRICOM facility in that country.

As Ezra Otieno, member of the Revolutionary Socialist League in Kenya and BAP’s U.S. Out of Africa Network Steering Committee, says:

“For all of these factors, France, the EU, and the U.S. are keen to maintain control over Niger. They aim to push the new authorities to restore their puppet Bazoum or to reach an arrangement with General Tchiani to maintain his predecessor's pro-Western stance. If these preparations fail within the next few days, Western imperialists want to intervene militarily with the support of their foot soldiers in the Nigeria-dominated ECOWAS bloc.”

It is clear that the United States and France have decided to draw a line here before France is expelled and U.S. interests are threatened. Without NATO, the United States or France, ECOWAS would not be able to intervene. It is telling that, of all the coups in Africa, ECOWAS is ready to intervene militarily in Niger. This is because their masters in the West demand it. Apparently, ECOWAS member states have chosen servitude to imperialism over the people's will.

In Haiti, the imperialists use Kenya and the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) as cover for their intervention. To do the same for the coup in Niger, they have the President of Nigeria, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, and ECOWAS. Now they are facing a united front composed of Burkina Faso, and Mali, whose leadership have all expressed support for Niger’s sovereignty. While the CNRD of Guinea, Comité national du rassemblement et du développement (National Committee of Reconciliation and Development) is not part of the front, their Spokesperson, Aminata Diallo said that if “…requested by ECOWAS to send troops that we would refuse…”

ECOWAS is working as a comprador structure, along with the West African Economic and Monetary Union (UEMOA), which has levied financial sanctions against Niger and the coup leaders. The situation in Niger demands an African response, not the imperialist-led and anti-people militarized one suggested by members of ECOWAS.

The Black Alliance for Peace October 2023 International Month of Action against western militarization of the African continent, demanding that the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) is shut down, will be more important than ever before. The annual Month of Action is an opportunity for political education and action that links the domestic war being waged against African peoples in the United States with the war that the United States wages on the continent of Africa and globally.

From Haiti to Niger and beyond, we must build an understanding of Pan-Africanism and illuminate the interdependent geo-political and economic interests among African/Black people in Haiti, the Americas, the African continent, and among those domestically colonized in the enclaves of the imperialist countries.

No to imperialism in Black face. Yes to Pan-African self-determination. U.S. Out of Africa!

Banner photo: Supporters of Niger's ruling junta gather at the start of a protest called to fight for the country's freedom and push back against foreign interference in Niamey, Niger, Thursday, Aug. 3, 2023. (Courtesy AP Photo/Sam Mednick)

An Africa Anti-Imperialist Week of Actions Launches Today to Expose and Denounce Biden Administration’s U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit in Washington, D.C.

For Immediate Release     

Media Contact

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DECEMBER 12, 2022— In a direct response to the Biden administration’s “U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit''—taking place in Washington, D.C., December 13-15—the U.S Out of Africa Network, the organizational arm of the Black Alliance for Peace’s (BAP) campaign to shut down the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM), has launched an anti-imperialist week of actions in Washington to raise public awareness about the cynical intentions of the summit.

BAP’s December 9 statement challenges in detail the Biden administration’s claim that the summit will “demonstrate the United States’ enduring commitment to Africa, and will underscore the importance of U.S.-Africa relations and increased cooperation on shared global priorities.” BAP pointed out the United States militarily occupies 53 of the 54 countries on the continent in one form or another, that it sustains a drone war in Somalia, and that it led the 2011 NATO destruction of Libya.

BAP’s actions throughout the week will include protests and rallies, starting on December 13 with a noon forum, “Africa Anti-Imperialist Summit: Voices from the Ground.” Then a press conference will be held at 2 p.m. on December 16. Both events mentioned will take place at the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) at 1301 Connecticut Avenue, 6th Floor, Washington, D.C.

While Biden administration officials play down their concern about the inroads of China and Russia into Africa, U.S. Out of Africa Network Coordinator Tunde Osazua says, “Challenging these inroads is a clear goal of the summit. On the heels of Human Rights Day they’re convening the summit to undermine the human rights of African people and want us to ignore the historical record of the U.S. in Africa.”

