THE AFRICA FORUM -RUNNING AFRICA -KABU MA'AT KHERU-FOR -11-18-2024

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
I want being a represent in a man for Uptown TV.

(00:07):
You understand?
All of that, say all of that in what language we're talking now.
Well, um.
Because if you don't do that, you know, we have things for you, you know, you can just listen to this.

(00:30):
I read from Swahili, run in Africa.
Oh my God.
So if you don't, if you see.
Oh my God.
Do you understand now?
So it is what it is.
Yes.
Yes.
So welcome to the space.
Thank you so much.

(00:51):
Appreciate it.
What a nice to be here.
What a journey.
You came in.
I came in on the island last night.
Yes.
Just last night.
Yes.
You want just a mic.
You're good.
I will give you some time to adjust the mic.
No, you want to adjust the mic.
Yes, I want to.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Go ahead.
All right.
Black Master Live in the studio.
And at the studios right now of I really have a little bit more about him.

(01:15):
I'm going to tell a bit about the music he does to.
But this man is a poet.
And so we need to talk about that.
A multi award winning poet, but also someone who is seriously concerned with the.
The struggles, the plight.
The liberation struggles of African people wherever we are.

(01:39):
And hence in here he is in Jamaica.
My brother, I want to talk a little bit about your journey.
Right.
Because we started out by saying that the man from Tamale.
I don't know if I'm the only one who called you that.
Yes, the very first one.
Well, there you go.
You're going to have to do a poem about it now.
All right.
So tell me a little bit about your background yourself and the journey out of Tamale into

(02:03):
the slums and into academia and then to reggae music.
All right.
So as you rightly said, I was born on the second of September, 1974.
It was a Monday at seven twenty p.m.
My mother told me I weighed five pounds five.
You know, when I was born and I was born at a Tamale regional hospital.

(02:24):
And my father was a teacher.
My mother was a teacher.
So education was something that naturally came to me.
So I went to school and yes, all the way from when I was about, you know, I will say about
four years I was already in school and we went all the way through to the secondary
school, which was done at Kumasi.

(02:46):
Yes.
A beautiful city.
That's where I got married.
Yes.
That's where I went to school.
Secondary school.
As you said, a beautiful city.
Yes.
Beautiful.
Yes. So I went to a secondary school, Kumasi.
And then from there, I went to the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, also
in Kumasi, where I graduated.

(03:09):
And then I went to the Coventry University in England.
And what did you study in Coventry and and and in in in university at the University
of Coventry?
Yes.
Yes.
Yes.
I studied oil and gas management.
That was what I did for my masters.
And now I am doing a PhD almost completed at the UK ZN.

(03:34):
That is the University of KwaZulu Natal.
So now you're in South Africa?
South Africa.
Yeah.
That's where I'm doing my PhD.
Yeah.
So what's and the PhD is still oil and gas?
No, I moved from oil and gas to peace management and conflict resolution.
Yes.
That is what I am doing right now.

(03:55):
Yes.
And I want to pick up right there because and in your in your bio, we talk about you
coming through the slums, not not seeing Reggae, but somehow meeting Reggae, which comes out
of the the the the the the dongle, so to speak, the slums, so to speak.
Right.
But at the same time, and you're meeting that with going through academia.

(04:23):
Explain to me how that happened, because I know that for myself, my own background.
In my own family, Reggae music was here in Jamaica, looked down upon.
And I'm not quite sure what your situation was.
But what was the response of your parents and your peers to you going off into Reggae

(04:47):
music as opposed to or did you make a choice?
It didn't sound to me like you made a choice.
You carried both Reggae and academia.
Well, I will say that I was chosen.
Academia was in it.
I mean, running left, right and center doing my schoolwork.
So when I was chosen by Reggae music, I mean, because when I was in school, I was listening

(05:09):
to Reggae music.
A lot of my Rasta friends, I mean, would be talking Reggae, talking Rasta and all that.
So how did you how did your parents and those around you, your peers, your guardians, whoever
they were, how did they view that your advent into into Rastafari and into Reggae?
OK, so it all happened at the University of Kwame Nkrumah, University of Science and Technology.

(05:32):
Of course, my father used to bring home Reggae music, who played from cassettes and all that.
But for him, it was just music, you know.
But when I got to the university and met my Rasta brethren and they were talking Reggae,
talking Reggae artists, talking Jamaica, talking Rasta and all that, I got very, very interested
in it.

(05:53):
And then I decided that I was going to go that line, you know, of Reggae and dreadlocks
and Rasta.
My parents did not take that easy, you know, especially my mother.
I mean, she was told that Rasta people smoke a lot and, you know, a lot of them walk barefooted.
A lot of them are disoriented in life and all that.

(06:15):
So this is happening in Ghana.
In Ghana, yes, right, right there in Ghana.
So my mother didn't like it at all.
And to make it worse, there was a Reggae artist on stage at the time on TV and that was Joseph Hill Culture.
You know, yes, of blessed memory.
But that's good Reggae.
Yes, very good Reggae.
But she was watching it on TV and all of a sudden he pulled out a spliff and started smoking.

(06:39):
Yes, I remember that clearly.
We're watching it from a black and white TV.
How old were you at this time?
At the time, this probably was when I was about 21.
Right.
Around 21, yes.
So here is our son going into something that is not so well understood in Ghana and is so prejudiced.

(07:01):
And then you see one of his mentors on TV.
He's singing so well and we're about to change your mind and say, oh, OK, well, these people sing good.
That is good.
All of a sudden he pulls out a spliff and he's smoking on stage.
I remember she was crying and say, oh, no, oh, no, oh, no.
So I'm it.
This is what you want to do with your life.
This is what you want to do with your life.
And many people said I look like her.

(07:23):
I resembled her so much.
So she didn't want somebody who resembled like who resembled her and, you know, her son go that line.
So what? So talk to me about that then.
I mean, what?
So you because you even changed your name to Black Rasta Black Rasta.
At some point, did she ever come to terms with?
Oh, my God, she did.
She did.
And that's where my happiness is.

(07:45):
I mean, she thought that I was going to stop schooling because I was quite brilliant when I was in school.
She thought I was going to stop and she thought I was going to be smoking and walking barefoot.
And, you know, all those prejudices she had about Rasta, she realized I didn't go into any of them.
Well, I had my.
This is across Africa, though, but it's still very big.
Yeah.

(08:06):
And so your music was being played.
Yes, it was. It was on BBC and it was on the Independence Day of Ghana.
I remember too well.
Two thousand and one, the sixth of March 19, 2001.
Nineteen fifty seven was when we had our independence.
So she had that on BBC.
I remember my uncle coming all the way from Bolgatanga, which is a town in the northern part of Ghana.

(08:27):
Do you know I'm nodding like this is because this is not TV.
So people don't see me. But the first time I heard your name was at the BBC.
Oh, wow.
BBC Africa, where I was returning and the first time I heard your music was at the BBC.
So we know you are speaking exactly the truth that that in the especially within BBC Africa,

(08:48):
your music was being played, your music was used as soundtrack, your music was used as music bed and so on.
So, yeah, you're right.
And so I looked I looked you up way back then and I know a lot about you.
So I've been following you and and really just to say I am honored and I'm proud of you.
Honestly, the work, the journey and just happy to have you in the studio.

(09:13):
When Benjamin called and said that you were coming, I mean, we tried to do everything.
I'm very happy that you were able to clinch the deal.
I hear you have the biggest show on the island and beyond.
And I am so proud of you as well. I'm honored to be on the show.
The whole of Ghana is listening right about now.
And I know the calls are going to start coming in crazily.
Do you know you're right?

(09:34):
Because I have a text here from Ghana from someone who said, we can't download the app.
And I need to I need to report it because they need to listen and they're not getting you.
That's one person. But other other texts are coming in.
People are finding it is it is so for those who are not call a friend and tell him how to download the app.

(09:56):
Right.
So right. So let's talk about the the the journey in the music.
Right. Because you you developed a special kind of music.
Did you actually this is you came from the poetry.
Yes. Right. So I want to start there from how you started out to developing this new music,

(10:18):
which is really a reggae fusion that is really so popular.
Right. Right. Well, I mean, I never knew I could sing.
My mother used to sing in the bathroom.
She would get into the bathroom and hear a voice all over the place.
My father would only sing if he was a little tipsy.
And so I would hear a lot of music around me.
But the very first poem that I heard was that of Muta Baruka.

(10:44):
He's listening. Say good morning. Good morning.
Muta Baruka. Yes, yes, yes, yes.
And his poetry was what I had first. Great Queens of Africa.
I had a great Queens of Africa. Then the poetry came in.
This is that African tin tin tin tin.
So I told myself this man is not singing. He's talking.
I think I can talk. And that was a compilation album.

(11:08):
So you'd have picked out Muta. Muta Baruka.
Yeah. Yes. Yes. Yes.
And it was so interesting. I like the female voice there.
And I would love to know who did that singing on the album, the female voice in there.
And it was so beautiful. So that was how my poetry journey started.
So I started to write poems. I got to know what it meant to rhyme, what to do here, what to do there.

(11:35):
And the rest is history. So I started to write poetry.
But I realized that I could also do a little bit of singing at a time.
I didn't really get into it. But traveling around the world, meeting a lot of reggae people,
and I'm getting to understand that, okay, so this is reggae music, reggae music, you know,
originated by my people right here in Jamaica and all that, getting to know the history and all that.

(12:00):
I realized that a lot of the time the attention is on Jamaica.
But I do know that as an African, I needed to be able to inject a little bit of my identity
and my musicality into it in terms of the music, the sounds and all that in order to,
I mean, give it a certain kind of flavor.
That was how come we were able to come up with Kuchoko.

(12:24):
And Kuchoko is just the sound of reggae music.
When you listen to authentic reggae music from Jamaica, you hear that sound, Kuchoko, Kuchoko, Kuchoko, Kuchoko, Kuchoko.
And when you go to Nigeria, they say, Nya-ke, Nya-ke, Nya-ke, Nya-ke.
But we in Ghana say Kuchoko, Kuchoko, Kuchoko.
And when you go to Ghana, they call reggae music Kuchoko.
It's interesting because you kind of open your eyes to something right here, right?

