On Obama and Africa

At the Foreign Policy Association you can see my latest "Viewpoints" article, "On Obama and Africa," in which I give my take on the Dinesh D'Souza-Newt Gingrich idiocy in which they asserted that Obama is informed by a "Kenyan anti-colonialist world view."

[Cross-posted at the FPA Africa Blog.]

In Addis Ababa

I am in Addis Ababa (see here for more), have not slept in 40 hours and since my hotel room seems to have ESPN International, which is supposed to have the Celtics-Lakers game overnight (it's after midnight now and I just got to my room), it looks like I'll roll out of here tomorrow morning (5:00 wake up!) on virtually no sleep. And then of course I get into Joburg with just hours to spare before the South Africa-Mexico game.

In the meantime, you might know this guy. You might think he's me. (He's not me.)

At the South Africa Blog: Self Indulgence Alert

Things have been busy at the Foreign Policy Association South Africa Blog, which increasingly might be moving toward being a more general blog on African affairs with its center of gravity in Sub-Saharan and especially southern Africa. I've been busy writing about the Kenya crisis, the new (though likely futile) challenge to Robert Mugabe's tyrannical regime, South Africa's State of the Union, South African sport, and much more. Please check it out.

Ngugi's Africanism

Ngugi wa Thiong'o, one of the most respected of all African novelists and an ardent advocate of pan-Africanism, recently gave a series of lectures at the University of Nairobi, the institution from which he was fired after he was detained by the government under Jomo Kenyatta's regime in 1977. Ngugi has been an ardent advocate of the use of African languages, and has practiced what he has preached, choosing to write only in Gikuyu, the natibve language of his Kikuyu people, rather than English. Kenyan journalist and writer Rasna Warah has the story in the Mail & Guardian.