BAP is also calling out the Congressional Black Caucus for their ongoing support of U.S. oppressive, murderous policies in Africa. “These members sit quietly, in active dereliction of their duty, to safeguard the rights and interests of Black and oppressed people,” says Netfa Freeman, BAP Coordinating Committee member.

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Banner photo: The center of Benghazi in ruins after years of conflict (courtesy Ivor Prickett for The New York Times.)

Invitations for a Seat at the U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit Table Should Not Only Be Rejected, the Table Needs Turning Over!

The Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) recognizes the “U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit'' — scheduled to take place in Washington, D.C. December 13-15th — as nothing more than collusion between neo-colonial powers and U.S. attempts to advance and maintain dominance over the continent.

Liberal elements of U.S. civil society will preoccupy themselves with the issues they think should be addressed at the Summit, claiming to act in the best interest of Africa or, as with the Summit of the Americas held earlier this year, attack those who they say do not deserve to be invited. Such dispositions presume the U.S. has honest intentions for Africa and legitimizes/obscures its real interests and role.

Convened on the heels of Human Rights Day which is held every December 10, the Black Radical Human Rights and Peace Traditions must center the historical record of the U.S. in Africa and the geo-strategic interests it is committed to upholding. The carefully considered proceedings, side events, invitations, and public relations campaigns are designed to secure greater control of Africa’s abundant resources for U.S. “national interests” aligned with the interest of international finance capital.

Having assumed the racist mantle of the “White Man’s Burden” in the Global South in general and Africa in particular, the U.S. claims that this summit will “demonstrate the United States’ enduring commitment to Africa, and will underscore the importance of U.S.-Africa relations and increased cooperation on shared global priorities.” Such statements should be exposed as being disingenuous and an effort to cover up the United States' malign intent.

African independence movements since the 1950s have been destabilized by U.S. administrations of both parties. Democratically elected leaders such as Patrice Lumumba of Congo, who was assassinated by the CIA, and Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, who was overthrown in a CIA orchestrated coup, fell victim to U.S. government meddling, and they are only two among many. Contemporary U.S. interference has involved proxy wars in Congo with the assistance of Uganda and Rwanda, and in Somalia with Ethiopia (2006-2009) followed by a sustained drone war over Somalia under the guise of fighting extremists. In 2011 the U.S. led NATO in a regime change operation resulting in the total destruction of Libya. The U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) occupies 53 of the 54 countries on the continent in one form or another for U.S. neo-colonial hegemony.

A core goal of the U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit is to challenge the inroads of the People’s Republic of China and to a lesser extent the Russian Federation vis-à-vis the continent. The political sectors of the U.S. oligarchy are concerned about regional cooperation initiated in the Horn of Africa since 2018, and anti-France and pro-Russia expressions among the people in countries like Mali, Guinea, and Burkina Faso, which is invoking the legacy of the revolutionary Thomas Sankara.

Most notably, the complicity and silence of the Congressional Black Caucus members over the role of the U.S. federal government in Africa and the dereliction of their professed purpose to represent the interests of Black and oppressed people will undoubtedly find political cover in the U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit. CBC members will be key-note speakers, event conveners, and backdoor deal makers for the U.S. neocolonial, white supremacist, patriarchal order. 

In contrast, the Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) is holding an anti-imperialist week of actions to raise public awareness related to the real issues that should be on the agenda for discussion at the U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit.  BAP calls for the dismantling of NATO, AFRICOM and all imperialist structures. Africa and the rest of the world cannot be free until all peoples are able to realize the right of sovereignty and the right to live free of domination.

We demand:

1. The complete withdrawal of U.S. forces from Africa;

2. The closure of U.S. bases throughout the world; and

3. The Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) to oppose the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) and conduct hearings on AFRICOM’s impact on the African continent, with the full participation of members of U.S. and African civil society.

Join BAP for an anti-imperialist week of actions!

Banner photo: The 2014 summit table surrounded by the empty chair reserved for invited participants (courtesy DOS Flickr)