(12:50):
Because I've said in this space a lot that my father played the guitar, right?
So I and I remember, you know, evening time just sitting on the veranda when the night confusing the day
and he's on his guitar and he's just going, mmenga, mmenga, mmenga.
But it's the same Kuchoko.
Kuchoko, that's right.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

(13:13):
This is quite something.
Yeah, so we injected a lot of African energy into it in terms of the sights and sounds will make you see it, you know.
So that's what you took, so it's Kuchoko.
Kuchoko, yes.
Kuchoko is what the music is called.
That's what the music is called.
It's reggae music in its entirety.
It's just that we put in a little bit more of African instruments like the kora and all that.

(13:39):
But when you listen to it, you know that this is reggae music.
Which one of these, I can get this because I have a few lined up here.
Obviously it's all YouTube, so I'm sorry because, you know.
So I just played, tell me one that I can find that has, that's very clear.
Kuchoko inside.
All right, good, good, good.
All right, so I mean this album is called The Salaga Soldier.
And when you listen to a song like The Barber Shop, Barber Shop featuring Anthony B.

(14:07):
I mean it is a remake of Jacob Miller's Tinament Yard.
This time around I decided to call it The Barber Shop because I had a dream.
And in this dream I saw Jacob Miller singing and I was sitting on his left hand side.
All of a sudden I told myself this man is going to change this song into a barber song.

(14:28):
You know, relax the living tinament yard and all that.
And I said he's going to sing about a barber.
And he turned around and looked at me and said, you are the one who's going to sing about a barber.
Not me.
And pointed at me.
I came out of the dream.
Well I didn't really take it to be anything.
But after a couple of days it kept coming to me.
And I decided to go into the studio and make a barbershop.

(14:50):
And when Anthony B. heard it, first comment, oh, what a tune.
What a tune.
And he came on it.
I'm not sure if I have it here because I'm trying to...
Run in Africa.
Yen Yau Krono.
23 after 7 o'clock.
We're back with you inside of the Africa Forum.
This is Running Africa.
And my very special guest in studio is Black Rasta.

(15:12):
But just to quickly tell you what's happening in Senegal.
So the polls have opened in Senegal, as you know, the parliamentary elections are on.
Today more than 7 million of the country, 17 million people are eligible to vote.
Today.
And we are rooting, as you know, for Fayet.

(15:33):
For Senegal's president, Joume Fayet.
So we're watching this very, very closely.
We think that right now he is the best option for Senegal.
And we're watching that with bated breath, literally.
Hope it goes well.
The Al Jazeera is reporting that it seems to be going well so far.

(15:57):
Let me check some of the other continental newspapers coming out of Senegal and Africa generally to see what they're saying.
But yeah, that's what's happening in Senegal.
All right, so we're back with you, Black Rasta, in the studio and passing through Jamaica.
So you came in last night and you're heading...

(16:19):
Tell me, what's your plans like in Jamaica?
Yes, I am here to do a lot of things first and foremost.
It's a pilgrimage to me.
I mean, when I arrive at the airport, I was down on my knees to kiss the ground.
This is where my ancestors were brought to.
And it's unfortunate having been here all this while.
So when I arrived, that feeling was wonderful, especially that I came on an airline that was an inaugural one,

(16:44):
the very first time in Jamaica from Hartford in America.
Really?
Straight, you know.
So we had the fire service come in and spray water on it.
And we had people dancing and singing and waving the Jamaican flag, you know, and all that.
We had a mental group out there playing music and all that.
It was a spiritual welcome.
So this was your first...this is your first time in Jamaica?

(17:05):
Very first time in Jamaica.
I'm having some big fun.
Probably I don't understand you because you came in last night.
In fact, we actually arrived in the morning at 10.30, you know.
Yeah, 10.30 and we're in the airport there for two more hours, you know, just celebrating.
Just celebrating?
Yeah, just celebrating.
And I was the only dreadlocked turban wearing rasta on the flight.

(17:28):
So there was so much attention on me and all that.
Yeah, it felt spiritual and it felt special.
So you said this is like this is a pilgrimage for you.
Pilgrimage, yes.
What are you planning to do here?
Who do you hope to see, talk to us about that?
Yes, I'm going to be filming some music videos.
I have a song with George Nukes, which we'll be working on.

(17:49):
And then we are almost finishing a song called Natty Marcus Mosiah.
I'm recording that with Fred Block.
Fred Block.
Yeah, sounds good.
Yeah.
So we hope to be able to finish with the music videos and I'll complete the barbershop, I mean, music video here as well.
Then I will take time to go around the country, the island, and see what is in there and, you know, sip into the spirit of our ancestors.

(18:16):
It's for us when we go to Ghana, we say you could take Jamaica up and put down in Ghana.
And for but for the maybe the accent, you wouldn't know that is a different country.
Does it feel that way to you?
Like, wow, this is Ghana.
It does. I mean, it does.
It's only when the people start speaking.
In fact, there were some people I saw on the street and I almost called them Ghana names, you know, people that I know in Ghana.

(18:41):
And I was going to shout, yeah, yeah.
You know, and then I had to restrain myself.
I mean, it's the same people, same, same, same people.
And the first Jamaican food I had was Bami.
You know, in Ghana, we call it Yakey Yakey.
Yeah, I mean, it's a different style.
I mean, I really enjoyed it by me and I'm boiled vegetables.

(19:06):
I mean, really nice steamed vegetables.
I had that. So, yes, I mean, Jamaica is it's a very beautiful place.
I hope you'll get some Kenki while you're here because we call it Dukunu.
Yeah. Kenki. And so we call it Blue Draws Dukunu.
And I think it's another name.
I think that's the way you're laughing. Yeah. So we definitely have that.

(19:29):
You see, it's interesting.
Some of these names when I come in and I hear them, we have Red Red, but it does a fire planting, but not the Red Red like, or you know it.
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, yesterday I was asking for palm nut soup and I'm told that, oh, we don't have palm nut soup in Jamaica.
So you don't have palm nut.
It's oh, somebody said, yes, we don't have palm nut.
I said, Jamaica's call it Abbe or something.

(19:50):
Yes, we do.
I said that is coming from my area in the northern part of Ghana.
We call it Abbe.
They are people that are called Abbe.
And we call it Abbe.
Now you just mentioned Dukunu.
Yeah. That's how we call it in the northern part of Ghana.
Yes. Dukunu. Yes.
Dukunu.
That's how we call it.
So we have kept the name, but we it's interesting you said that because obviously we know Kenki.

(20:15):
So we've you know, we go and we see Kenki, people selling Kenki on their heads and you know throughout Ghana.
But you say in the northern part.
In the northern part and also in the southern part.
It's called Dukunu. Dukunu.
And we the northern part say Dukunu. Dukunu.
In the south they say Dukunu.

(20:36):
This is interesting.
Yes, it is.
This is getting interesting.
It's the same people and you know, I mean what I've seen so far and when I arrived at the Mbe airport yesterday,
it was so beautiful and so nice meeting the same people, everybody ready to help.
I mean, contrary to some of the things we hear on radio and on TV.

(20:58):
I mean, you see that well, just like Africa has been, you know, bad mouth all over the place in the media.
The Western media is the same thing.
And this is our, this is a challenge for us as African people, isn't it?
It is.
There's a deliberateness in the negative stories and the negativity that's pushed out about Africa and about ourselves.

(21:21):
To ourselves that we have somehow bought into.
Right.
And the idea, let me know what you're thinking is on this because you will find Jamaicans who will go,
they'll find them on a vacation in the UK, in Europe, in France and Spain, in the United States in particular and other places.

(21:44):
But for them, Africa is a faraway place that is, that people are starving and people are literally still,
for so many Jamaicans, people are still living in, Africans are still living in huts and so on.
Talk to us about that mentality because you are getting something similar from your end
that Jamaica is such a terrible place.

(22:06):
I heard you say just now contrary to what you see and hear on the news, how do we break the back of that apartheid?
By what you are doing right now on radio and what I'm doing in Ghana and also on TV when we own our own media
because they started doing that brainwashing us from the days of slavery, you know, and all that.

(22:28):
You see, they are using their media to tell you what they want you to hear.
They put that in Hollywood movies and all that and we keep watching them and seeing that and hearing that on radio.
And when you keep listening to the lie over and over, it finally becomes the truth, you see.
They keep telling us that even in Ghana and some parts of Africa, they still believe that they are slaves.

(22:52):
There are some people in Africa who believe that it is their right to be called slaves.
They have been able to own slavery.
We are slaves and we remain slaves forever.
And that is supposed to be spiritual.
You see, that is what they keep telling us and that is what we keep imbibing.
So the media is what can help dissipate some of these lies, you see.

(23:16):
And our own movies, a lot of our movies are just talking about witchcraft and talking about this and that.
Some of them are even trying to behave like the Hollywood people like that.
Until we start telling our own story.
They are saying that until the lion writes his own story or gets a writer to write his story for him,
the hunter is always going to be the winner, you see.

(23:38):
Until that thing happens, this is what is going to happen.
And I see a strong uprising. I see a lot of things happening.
I mean, when I was coming to Jamaica, I was told that this show is one of the biggest in the whole Caribbean and beyond.
Well, I am very happy to hear that.
And I asked, why is it so? They said because she is always talking about Africa.
And I said, oh, OK, so Jamaican people really want to listen to African stuff.

(24:03):
They want to really know about Africa.
Then that is a great rising.
Yes, for people to be able to link up to the motherland.
This rising that you are talking about, I think this is critical.
The issue you raised in terms of the role of media in changing the narratives is also pretty important.
We find and I'm not quite sure what the situation in Ghana is,

(24:27):
but we find in media that obviously media ownership plays a big part in what you can do and how you do it.
Explain to me how this works in Ghana, the extent to which the private sector controls the message.
Wow. Wow. This is a very brilliant question.
In Ghana, I tell you, the media is owned by politicians, people I love to call politicians.

