Masiphula Mbongwa retweeted
ECOWAS wanted a reunion. The AES came to negotiate.
On October 17 and 18, 2026, the two blocs sat at the same table in Dakar for the first time since Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger walked out of ECOWAS in January 2025. The room was full of foreign ministers. The air was full of speculation.
Then Burkina Faso's Foreign Minister, Karamoko Jean-Marie Traoré, ended it with three words.
"Il n'en est rien." There is no truth in it.
He was answering the question that had been building for weeks: was the AES preparing to come back? The answer was no. Not now. Not like this.
The joint statement was careful. It spoke of "fraternity, mutual respect and openness." It stressed "good neighbourliness" and "respect for sovereignty." It announced working groups to prepare a framework cooperation agreement on trade, freedom of movement, and security.
What it did not announce was a reunion.
Mali's Abdoulaye Diop said the talks must be "entity-to-entity"—AES and ECOWAS as two separate organisations, not one bloc absorbing the other. Niger's Bakary Yaou Sangaré said it plainly: "The AES is not against ECOWAS, but it has another path."
That is what Dakar was. Not a homecoming. A negotiation between equals.
The AES did not leave ECOWAS to isolate itself. It left because the bloc sanctioned it, threatened it, and refused to accept that three sovereign states had chosen a different direction. In the 20 months since, the AES built a joint military force, an investment bank, and a common biometric passport. It did not need ECOWAS to survive. It does not need to rejoin to cooperate.
West Africa now has two regional bodies where there used to be one. The old bloc has to learn to share the room.
Masiphula Mbongwa retweeted
It’s been six days since this remarkable woman of Indian origin (see her story, attached) won the #NobelPeacePrize. And the Government of India, her ancestral homeland, hasn’t so much as congratulated her?! Shame on the petty men who have made such a deplorable decision.
Masiphula Mbongwa retweeted
Perfect example that flew right over her head 🕊️
On #METROFMTALK, we also spoke to Mametlwe Sebei, Legal Expert and Lecturer at UNISA who also works with Lawyers for Human Rights, to get a legal perspective on South Africa’s new asylum rules.
We unpacked what the Constitutional Court ruling means for asylum seekers, why access to the application process matters and the challenge of balancing legal protections with concerns about the capacity of the asylum system.
How does South Africa protect the right to seek asylum while ensuring the system is properly managed?
Catch the podcast on metrofm.co.za
Masiphula Mbongwa retweeted
History will disappoint you fast if you think you can use anti-apartheid guerillas as an example to push an “abahambe” agenda.
Masiphula Mbongwa retweeted
Students graduating from Cambridge.
The youth might just save this planet!
#FreePalestine
Fuck #Israel
Masiphula Mbongwa retweeted
Africa’s borders were not drawn by accident, but by design to divide communities and weaken unity, according to Dr Roy Casagranda.
He points to the Hausa people of West Africa. Once connected across the Sokoto Caliphate, they were later split by colonial borders that became modern-day Nigeria and Niger.
For Casagranda, that legacy still matters because borders drawn by outside powers continue to shape identity, politics and tension across the continent.
How much of Africa’s present is still being shaped by colonial borders?
#Casagranda #AfricanHustory #Precolonial #Nigeria #PanAfricanism #AfricanUnity #ColonialBorders
Masiphula Mbongwa retweeted
There is a man in America who is so wise, so profoundly brilliant, that history will one day look back at him as an absolute genius.
If you are an African who grew up watching Hollywood legacy broadcasts and consuming mainstream Western media, you definitely don't know him.
For the most part of my life, I didn't know him either.
He never came across my radar because he was operating in the deeply censored era of intense political correctness.
In a world that polices thoughts, there was simply no way a man like him was ever going to be celebrated by the mainstream.
He isn't popular on our side of the world in Africa. But his thoughts, his philosophy, and his ideas are exactly what this side of humanity needs for the true betterment of our society.
His name is Thomas Sowell.
What makes Thomas Sowell a hero is his intellectual armor.
He operates on straight logic with zero filtering.
In a world obsessed with optics, he prioritizes reality over feelings, and hard evidence over raw emotion. He doesn't tell you what feels good; he tells you what is true.