(24:55):
They own the Ghanaian media, so they use it for their politics.
So every radio station in Ghana does not survive if it doesn't do politics.
So they are all aligned to either this political party or to that political party.
If you don't do that, you are out of business.
I mean, I was so excited that you went on a break and played a number of adverts.

(25:19):
Radio stations in Ghana don't have that many adverts anymore if they don't do the politics thing.
At the end of the day, your employer will kick you out because your show is not making any money for this.
It's about the money. So you have to do what is supposed to be done, the politics thing.
So, OK, so I want to come back to that. I do have to take another break.

(25:42):
That's my brother. I'm so excited. Yeah.
Yeah. Can you not sleep yet?
Well, I had some sleep. Yeah, but I could do with more.
So you understand the Jamaican language, right?
Well, I manage with it.
I mean, it sounds like the Ghanaian pigeon.
I think I'd come. I'd go chop come as a day. I know chop nothing. So I'd be hung.

(26:08):
Yeah. So I want to see you if you do make you not take too much.
You do. I just come make you sit down and chop something.
You don't see the thing I tell you.
You know, I want to make you hear you see what you speak in Jamaica.
Say, in fact, I think Jamaica is the only place I hear in aside people in Ghana, especially from the northern part.

(26:30):
And we do that a lot. Yes. I mean, the Dagomba people.
Yeah. I mean, who in fact formed a lot of the ancestors right here in Jamaica when you speak and they don't hear you what they say.
Or when you say something and it's unbelievable when you say, they say, don't say any more of those words.
That's the Kura. Go stand up beside him.

(26:53):
I'm talking different words now. Don't say any more of those words. OK. All right. That one is good. We'll leave it at that.
Good. I'm glad it's good.
You know, it was interesting, though, is so many of the words that are retention African retention here on the island are now classified as bad words.

(27:16):
And that is an interesting thing, because you're in South Africa now. We've got a mountain in South Africa called the Bomba Mountain.
Right. There's a place in South Africa that's where the bomba region.
The first bone in terms of mathematics and I suppose you'd have made up on this before.
The first people to develop and design mathematics were the women, the bomba women who use that bone, the vote on the bone called the bomba bone.

(27:46):
They call that. But here in Jamaica, if you use that word out of context.
You can be imprisoned and find.
I think it's unfortunate. Very, very unfortunate. I mean, you can't run away from yourself. You see, how did it become illegal or improper to use if the original source of the thing is legal?

(28:07):
How can it be illegal when it's photocopied? And that's a question that is very sad.
For instance, we have a river in Ghana. I don't know if you want me to mention the name.
You might have to write it down for me. Is it called a bomba?
Well, it's it's something else. But in Ghana, it's a river that gives birth to so many other rivers.
So we call it the P.U.M. P.U.M. River.

(28:31):
That's how it's called. The Pum Pum River. And and but we have the Pum Pum Yam here in Jamaica.
Oh, right. Yeah. Yes. Pum Pum Yam. Ah, Pum Pum Yam. So this is a river in Ghana.
Yes. Which is part of the Kintampo Falls, one of the most beautiful falls we have in Ghana and a lot of other such words.
How did some of these words become illegal on the island?
That's a very good question. I think you through academia and through the music will have to be raised.

(28:58):
Some of these questions and and and for us, we have to answer them, raise them and answer them.
I've answered the one for Le Bombo. I think it is really because there was there is this attempt to for us to make us forget
that we are the initiators and the innovators and the originators of mathematics. Exactly.
Because if we know the Le Bombo bone, then what does that make us?

(29:24):
It makes us great. Exactly. And our children. Yes. Yes. So tell them is a bad word.
Yes. And the king of all the bad words in Jamaica. Yes. I mean, there was a king in Uganda who had that beautiful name.
Well, there you go. Beautiful name. And history tells us that anytime his name was mentioned, he appeared and disappeared at will.

(29:46):
So the white man was so scared of him. And it's that. Go ahead. Yes.
And because of that, it was banned on the slave ship. So you couldn't use that word.
And you couldn't and and still couldn't use it on the plantations and still couldn't exactly and still can't use it.
So, you know, I'm I'm I'm so these are these are some of the challenges that we have.

(30:10):
But we're going to have to break break it. Break it. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.
You know, yes, we have to break it because it's a way of breaking us away from our lineage and from our our source.
That was what they wanted to do right from the start.
That's why they carried us beyond the seas and brought us all the way here to be able to seal off all our links and our heritage

(30:33):
and our language as well. I think that Jamaica is not doing us too well and too good.
And some other such islands by burning those words and eating and yes, eating into the propaganda of the slave man.
Yeah, they're coming with the with the there are colonial laws that are still on the books.
And I think basically our even while we're talking about constitutional reform here is to get attacked.

(31:00):
And I think we can get attacked some of those but I don't think that there is the will to do that
because some of these are so ingrained in us now that just to say the word the response.
There are a lot of African words when you say them, even a good good African word, even even if that word a banter word
that means some kind of food and you say people can respond in in in negative ways.

(31:24):
So what's the point of this? Well, I'll say it another time.
Look at a black guy. You tell me what you hear about the program from far.
Yes. Yes. And then you want them to come check me out.

(31:45):
Yeah, I mean, what do you know about our chief?
We we're just reclaiming over the last few years since 2006, 2007.
Right. Not just the names, but also our ancestors like one of our freedom fighters that the British call Taki,
but which we have come to know through our own research was from Ghana, a Khan.

(32:09):
Yes. And it's Tetshi. What do you know about that name in Ghana?
If anything, the name Tetshi Tetshi is a very powerful name. It comes all the way from the Western region,
Western region. Yes. The Western and the Central region, the Fante's, you know, they love that name.
Tetshi Tetshi is a very powerful name and such names as Nani, such names as a foyer.

(32:36):
And all those names are very powerful names.
And I'm so glad that they came all the way here and still maintained their heritage and their power,
you know, fighting off the so-called slave master, you see, and standing very firm to be able to make history.
How long are you going to be here? I'm going to be here for four days, unfortunately.

(32:57):
Only four days. Only four days. So we're going to invite you back.
Yes. All right. Well, I'm I'm sure you're probably talking to Mota.
Hopefully, yes. I want to go see Mota. Yes. William, much more about your time and also about your studies,
because one of the things that you mentioned earlier is what you're doing on your PhD thesis,

(33:20):
which is looking at conflict resolution. Yes. How important is that for continental Africa?
Oh, my God. It's more than just important. What I'm researching into is the Songo Lagoon salt.
There's this spiritual salt in Ghana, which is coming from a river called the Songo Lagoon.
It's a lagoon. And history tells us that an ancestor called Nene was the one who discovered it.

(33:49):
I mean, he was chasing an animal and then shot the animal, the animal money to run with a bullet.
And he still continued to chase this animal to the middle of the forest where the animal showed itself
in the form of a beautiful woman and said, I disguise myself into that animal because you are a hunter.
And this is what it is. Can you see this lagoon? He said, yes. What can you see in it?

(34:11):
He said, I can see some white substance. What is that? Test it. He tested it. He said it tastes good.
He said this is salt. Anybody from Africa can come in.
Anybody who looks like you can come in and have this salt, you see.
So do not stop anybody from coming to be part of this salt.
But for some time now, the government has put its dirty hand inside this this lagoon

(34:34):
and try to nationalize it as in, OK, it's a government property.
They are privatizing it and selling that off to political people.
And so that the people lose access, they lose access to the team.
And every now and then they're shooting, they're killing.
Arrows are being shot. People are being beaten and all that.

(34:56):
So I decided to go into this and look at how this whole thing started and how we'll be able to resolve it.
So the Songo Lagoon salt produces the biggest amount of salt in the whole of Africa.
And according to people who love salt, it is the sweetest salt in the world.
I really want to see your research when it's through.

(35:17):
And if you could just keep in touch with us that we can talk to you along the way.
And then at the end of that, I have great interest in that consider.
I suppose you would have gone into the history of salt also.
And our salt was a gold of certain times.
So how important that would have been to us as a people generally speaking.

(35:38):
Right. Right. Right.
A lot of that seems to be happening on the continent of Africa in terms of the public private private public private partnerships.
It's the very same thing we see happening here on the island in Jamaica.
So we're losing access to spaces.
Yes, I hear the beaches in Jamaica right now almost privately owned hotels have been built on the beaches and all that.

(36:02):
The indigenous people don't have access to the beaches.
And, you know, I mean, that is all Jamaica has apart from his people.
Yeah. The beautiful beaches and all that you see.
And if it's privatized at the end of the day, Jamaica is going to lose its tourism appeal.
Help us to fight this battle in your music and wherever you go in the international and the global spaces.

(36:24):
We're totally out of time. So I want to give you a minute to do something acapella.
Ah, OK. Well, I have a song on the album called Sodom and Gomorrah.
I was going to talk about Kaffankeri, which is sung in the Hausa language.
In Africa is the second biggest language house apart from Swahili indigenous language.

(36:46):
And it's teasing some of our people who eat dogs, dog meat.
It's telling them, well, you've eaten enough of the dogs.
Let's find time and eat more vegetables and get healthier.
It's called Kaffankeri on the album.
But I'm not going to do that today because you don't have time.
What I'm going to do is call Sodom and Gomorrah.
I traveled all the way to Israel and I went all the way down to Sodom and Gomorrah.
I mean, the two cities, original cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, and it inspired me to make this song.

(37:12):
It's called Sodom and Gomorrah.
So let the fire come, O Jah, Kokono, fire, fire, fire.
Let your fire come and Sodom and Gomorrah.
Sing again.
So let your fire come, O Jah, Kokono, fire, fire, fire.

(37:36):
Let your fire come and Sodom and Gomorrah.
Hear this now.
Bring down your fire, Jah, we need your fire, O Jah, Jah.
Burn down the system, burn down the state, punish the leader.
So many churches yet sin has increased.

(37:58):
Roman father in pedophilia.
We no have no love, no waste man to man.
Too much wickedness.
So let your fire come, O Jah, Kokono.
O Jah, Kokono means the hotter red fire.
Fire.
Thank you so much, my brother.

(38:19):
It was a pleasure having you in the studio.
Thank you, Takura, for ensuring that our brother is in the studio this morning.
Thank you so much, Benjamin, Benji, Benjamin Asimow for ensuring that our brother is in the studio this morning.
Dr. Taylor, just to remind you, is a senior biomedical research scientist in immunology working in the biopharmaceutical industry in the United States.

(38:47):
He holds a BSc from the University of the West Indies in biochemistry, chemistry,
and an MA from the City University of New York City College in biochemistry and immunology.
He gained his PhD from the Graduate Center, City University of New York in biochemistry immunology,
and we don't have to go through all of that.
It's postdoctoral training for the University of Pennsylvania because now you know him.

(39:11):
But one of the reasons why I'm doing this is because Dr. Taylor has gone out in a very serious way on behalf of the people of Jamaica
to ensure that there is equality, equity, justice, and that basic human rights are guaranteed.

(39:32):
He is the founder of JABEM, and that should ring a bell.
He's back online this morning because there are issues to talk about.
Dr. Devon Taylor, good morning, sir.
Greetings, Cabo.
Greetings.
Morning to Jamaica.

(39:54):
As usual. Not sure if we have you alone online, but I'm not...
Do you have Damian with you now?
No, I'm here by myself.
Okay. All right. So Dr. Taylor, you know, so much happening around us, access to beach and access to rivers.

(40:16):
And one of the things that JABEM has done for our listeners who do not know is that you have called the nation together
to look at this problem and to deal with it not just from a legal perspective, but appealing also to consciences.

(40:37):
What is JABEM?
Yeah, so the JABEM is an equal rights and justice movement.
JABEM is an environmental justice movement, and JABEM really is basically to remove all these discriminatory laws, practices, and policies

(41:01):
that is really blocking Jamaicans from the resources of the land, blocking Jamaicans from their beaches, from their rivers,
to stop the steal, to stop the sellout, to stop the transfer of wealth, to stop the transfer of our beach lands and our beaches

(41:22):
to capitalists that abuses them environmentally and disrespect the people of Jamaica by excluding them in discriminatory ways
from the uses of the beaches and the river. So we are pushing back at that.
We are seeing a lot. The tourism industry is out in all its glory.

(41:45):
Ed Bartlett was on BBC Hard Talk just recently, and there is a big push again for winter tourist season and all of that.
This usually happens pre and during. At the same time, we're seeing within the tourism industry, there are so many protests,

(42:07):
so many unrest among the workers. I know you have eyes on that, Devon, because I saw where JABEM came out and said,
standing in solidarity with the workers. Your own thinking of what we see unfolding labor-wise in the tourism industry in Jamaica?

(42:30):
So, yeah, we've been closely watching this, because tourism is considered the crown jewel of the Jamaican economy.
Fifty percent are foreign exchange and providing about a quarter of the jobs.
But this industry, people in it are feeling that they're unfairly treated and they don't feel valued as partners within this industry.

(42:56):
So if over the last couple of days, if you watch carefully, and I'm looking beyond what they're calling for openly around pay,
around allowances, around their pay cycle, which really says people are struggling to make ends meet because of this high cost of living,

(43:17):
and the working conditions are really bad, the long hours, the meal rationing, unable to use the amenities, no leisure, and they're overworked.
But at the base of this are the systems of oppression, Kabo, that is associated with a plantation tourism model.

(43:38):
Right? This is what the people are crying out about. And if you listen to what they say, one of the protesters says slavery abolished in Jamaica from 1834,
and these people treating us like we are slaves. They're working us into the ground and refusing to pay us.

(43:59):
Another worker says, he likes slaves. They want fewer expats in the jobs that Jamaicans are qualified for.
Another worker says, when the hotel is sold, there's no general meeting. People just come in, all right, and take over. It's pure bully business.
No communication. So when you really listen to the people, they're just responding to the systems of oppression that is associated with the tourism model.

(44:31):
So we had to come out and highlight this because you and I have spoken about this two years ago, about this oppression that the people are facing within this business.
And then the government come out and what the government is saying, that our tourism workers are vital to the industry and it remains a critical pillar of the economy.

(44:52):
But what? They should stay calm and work us out with the hotels. And this is coming from both political parties, you know, that they're talking about workers' rights,
but they're saying stay calm and work us out with government. It's a state of dealing with the problem.
And this is all connected, isn't it? Because as you talk about the systems of oppression that continue to keep our people in servile servitude,

(45:20):
the system also is ensuring that access to land and access to beaches is only available to the top 5%, 1%, if you will,
and that the majority of the people continue to be excluded from these spaces of recreation and these spiritual spaces, if you will, because this is what we are.

(45:46):
We are spiritual people on this island. I know that there is what Jabem has done is, so we've been coming up against this system for so long, but nothing is changing.
Jabem has taken this stance that the only way that we see ahead of us now, clearly or darkly or with some fog, is really to attack this,

(46:12):
to take the government literally to court through looking at some of these ancient colonial laws that are still attacking some of these laws, my bad.
So there are some cases that are in court now, and I know that there is a big one coming up again, another hearing again, that has to do with the Blue Lagoon.

(46:37):
So let us go there, because the Blue Lagoon, if you give us a quick background, is also one of those spaces that is under threat from the government of Jamaica.
Yes. So I mean, as you know, I should just remind Jamaica that the Beach Control Act of 1956 clearly states that Jamaicans have no right to swim,

(47:03):
no right to bathe, no right to walk along the shore, and no right to fish. All right?
Jamaicans do not have rights in their land rights to trot over land and access their beaches and rivers. This was not something that was given to the Jamaican people.
All right? And that we must know that we need to repeal that act and remove it, because it is the foundation of this plantation tourism model

(47:31):
that allows tourism, tourist interest, allows corporations, allows property owners to own all of these spaces and block the public out.
So what we saw in Blue Lagoon, I mean, two years ago, is that they shut down the path, the track, the roadway, that parochial road that the public has been using for more than 100 years,

(47:56):
from time immemorial to access the Blue Lagoon. And why did they do that?
It's because they wanted to lock the people out of the Blue Lagoon and control the Blue Lagoon, to break our prescriptive right access.
And they would control that space. We have seen them doing it in Mamie Bay. We have seen them doing it in Old Fort Bay.

(48:18):
We have seen them try it in Bob Marley Beach. We see them doing it in Discovery Bay. It is across the island that private interest will shut down a track, a roadway, a path,
that we the Jamaican people have been using since time immemorial to access our beaches and our rivers.
And they do it in a neocolonialist form to really control the resources of their land and build out their wealth.

(48:43):
So we had to file in the court, you know what I mean, using this prescriptive right act of 1882,
to say that we have been using this for more than 20 years, as described in that act. And so we deserve to use it in perpetuity.
And we have to drag several entities into the court. So it's not just the government.

(49:07):
We have the Jamaica National Heritage Trust, who are designated Blue Lagoon a monument, and they did so without even crying back an acre of land.
Now, there are more than 238 acres of land that surround this Blue Lagoon Cabo.
And the government of Jamaica do not own not even one acre of land.

(49:34):
How the hell did all the lands around the Blue Lagoon get transferred to private interest, and the people of Jamaica own none of it?
All we own in the lagoon is the water, and we can't even have guaranteed rights to it.
The municipal corporation of Portland shuts down that road in complicity with the Jamaica National Heritage Trust,

(50:00):
erect barriers there, and have private security guards. And up to today's date, we don't know who's paying these security guards,
that is blocking the public and routing us over private land that is owned by private interest.
Who is a member of parliament for that area?

(50:23):
This member of parliament is Anne Marie Vaz.
All right, and so I think we really need to stop pussy-footing around this.
I think we need to now call Anne Marie Vaz. And pretty Anne, we're asking you to come into the space.
Come and talk to us about what is the situation with the Blue Lagoon, because this has been going on for years.

(50:46):
I think this is about time that we hear from the member of parliament.
We have spoken to every single person around the Blue Lagoon, apart from the member of parliament.
So pretty speaking, Anne, Anne Marie Vaz, we're inviting you to this space.
There are two women that I really like in politics in Jamaica.
Now, one is Anne Marie Vaz, and the other one is the Minister of Foreign Affairs.

(51:09):
And I really like them. I tell people all the time that really I like these two women, their personality and so on and so forth.
And so that considering that this is what I've said so many times, I feel free enough to invite pretty Anne to this space to have a conversation about Blue Lagoon.
This is getting now very, very serious. All right. So it is in court.

(51:33):
Anne Marie Vaz, you're standing behind you, watching the people take whoever, because it must be the government, to court.
Isn't it the government, Devon?
Yes, but there are also private interests.
Other respondents?
Yes, that we have in court.
So you're standing behind, you're watching this. You are watching this. Please, let us hear from you.

(51:59):
So I'm going to make it a part of my duty to reach out to Anne Marie Vaz, which I've never done, and then to have her give us her thinking on this,
because we have heard from the Minister of Culture, responsible for Jamaica National Heritage Trust.
We heard from the junior staff at the Jamaica National Heritage Trust.

(52:20):
We've heard from technical people at the Jamaica National Heritage Trust, but the member of parliament has not said anything.
Anne Marie Vaz, you need to say something.
All right. So moving ahead, the case is in court and there is a date that's coming up, Devon, and there's also an event that is connected to this.

(52:44):
Let's talk about it.
Yes. So we have court from November 25th to the 29th.
The trial begins. We have like a four or five day trials in the Portland Resident Magistrate Court.
And just to really kind of pull the community together, we have a rally coming up in the Blue Lagoon for Sunday, November 24th,

(53:12):
where we're asking all the community in Portland and across Jamaica to come have a swim, come share your memories in the Blue Lagoon,
because if we lose this, it could be the last year in the Blue Lagoon.
All right. So come take a dip, come swim, embrace the Jabim family, all the communities in and around Sierra Hill, Draper, Zion Hill, Winifred community, all the way up to Longbeer.