Now, at 96 years old, his legacy stands as an undefeated monument to truth.
The questions that African nations are desperately asking today about economic independence, development, and social progress were already answered by Sowell decades ago. Because his work was rooted in objective truth, it has never lost its power. Truth is timeless.
To introduce Thomas Sowell to Africa is to introduce a toolkit for intellectual and economic liberation.
Sowell famously proved that policies must be judged by their actual results, not the good intentions of the politicians who make them.
He showed how top-down government interventions often destroy the very industries and people they claim to protect.
He has spent a lifetime showing that true wealth and development come from internal cultural capital, marketable skills, family stability, and hard work, rather than waiting for external aid or global systemic changes.
He decoded global politics by explaining that human conflict usually boils down to two worldviews: those who believe a small elite should micro-manage society from an office, and those who trust ordinary individuals to make their own choices in a free market.
Thomas Sowell is a hero who fought the intellectual wars of the 20th and 21st centuries without ever compromising his integrity.
He didn't seek the applause of the crowd, which is why the mainstream media tried to bury his name.
As Africans looking toward the future, we can no longer afford to ignore his maps. It is time to bring his books, his lectures, and his straight-logic philosophy to our universities, our political debates, and our dinner tables.
Masiphula Mbongwa retweeted
🚨THE AFRIKANER BOY WHO NEVER CHOSE TO BE A ZULU BUT BECAME ONE. LITTLE KEANAN IS STEALING SOUTH AFRICA’S HEART ‼️‼️
Little Keanan is just a small blond white boy who grew up very poor in Jeppestown, raised among black South Africans. Nobody asked him what language he wanted to speak or which culture he wanted to live. Keanan was dropped off in front of a Zulu couple’s home, and they raised him as their own. Until today, no one knew who his parents were.
Now he dances traditional Zulu steps like he was born into it, sings Maskandi with that perfect pronunciation and pure energy that stops you mid-scroll. People keep saying he’s the next Johnny Clegg and you get it the second you watch him🎤
There’s no acting, he is just a kid who belongs exactly where destiny placed him, he never got to choose any of this.
The poverty, the streets, the people around him decided his path and somehow he’s living it with the most innocent ❤️ Colour doesn’t even register when you see him. You see a little boy showing real kindness and care for others so easily that it touches you deeply.
🌱That’s why so many South Africans are losing their hearts over him because he couldn’t choose his destiny, it was chosen for him and he is making it his own, in the most beautiful way 😁
The ANC must do what the ANC must do in the GNU in respect of its renewal, unity with all progressive & democratic forces, getting rid of neoliberal & austerity economic policies, & ridding itself of corrupt & counterrevolutionary elements within its own ranks.
"When you are wrong, you must say so!" ANCYL President Collen Malatji says bringing the DA into the GNU was a mistake that brought chaos, not stability. As ANC Secretary-General Fikile Mbalula warns that "nothing binds us forever" to the DA, pressure is mounting on President Ramaphosa to dump the coalition and reopen talks with parties like the EFF. Has the GNU reached its breaking point? 🇿🇦
#SAPolitics #GNU #ANC
Masiphula Mbongwa retweeted
The government controls less than 20% of the economy in South Africa.
Over 60% of management in the private sector is White men so this "partnership" is just useless PR justify auctioning public assets, there's no economic growth that will be produced
The nnoliberal institution of government is not about hearing our voices and articulating designing policy to reflect that. It is to command the big state, which ... allows the legislature and regulate ... that state - Prof Bill Mitchel. youtube.com/post/Ugkx2kut3yq…
A sinister form of genocide against AmaHlubi by cultural means. The Nhlapo Commission endorsed, consolidated, and continues that British Colonial policy of genocide against AmaHlubi. facebook.com/share/v/195GbVB…
The wisdom of Black owner value chain intergration and ownership - Vuyani Nashwa. #TikTok vt.tiktok.com/ZSQoxwRwy/
None dare challenge Mama Graca Machel about being South African, Mozambican, Zimbabwean, Malawian, Mosotho, Mswati. threads.com/@thinking.africa…