(53:39):
You know, I'm from Portland. We are asking you to come up to the Blue Lagoon on November 24th so we can all gather in the lagoon, you know, in solidarity to really speak to the powers that be,
that these spaces, which are the treasures of the land, should not be, you know, I mean, under these kind of colonial, near colonial control.

(54:04):
And this is serious business, but we are losing the access to these spaces.
November 24th.
Or the capital of the tourism product.
November 24th is what day?
That is Sunday.
Sunday, November 24th, which is Sunday coming, that the Jabim and us that we're saying to the people,

(54:30):
meet us at Blue Lagoon, let us go for a dip in the water.
This is what we want the people to come out, what people to come out and really speak with one voice that we can no longer allow a plantation towards the model because come on, this is all about

(54:55):
chyphoning off the best parts of Jamaica, taking away our ecological heritage, our beaches and our rivers from the people of Jamaica and transfer them to private interest.
This is a kind of tourism product that does not benefit the nation, that breathe and perpetuate oppression, as we spoke earlier about these conditions are really oppressing the people to untenable working conditions,

(55:30):
the lack of leisure, the landness, the unchecked capitalism and profiteering, extractive industries, these are with greed, corruption and bad governance, and at the foundation they are racist and classes that really push this era of environmental abuse that seeks to do what?

(55:53):
Drive wealth inequality in Jamaica.
This is the root of the problem that is happening in this plantation tourism model.
This is a point we are making to Andrew Holness and to Mark Golding, specifically now because Andrew Holness is the Prime Minister, to say that we hear you talk about prosperity, we understand that, we are seeing it too, and just like the workers in the tourism industry, they are seeing prosperity, they are very close to prosperity actually, they just can't access it or participate in it, but it is around them.

(56:34):
And when people begin to see prosperity around them, just for the few, and the majority of the people, for the majority of the people it is a mirage, then you get protest action, you get labour unrest, and you get more as 1865.
So the point we are making is there has to be some kind of response and intervention at the level of government to allow for access to spaces, land, river, water, sea, ocean, you name it, for the majority of the people of Jamaica.

(57:11):
Let me just reiterate, Devon, can you reiterate for us the call that is being made for the 24th of November, and also to quickly, because we have just five minutes left, to quickly talk to us about what's the latest with the Miami Bay situation.
Yes, so again, Sunday, November 24th, come to the Blue Lagoon, come to the Blue Lagoon and you will join Jabem and all the communities in and around for an advocacy rally to speak in one voice that we want to protect our parochial road to the Blue Lagoon so Jamaica can enjoy that.

(57:49):
And I want to also, I like that, the other defendants in the case are Blue Lagoon Jamaica Limited, Blue Hole Investment Limited, Blue Hole Olin Limited, and Cold Arbor Limited.
These are the private interests in addition to the Portland Municipal Corporation and the Jamaica National Heritage Trust.
That we, the Jamaican people, are going up against in the court, starting November 25th to defend our rights to the Blue Lagoon. All right, and the only way this is going to systemically stop is if the Jamaican government, and I'm speaking clearly here to the ruling government and to the opposition that you need to dismantle

(58:32):
the land and plantation tourism in Jamaica and afford Jamaican rights that are unfettered and general to the entire beach ecosystem.
If the Jamaican government come tell me, say, they will give me a beach over there or a beach over there. So that is separate but equal and it's a segregated concept to be entertaining in your head and we're not going to take that. We don't want a beach for white people and a beach for black people. We fight the war there.

(59:03):
We fight the war. In essence, there's a name for it and it's called apartheid. This is, this is simple. All right, and quickly in a minute, what's going to be here quickly? We're having also a rally in Miami on the 24th, the Saturday, because Jamaica, I want to let you know that the
government is taking an issue, not only from beach, but from river that the river, the river that we know, okay, rolling river that sits next to Amdons River.

(59:35):
We have over 741 acres of that sensitive watershed, and they're planning to build out a massive segregated housing development of more than 800 houses that is going to destroy that river. They're going to destroy the little river and roaring river.

(59:56):
And we need to stand up as Jamaicans and say enough is enough. Water is life. That watershed is very sensitive, and it holds so much biodiversity. It's one of the last remaining coastal forests, because as you see them ripping out everything along the North Coast, and this is from an ecological perspective.

(01:00:17):
It's from a cultural perspective, and it's from an archaeological perspective that we need to protect that. So on Saturday, the communities in and around the area is going to voice their opposition to this, this ill-advised development.
And we're saying that because we know that the Water Resources Authority have concerns about it. We know the Natural Resources Conservation Authority have problems with it, but this project was approved, okay, by NEPA, with permission of the National Work Agencies and UDC for this to continue.

(01:00:54):
And there's significant problems if we destroy this watershed. So we're asking the public in and around, send an, send an wake up, listen to me. This thing is not a partisan thing. We have an existential threat to our environment, and we have to stand up and face it, because we must protect our water resources.

(01:01:18):
We must protect the capital of the country, beach lands, rivers, okay, and the beaches. These are capital, and whoever control the capital control the country.
And we don't control the capital right now because all the lands here are being sold off, the prime spaces that are important for the survival of the nation in an era of climate change, in an era of unchecked wealth disparity and wealth and inequity, in inequality that we must push back against, because all of these systems of oppression, as I talked about, are upon us.

(01:02:01):
And they are being bred by this kind of tourism product, by the way our country is managed. We must come together right now. This is the time that we must.
Four lines to speak with geopolitical analyst and Pan-African scholar Kwame Piyanke in a minute.
All right, on the four lines, Pan-African scholar, geopolitical analyst Kwame Piyanke is joining us on the developing story and on the backside of the US elections, looking now at, and we're doing this again, looking at this through geopolitical lenses.

(01:02:47):
And the reason for that is that we are pretty concerned, as always, with the foreign policy, Europe and America, foreign policy towards Africa and the African diaspora.
So whenever there's a change, a significant change in government in any of these countries, we do this in these spaces or when there is a big event, like for example, the COVID event and so on, we do this in these spaces or China.

(01:03:15):
Remember that whole China incursion into Africa and into the Caribbean.
We looked deeply and critically at the settler colonialism aspect of it, but one of the things that Kwame underscored through all of that process and we did scores of interviews was the need to leverage China-Jamaica relationships, China-Africa relationships.

(01:03:46):
That wasn't really done and we're feeling the repercussions, whether unintended or otherwise, the consequences are what we're faced with now.
Kwame has been talking us through the US elections.
He's been right on everything so far and we return now to talk about the cabinet that we see emerging under Donald Trump. Kwame Piyanke, greetings my brother.

(01:04:16):
Thank you so much, as always.
Good morning, Capitol. We sound a little bit different.
Do you know that I think you are very, yeah, because the whole thing is out of work.
I'm going to have to do something. So hang on there. You're literally unhanceful, far from me. Hang on there.
I'm going to try and fix this.
Africa, Africa, run in Africa.
Jamaica.

(01:04:38):
So what you can say, also, Kadiya.
All right, we're trying to get this up. Hang on there, Kwame.
Yeah.
All right. Is that better?
Much better. Much, much better.
Good. Yeah, because you are remote, remotely controlled.
And now you're in the space.

(01:05:01):
I suppose you're looking at this critically as usual, Kwame, the Donald Trump's, his administration, the cabinet and so on.
Over the top of your head, what are you seeing, firstly?
He's appointed a bunch of China war hawks to the cabinet with neocon sensibilities. They're all very pro-Israel.

(01:05:29):
There are some differences, I wouldn't say total differences.
I think that most of the foreign policy people he had appointed agree that the United States has to get out of Ukraine.
But that isn't a surprise either, because the Council on Foreign Relations just wrote an article saying that they need to cut a peace deal with Ukraine.
If you understand the political system works in the United States, the people who write the papers for the Council on Foreign Relations are typically appointed to the presidential administration, be it Democrat or Republican.

(01:06:04):
And it's not only foreign policy that the CFR delves into, it's domestic policy.
But that being said, they seem to have agreement on that.
You have this defense secretary, Pete Hexseth, who is very, very pro-Israel to the point of religious fanaticism.
But he wants to reduce the intervention in Ukraine. We'll see whether he's confirmed there are some sexual assault allegations against him.

(01:06:32):
They nominated Tulsi Gabbard, who was against the Syria intervention and the Ukraine intervention.
But again, she's very pro-Israel. It's funny that they're calling her pro-Russian for being against the Syrian intervention and the Ukraine intervention.
She's also against the Libyan intervention.
But coincidentally, Obama's head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Martin Dempsey, was against the Syria and Libyan interventions.

(01:07:02):
So I find it funny that the Democrats are giving that name calling to her.
And then he appointed someone named Elise –
Stephanie.
What's her name? Stephanie, yeah. Elise Stephanie for the UN ambassador.
And again, she was one of the main ones who pressured the Ivy Leagues to crack down on the pro-Palestinian protesters.

(01:07:27):
And I think some of the pressure she had got Claudine Gay fired for plagiarism.
And again, she's very much a pro-Israel hulk. She kind of hawks.
She worked for one of the neocon think tanks that was run by Bill Kristol, who's – the neocons that were under George Bush were –
Bill Kristol, he had worked directly for Bush but influenced him.

(01:07:51):
You had Richard Pearl. I forget the other one. I think Kagan was one of them.
Paul Wolfowitz, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, like I said, Bill Kristol, Robert Kagan, and Norman Pothertz.
Yes. Yes, exactly. He has a great memory.
But a lot of these neocons started off in the Clinton administration.

(01:08:13):
Victoria Nunes started off in there. I think Kagan started off in there.
So this shows you the continuity of the foreign policy directly, no matter what the administration.
Then you have the secretary of state, Rubio.
Yes, Rubio is interesting too, again. Very much pro-Israel, very much into intervention in what is – Latin America.

(01:08:42):
He wanted to use military intervention to overthrow the Venezuelan government.
Rubio is from a Cuban family. He claims to have been escaping Castro.
However, the family emigrated to Florida three years before Castro took power.
He was promoting some sort of intervention in Mexico to stop the drug trafficking there,

(01:09:06):
although ironically Rubio's brother-in-law is a convicted cocaine trafficker.
He got his brother-in-law a real estate license despite the law prohibiting that in Florida.
So that's kind of an interesting contradiction as well as Marco Rubio.
Going back to Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence,

(01:09:27):
she's supposed to brief the president every day on goings-on throughout the world.
She's supposed to tell the president about covert, the status of covert actions going around the world.
And then she writes the threat assessment every year.
Her office writes a threat assessment every year in regards to the United States.

(01:09:48):
I want to pick apart some of the things you said, just take them one by one,
and in no particular order, because I want to go back to having our listeners understand when we say near conservative
what it is that we're talking about and the continuation of that.
But first of all, to say, Marco Rubio for me is – I saw the playbook, the same Neocon playbook,

(01:10:13):
no change, nothing at all, but because of Rubio's historical stance on Venezuela and Cuba,
and we saw the coups that Trump led when he was in his first outing as president.
Is there cause for concern that the Latin America, which would impact the Caribbean, the strategy,

(01:10:41):
there is a little – I wouldn't say different, but it seems to me as if the president and those around him,
the Neocons and so on, were more concerned with Latin America, but that Trump is not necessarily so.
And people like Marco Rubio could be given a free hand to just do all the dirty things that he's been talking about.

(01:11:07):
It's not just Rubio. There's the appointment of Mike Waltz, who called for a new Monroe Doctrine in America,
a new Monroe Doctrine in the Western Hemisphere to counteract the influence of China.
So this is not new. However, I have to say the world has greatly changed since Trump has last been in office.

(01:11:30):
The Ukraine eventual debacle was started as a de-dollarization, was accelerated as a de-dollarization.
A lot of countries have gotten into agreements with South American countries, including Russia, China,
and I think Iran, I believe, has some negotiations and has had some investments with South America

(01:11:56):
and Central American countries, but I have to check that. So essentially it has changed.
It's going to be harder to run coups. I think the most vulnerable country in terms of Latin America is Bolivia,
because you had a coup that removed Abel Morales, and then eventually his ally was placed in there,
and now he and his ally are literally at war with each other, literally, because Abel Morales was shot at a couple of weeks ago.

(01:12:23):
So it's going to be interesting to see how that plays out.
Isn't Venezuela, because Trump tried to install one, what's his name, Guaido?
One Guaido. I think it was initially Obama. Was it initially Obama to try to do one Guaido and Trump carried it out too?
It's quite possible. I'm seeing it as another Trump thing. And that we still, even to this day, like Maduro or not,

(01:12:46):
especially with the Guyana question, that we still, up to this day, see that there's this segment,
and I think it's a neoconservative as usual, who are pushing for the right-wing leadership of countries like Venezuela.
We heard Trump saying from the platform a while back that the reason he kept troops in Syria wasn't because he wanted war in Syria,

(01:13:18):
but it was to take the oil. He said that out loud. He said the quiet part out loud.
I don't want to say refreshing, I don't want to say in a positive way, but the good thing about Trump is he says the quiet part out loud.
So Trump is a lesson in civics. Whereas Dick Cheney, who had a company that stood to benefit from the natural gas pipeline

(01:13:45):
that they wanted to run from Syria, they'll say terrorism, or Hillary Clinton will talk about developing countries and things of that nature.
Trump says the real word, which is the S-hole countries, which is what they really think.
But I think that's the difference between Trump and, say, the Democratic establishment and the Republican establishment,
he did say the quiet part out loud.

(01:14:07):
Explain to us what you mean when you say neocons, and why we're saying there is no change.
There's a continuation from Reagan to George Bush to Bill Clinton to Barack Obama to Joe Biden to Donald Trump.
From Donald Trump's picks, we can extrapolate that as far as foreign policy is concerned, nothing has changed.

(01:14:36):
Yeah, because the neocons start off as communists. They were left-wing. They were looking for a home in the Democratic Party.
In the Democratic Party, they had a strong pro-Israel contingent even in the 70s, I think even before that.
But then they were able to latch onto the Republican Party, particularly through Dick Cheney, and I said also the Clinton administration as well.

(01:14:59):
So they became more right-wing, and they transformed themselves into a more right-wing regime.
So they're Israel-firsters, foremost.
But you have to remember, to me, Israel is the relationship between the U.K., the U.S., and Israel.
The U.S. and the U.K. are the good cops. Israel is the bad cop.

(01:15:20):
The U.K. created Israel to basically have a European allied country supervising the Arab countries with the discovery of oil.
And I think, frankly, the Northeast Africa as well, right? And the U.S. has carried on the U.K.'s strategy.

(01:15:42):
For years, the U.S. and U.K. strategy are one and the same.
So again, the neocons are just – they're the ugly face to U.S. and U.K. foreign policy.
And we can look at some of those initiatives that they have – what we call them initiatives for want of a better word.
But we saw Hillary Clinton under Barack Obama creating al-Qaeda in the Sahel.

(01:16:09):
And so I want to talk to you a little bit about that and about how counterterrorism, so-called counterterrorism, is a big part of the arsenal of the neocons.
Yeah. And here's the thing about Syria. I'll go a little bit back to Tulsi Gabbard.
They claim that they are supporting a dictator in Assad.

(01:16:32):
But we have a lot of Syrians in my neighborhood, and they're Christian Syrians.
And they served in Assad's army, and Assad was very tolerant of other religions there.
So there was no attack on people who were Christian. Assad is an Alawite.
The attack was on the al-Qaeda fundamentalist Muslims that were causing havoc in Syria.

(01:16:57):
And then Hillary Clinton used those al-Qaeda types to then attack Libya.
And then they spread to the Sahel states – Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, and frankly Nigeria, too, under the guise of Boko Haram.
So basically the whole al-Qaeda thing – and remember, al-Qaeda was basically the creation of the Big New Brzezinski,

(01:17:21):
because Osama bin Laden was an ally of the Big New Brzezinski when they were trying to overthrow the Soviet Union out of Afghanistan.
So this has been just a long relationship between the U.S. foreign policy establishment and al-Qaeda.
But I will say that the Libya intervention to me was the turning point in Africa's relationship with the United States.

(01:17:48):
Fifty years from now somebody is going to look back at the intervention and say,
this is how the U.S. lost influence over the African continent.
I've heard Professor Harris Campbell say the very same thing in his book, Nature's Catastrophic War in Libya is worth reading.
It was part of this reading, the Running Afghan –

(01:18:09):
Yes, that's what I'm going to do to do this, for sure.
So that when we're talking about Trump's foreign policy regarding Africa, the Caribbean, Latin America,
are you seeing much difference, if any, between his foreign policies and what we've had before – the Democrats, for example?

(01:18:31):
Because to me it's a continuation of it all.
Yeah, the big difference is he's not going to be pushing LGBT rights.
And number two, I read an article earlier this week where Trump didn't even have an African advisor in his foreign policy long time.
So let me go quickly now to the differences that you see.

(01:18:57):
And you're saying the main difference is it is connected actually to the domestic agenda in a serious way, which is the anti-LGBTQ or trans and so on and so forth,
which is something that is a massive domestic agenda for the Democrats but not for the Republicans.
And so you're saying that you see –
And based on my study, the reason this data is for the Democrats is because of population control, right?

(01:19:27):
And so this is not speculation.
You have National Security Study Memo 200, which said the greatest threat to the United States – and that was written in the 1970s under the guise of –
Henry Kissinger, supervisor of Brett Stokoe, wrote it – that the biggest threat to U.S. national security is growing populations in the African world and the Arab world, right?

(01:19:51):
And then there was a Planned Parenthood document in the 1960s called the JAPI memo where they said they wanted to promote homosexuality to reduce population within the United States.
So this is nothing new, right?
So – but again, this is now cost – because Trump – the Trump regime is more transactional than, say, the Democrats,

(01:20:14):
they recognize that this stance has really angered a lot of African countries,
so much so that the African countries are very quick to congratulate Trump on victory, which I found very interesting, too.
And they said they're optimistic that their internal affairs wouldn't be meddled in anymore.
And because these are ESOL countries for Trump, and that includes Latin America, and this is why I had asked the question before,

(01:20:39):
do you think that there is a – which might be good for Africa, and it should be good for Africa, where Africa is not in Trump's sights in the way it was in, say, Obama?
And I think you said that last week, Gina, in the way Obama and even Biden – we saw Kamala Harris, for example,

(01:21:01):
giving – just before she was named as the Democratic nominee, that she did an entire tour of so many different countries in Africa.
And the tour was really to spread – or to get the African leaders to sign on to the agenda, the LGBTQ agenda, but also the wider trans agenda, population control agenda,

(01:21:27):
which the two things might or might not be related, but this is basically what it was. Her entire speech, if you look –
Yes, they are related. They are related.
So if you look at her speeches, this is basically what she was saying.
I would suggest everybody look up the JAPI memo. If you don't believe that memo is real, there's actually a document on the web that you can download that –
from the actual paper that was written in 1966. Right? And if you realize that the link between, say, Margaret Sanger and the foreign policy establishment –

(01:21:55):
Margaret Sanger was the founder of Planned Parenthood, it was called the American Birth Control League – there definitely is a link between that and population control.
So we take some note there, and then to go back to Latin America, the Marco Rubio pick is – for me, I am hoping he doesn't get confirmed.
What are the possibilities? Because we know that when he comes – you talk about China Hawk, he's a Latin American hawk. He's a Latin America hawk.

(01:22:18):
He wants to –
I think Rubio will get confirmed.
It is such a pity. We should get confirmed and then just get kicked out.
What?
Confirmed and kicked out.
We'll see. We'll see how much – and we'll see – you know, Trump – that's something on the Joe Rogan show, because as much as Trump has come to hate John Bolton,

(01:22:39):
he says, you know, John Bolton was an effective negotiating tool for him. Now, granted, Trump may be trying to make himself appear smarter than he actually is,
but he said, you know, he could bring John Bolton in the room and everybody would say, oh, this guy's crazy. And then there will be more ones to negotiate with Trump who would seem reasonable in that room.
And then John Bolton wrote a book saying – John Bolton wrote a book saying that he was in the room.

(01:23:03):
And that book is not flattering to Trump, but it also tells a lot about the neocon agenda, the foreign affairs policies that they have signed on to, which is pro-Israel, anti-Russia, anti-China.
Let's talk about Russia. Let's talk about Russia and China in terms of the picks that we're seeing. Pretty interesting, aren't they?

(01:23:30):
Yes, they are. And again, I – you know, Trump wants to cut a deal with Russia, but they are – they do not have leverage against Russia and Ukraine.
Russia's gained so much territory in Ukraine, and they can threaten to go all the way to the Dnepr River now. Ukraine Army is drafted 50-year-old men.
So it's a bunch of Mike Tyson being drafted to the Ukraine Army, basically.

(01:23:53):
Apologize.
You know, I'm sorry. Mike Tyson's close to my age.
Apology accepted.
More of a really fascinating – so – but – you know, so they really do not have the upper hand when it comes to Russia.
China is a little bit different. I'm going to say so much the upper hand. I think some of the – some of the bluster is to force China to spend more money domestically to buttress their economy,

(01:24:21):
which they can then have to spend less on their military, or it might force China to go further into debt, right?
Because China is pretty solvent in terms of their debt to external people. I think most of China's debt is owed internally.
So – but China is fastly developing weapons. I mean, they developed the F-35 copy that's a stealth fighter, and they announced it at one of their recent military shows.

(01:24:54):
So I guess they – because China's more vulnerable because the U.S. is still a big customer of theirs, but they're planning for the U.S. no longer to be a big customer.
That transition is going to be kind of rough for China.
Yes, I'm not – yes, I'm not quite sure what happened there, but I'm hearing you. Go ahead.
Yeah, yeah. So – and I think – and so you have this excess manufacturing capacity that they will have, so they're going to have to dump their goods or sell their goods to Africa and the Caribbean and Latin America.

(01:25:29):
And I think during this time period, leadership in those areas or political – political representation in those areas have to be aware of it and then say, listen, we're not just going to step to your goods willy-nilly.
You know, we want something out of it. We want a plant that we own 50 percent of, that we have management control of, we want technology transfer, so on and so forth, if you're going to sell our goods.

(01:25:51):
And China's going to be a little more desperate as a result.
So you see the Cold War being heightened and the trade war, which is currently underway – it's been underway for a very long time now – but that also will be ramped up according to the picks you're seeing?
Yes, it will. But the other thing too, again, as I said, that you have a lack of skilled trades in the United States.

(01:26:13):
That's why the attempt to reshore the chips were a disaster. And I'll tell my friends, I thought it was going to be a disaster.
And in Taiwan, they're laying off a whole bunch of people as a result because they do not have the technical skills here anymore because they're not being taught in schools.
So I always say it's going to take at least 20 years to get the skills up to adequate levels so the United States can adequately reshore manufacturing.

(01:26:41):
The United States has 20 years. That's the question.
Yeah. Trump is – and he speaks – they're really speaking out the quiet part out loud.
It's not that they're doing anything different from what has been done because there is currently a trade war on.
So him talking about tariffs and so on, that is more like a smokescreen, isn't it? Because there is definitely a trade war on with China.

(01:27:04):
What about Taiwan? How do you see him?
I know they want to use Taiwan to threaten China. They want to give military aid to Taiwan.
I hope I'm not revealing too much when I said this. When I was working, one of my customers when I was working with was Taiwanese.

(01:27:27):
We were trying to – I think we – no, we did – we implemented new technology into the company I was working with.
But I was asking him about that. This was 20-something years ago. And I said, man, if I didn't know better, it seems to me that a lot of technology transfers from Taiwan into China.
And he said, yes, but that's very true. And I said, did the U.S. senators know this? And he said, yes, they do.

(01:27:50):
So the more military aid they're going to give to Taiwan, that technology is going to be transferred right in China.
I'm trying to remember the name of the big Taiwanese chip company. I think it starts with a P. But they have plants in China.
So as you said, China hawks, we – all the picks we're seeing – and obviously we're not spending a lot of time in Israel, because – talk to us quickly then.

(01:28:16):
Take a minute to say what the policy will be in terms of the continuity or not regarding Israel from the picks that you're seeing and from what we're hearing so far.
I think it's still going to be the same policy. Because Anthony Blinken had the same sort of hawkish views and stuff.
He says it in more diplomatic terms, slightly more diplomatic terms. But again, the kicker is that countries like Lebanon and Iran have really ramped up their military technology.

(01:28:48):
So that's why Israel is having such a hard time defeating Hezbollah and Hamas at the same time.
And then the attempted attack, missile attack on Iran a few weeks ago failed miserably.
So I do not think the hawks and the Trump administration will be a successful attack on Iran, especially since Russia has announced – I wouldn't say some official lines,

(01:29:11):
but they've gotten very close in terms of technology transfer in terms of the Iranians, so that I don't see that being successful.
They may be a bunch of bluster associated with it, but they may try to cut a deal with Iran.
I'm curious whether Iran has lithium there and iridium there. And that's why Musk is trying to cut a transactional deal with Iran.

(01:29:32):
It's left them down on stilety toward Israel. Iran has some trouble too because their currency has been under attack.
The Iran question is interesting. And I think both for myself and you, we're pretty sure of how this would unfold in terms of Iran and America's foreign policy.
But that meeting, Elon Musk and the Iranian ambassador is a fly in the ointment.

(01:29:59):
And also, should Marco Rubio be concerned? Because Musk is appearing or emerging as a shadow Secretary of State.
Yes, I think so too. I think, again, Rubio – and I could be wrong. This is where everything is such bluffs.

(01:30:20):
So I really could be wrong. But I think Trump is trying to play both sides against the middle.
So Rubio may not have any real power in there, unless Trump and his other national security advisors advise it.
I think somebody like John Ratcliffe, the head of the CIA, will be more powerful than Marco Rubio.

(01:30:42):
It's possible that Tulsi Gabbard will be more powerful than Marco Rubio.
So that remains to be seen. And obviously, Musk is a shadow ambassador.
We're talking about Jared Kushner again being a shadow ambassador because they feel his ties to the Saudi Arabia government are closer than the Democratic Party's ties.

(01:31:03):
So it would be interesting if he's undermined. Remember, Colin Powell was Secretary of State. He was constantly undermined by Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld.
Yes, yes. And this is what – and it's interesting because I think you have hit the nail on the head.
This is exactly how this thing is going to play out, if it continues in the same way. It's going to play out in the very same way.

(01:31:24):
Yeah, you're very assured about it. I think when you're assured about it, you're just going to come out and start being very careful when it's hit.
Yes, you're very assured about it.
Because we have Trump talking on the one hand about more sanctions against Iran and the way – if you listen to Hagstead or Hegstead – so what's his name again?

(01:31:45):
Hegstead, yeah.
Hegstead and Marco Rubio. Over time, you know that the plan, as you said earlier, is to target Iran's allies in Latin America and so on.
Now, we're talking about the BRICS allies, if you will. So you think that there would be a more dynamic U.S. policy against Iran, but at the same time, you have this meeting in New York.

(01:32:10):
And it says –
Yes, and I would say that luckily somebody at Pentagon leaked the Israeli plans because had Israel been allowed to attack Iran, it would have been World War III.
I don't think people realize how close we were to World War III a month and a half ago.
I don't think people in Jamaica realize that between the U.K. demanding long-range missiles being shot into Russia and the Pentagon rejected that at the last minute while Keir Stormer was on the plane to the U.K.

(01:32:34):
And then the leak of the Pentagon leaked of the Israeli plan. So what happens is China is extremely dependent on Iranian oil, and it would collapse the Chinese economy.
China would not allow that to happen.
Well, we told them in this space how close we were to World War III, not that we could do anything about it, but we – yeah, we can do something.

(01:32:57):
We can talk about how – where do we go from here with war hanging over our heads in the way that it is.
And I think there's another discussion that we'll have, another one with you, Kwame, because we've spoken about this before, about what our responsibility is.
Understanding the geopolitics of it all, then what now becomes our responsibility, the continental Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean.

(01:33:23):
Let me take a quick vision peek through geopolitical and Pan-African lenses to see how these will impact U.S.'s foreign policy in the region, continental Africa, the African diaspora, Latin America.
Cuba we can't say enough about because I think Marco Rubio thinks that he owns Cuba, and I'm not quite sure what he plans to achieve there.

(01:33:52):
So that is a kind of a wild card, isn't it?
Yes, it is. But a lot of American administrations thought they owned Cuba.
In fact, one of the reasons that was given as to why Kennedy was killed, if you were to read a lot of the books that don't believe the Warren Commission, is that Prescott Bush was very angry about the Bush families losing their land in Cuba.

(01:34:16):
So, Marco Rubio is not the only one who thinks they own Cuba.
He's probably going to get a wake-up call on that one, and it will be interesting to see how CARICOM and those of us in the region deal with that in the Americas.
One of the things that you have pointed out, Kwame, is John Henrik Clark's views on Africa and whether or not Africa should be celebrating Arab countries.

(01:34:46):
I know I'm going a little bit off there.
Oh, yes, because we're talking about Lebanon. Let's talk about that for a second.
Trump's son-in-law is a man named Boulos. I think his name is Mike Boulos.
And Mike Boulos' father, I think, is Nassad Boulos, who owns a major motorcycle company in Nigeria.
It came out this week that Senegal is going to ban Lebanese births in their country because in Lebanon they are banning. They're making it very hard for African women to have births there.

(01:35:19):
And so, essentially what we're talking about with John Henrik Clark – and I was trying to find a quote in this book, Notes for an African World Revolution.
It's a great book, but it's poorly indexed. Great, great book.
But he basically said that African countries should not – and I'm going to preface this. I'm against genocide of all kinds.

(01:35:40):
They should not be only supportive of Arab countries when it comes to the Israel cause unless we're going to get something in return from it.
And so we have to be less sentimental. Settlement is a ruination of us, according to John Henrik Clark. And Marcus Garvey said the same thing.
So we have to be a little bit more cold. It has to be African interests first. You have Israeli births, you have American births, you have British births.

(01:36:06):
We have to be Africa first and foremost. Whatever doesn't support our interests, we don't support that.
In terms of the people like Gates, who I know there's a lot of conversation about him now, and the ethics committee, the request for the information regarding investigation into sexual allegations against him, pedophilia, and so on.

(01:36:31):
People like Matt Gates, who just trade neocons. People like Rubio.
Yeah, this is nuanced to Gates. Gates wanted to obviously bomb Niger after Niger cut off power to U.S. bases.
But he's shown domestically, he's attorney general, not me. He showed domestically some very pro-consumer things. He wants to break up Silicon Valley monopolies.

(01:37:02):
He wants to get rid of non-compete clauses in employment contracts. Basically, you can't – some companies say if you're working for, I don't know, Microsoft, you might have a non-compete clause where you can't go to Apple to work right, and you want to get rid of those.
So he's kind of a contradiction. He's very right-wing in some areas. He's left of the Democratic Party in other areas. The thing about Gates, he's just hated by the Republicans as he is by the Democrats.

(01:37:32):
It's funny that his investigation was dropped into design from Congress, the attorney general. So it's up in the air whether or not he'll be nominated.
So some already confirmed because they don't need to be – it doesn't need to go through the process of being nominated and confirmed.
Well, the chief of staff doesn't need to go through a confirmation. So her name is Susan Wild. She was a lobbyist for Big Pharma, including Gabby, a Bill Gates organization.

(01:38:04):
What about RFK?
Yes, then RFK, I think he's going to get confirmed as much as you're going to try to call him crazy and whatnot because there's some – I don't understand all the procedures and confirmation thing as well, but they say Trump can do recess appointments.
And then I don't quite understand what you need to do to break a filibuster as well, but I can see RFK getting confirmed for some strange reason.

(01:38:31):
Well, first, where did you say strange? He's the best thing that they've got on the entire team, if you ask me.
Yes, I agree. And let me preface this out in transparency. For a while, I donated to Children's Health Defense Fund, especially during COVID.
You know, RFK's view on the Palestine thing was aberrant to me, so I stopped donating to them. But they have an excellent newspaper called The Defender.

(01:38:56):
As much as the U.S. press calls RFK a conspiracy nut, the Defender's articles when it comes to vaccination, when it comes to health issues, are very well referenced.
You can go into the articles, find the primary references that we and yourselves – and determine whether or not what they're talking about is true.
So yes, that to me is probably one of the best ones. Yeah, we do have a major health crisis here in the United States, but also from a military perspective, 70 percent of all youth

(01:39:27):
who graduate from high school in the United States are basically physically unfit to serve in the U.S. military.
So, but again, whatever RFK implements, that turnaround you're not going to see for at least five, six, seven years in order to get the obesity issue done.
So I don't know how much – I think you might have some power over the FDA. You might have some power as to what goes into the food.

(01:39:52):
I mean, you could probably see a reduction in obesity in a couple years once the food supply is cleared out.
But, Cormie, you do know that the pharmaceutical companies are the new mafia. They're going to make him an offer he can't refuse.
It's possible. Yeah, it's very possible. But I know the pharmaceutical stock has tanked over the past week or so, too.

(01:40:16):
Well, let us see.
They're suffering financially, so there is leverage both ways.
Yeah, I don't have much hope, but I think that he's the best thing in the whole debacle.
Yeah, I don't have much hope either. We'll see what happens.
You know, I think some observers, very observers think he'll get confirmed, too.

(01:40:38):
Yeah, he should. Let's see what happens.
But we're looking for the mafia to come with guns blazing from the big iron on his hip, literally.
Yeah, because remember, the media is dependent on pharmaceutical money.
The CNN, the Foxes, and the MSNBCs. You watch any American football game.

(01:41:04):
Outside of beer and insurance, most of the advertising is pharmaceutical.
And what's interesting about that is that we have the mainstream media that's literally dependent on the pharmaceutical companies.
We have the mainstream alternative media like the Tucker Carlson's and them, who are also dependent on the pharmaceutical companies.
So it's left to see what's going to happen. One thing for certain and two things for sure.

(01:41:31):
R.F. Kennedy is a good look on the team.
I mean, we are now surprised that you're pointing to him. I thought Trump was going to double cross. I'm very surprised.
I think he's still planning to double cross it, but I'm just saying that off the of the cover.
Yeah, I think you're right. You may be right about that, too. Yeah, he might drop it.
And then that's true. Yeah.

(01:41:53):
The pharmacy, you double cross Kennedy before. Yeah.
Because Kennedy was supposed to be ahead of the vaccine board and Bill Gates came in and offered enough money.
He was out at that point. So that's very true.
Yeah. Because because we're out of time and have to wrap up, I want to give you a minute to wrap up this segment and then to ask you a quick question regarding Malcolm X.
Have you seen that story coming out of Malcolm X?

(01:42:15):
No, no, tell me about it. Let me just go look at it quickly.
Three daughters of Malcolm X have accused the CIA, the FBI and the. Oh, yeah, I've seen that over the past year.
All right. So now they're I mean, I agree with them, but the attorney is no good.
And I can tell you that from personal experience of where I worked and with that attorney double cross the black.

(01:42:42):
He was supposed to represent black employees in a major suit.
And if all except one got fired, none of them got compensation. All right.
So he's a nasty, nasty person.
So let's all listen as no quick look. We're talking about that. The daughters of Malcolm X have accused the CIA, the FBI, the New York Police Department and others in a one hundred million lawsuit.
This was filed on Friday of playing roles in nineteen sixty nine sixty five assassination of the civil rights leader in the lawsuit filed in the Manhattan Federal Court.

(01:43:12):
The daughters, along with Malcolm X, estate claimed that the agencies were aware and were involved in the assassination plot and failed to stop the killing.
So we'll pick that up another time. So I give you a minute to wrap this for me.
Well, I mean, as I said, in this time period, it's totally wait and see, because we don't know how the confirmation process is going to go.

(01:43:35):
Most of the opposition that you're going to see in Congress is going to come from the Republicans.
So and I think Trump likes to operate through chaos.
So people don't know where he's coming from and he kind of goes from this good cop, bad cop perspective.
But I think, you know, countries like Russia and China, they're not going to be so afraid of that.

(01:43:59):
You're dealing with long, ancient cultures and America's a new kid on the block.
The United States of America is a new kid on the block to them.
So they're more patient, more more circumspect and how they deal with things.
And I don't think the Trump administration is going to have as much leverage diplomatically as I think they will.
And as far as Africa is concerned, we're talking about the Sahel, we're talking about the Horn of Africa, places and also Congo, Sudan.

(01:44:31):
We haven't seen anything that tells us that there is any change in America's.
I don't think there's going to be much change in the Horn of Africa, although again, Trump, the visor that Trump has indicated,
they want to have a less hostile relationship with Ethiopia.
But the Biden administration cancels Somalia's debt.

(01:44:54):
So I don't know. So hand in hand, they want to cancel Somalia's debt to continue to have some sort of hostile force against Ethiopia.
While Ethiopia engages with Somaliland.
Trump's main adviser, Peter Pham, is an adviser to the DRC.

(01:45:15):
So we'll see how that goes.
And I think to the Sahel states, the Sahel states to me are playing this smartly out of everybody else.
We'll see if the Trump administration threatens some attack on the Sahel states.
It seems like the people that surround Trump are somewhat anti-interventions when it comes to that, although talk to Gavrige,
who's been in Africa on a military mission this year.

(01:45:38):
So we'll see.
We'll see. Well, militarization is their thing. So that explains a lot.
North Africa, before you go, they've been engaging with North Africa in an interesting way,
Morocco, Egypt, Tunisia, on what they call counterterrorism and so on. But we see the relationship between them and how they deal with North Africa and the connection back to Israel.

(01:46:05):
So that is. Yeah, because they want they want Africa.
And I said last week that Trump is not as ideological as Democrats,
but they would like the African country to sign on to the Abrahamic course and already continue doing business in the United States.
And I know they've made some deals with Morocco where they want to dispute their claims with the Western Sahara.

(01:46:26):
The Trump administration wants to make that deal.
And I think you can correct me if I'm wrong about this.
There's a lot of enslavement going on of our brothers and sisters in Western Sahara still.
Yes, as a result of Morocco's involvement in the Western Sahara government's involvement.
So again, we'll see how that plays out. All right.

(01:46:47):
Lots of lots of talk about we're watching it and then probably in a few weeks we'll come back to look closer at North Africa in particular and also at African.
And then also to look at Latin America, because I'm very interesting, interested in what to see what will play out in in Venezuela, Cuba,

(01:47:08):
Ecuador, as you said before, Bolivia.
And, you know, what the discussions around that are.
Interestingly enough, when Trump was on the stumps moving from place to place, he was just throwing throw in his speeches.
A Latin American country. And you wonder where did that come from?
Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

(01:47:29):
It's chaos time. And, you know, I think being political representation should be dealing with multiple partners to help with the leverage.
And that doesn't exclude them from dealing with the United States, but they have to be dealing with multiple partners so they can have some sort of leverage.
And then again, I've been emphasizing all the years, technology transfer is very important.

(01:47:50):
But I don't know if you have I don't know if you have the wise head, the Caribbean to do that.
The white has an African to do that, but not in Caribbean. I had to draw a line under this to say the bottom line is that the foreign policy as as we look at how Trump is rolling out his administration and his cabinet,

(01:48:11):
the foreign policy is going to remain the same.
Yes, for the most part.
For the most part, yes.
Thank you so much geopolitical analyst, an African analyst, my friend, my cousin.
Thank you, cuz.
All right. Thank you.

(01:48:33):
Okay, so we're watching this.
All right. No, not on champs.
Do I are you there now.
All right.
Not quite sure what is happening. And if we've got a call yet that's not there.

(01:48:59):
All right, just one of those mornings I know there's also a call coming in right.
Okay, that's also another.
Let me see. No. Okay.
All right, so, so let's do this all over. Can we get all the callers back online.

(01:49:24):
All right.
All right.

(01:49:54):
All right.
All right.

(01:50:24):
All right.

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