The U.S.-led Western press machine is sucking the air out of the media-sphere  with its “domination of the information space” and social media platforms like Twitter are putting significant and influential voices in “twitter jail,” said Riaz Tayob, a researcher with the South African Chapter of the Southern and Eastern African Trade Institute, on Russian media outlet RT’s “World Apart,” hosted by Oksana Boyko.

He was talking about media and other efforts to deny African nations the right to forge their own path as the U.S. and NATO fight a proxy war with Russia in Ukraine. Tayob, who is an attorney and an economist, once appeared on a live webcast featuring guests from seven African countries focusing on the economic effects of the global pandemic and hosted by The Final Call.

He quoted American writer and public intellectual Eugene Luther Gore Vidal, who called the U.S., “The United States of Amnesia” (which is actually the title of his film) “because everything in the media is soundbites … more psychology more than fact.”

According to Vidal, a political coup has already occurred in America.

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The right has triumphed and the human values of liberals have been consigned to history, or if this were a film, consigned to the cutting room floor.

“There is the traditional manufacturing of consent. And even more concerning is the oversimplification of very complex issues,” said Tayob of Western media and its tactics.

At a human level, one can display empathy for those suffering, in the case of Ukraine with violence perpetuated by Russia’s invasion, Tayob said. “But if you look at it at a geo-political level one can see that both China and Russia are (being) surrounded by American or NATO military bases.”

Africa’s perspective, Tayob said, has been “neutrality.”

“That doesn’t mean that we don’t have compassion with the Ukrainians or Russians, both people are dying on both sides,” the South Africa-based commentator said.

“On the geo-political (side) we  can see both were backed into a corner,” he argued. He acknowledged, “one must respect the rights of the Ukrainians like many Africans who are struggling for self-determination.”

Tayob argued African decolonization “wasn’t just decolonization, it was a process for self-determination.” And he referred to Samuel Huntington’s influential book, “The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order.”

In “that entire book he doesn’t mention Africa as if we don’t exist. This is a serious, serious problem because we are players in the world. We do contribute resources to the global economy and provide services to the production, international division of labor that exists,” Tayob said. “So this is a real challenge for Africa to maintain neutrality.”

This disregard of Africa and her right to self-determination tries to reduce the continent and its people to a place with no history. It’s like post-slavery arguments of racist Whites suggesting Blacks made no contributions they could respect.

W.E.B. Du Bois offered a scholarly rebuke to these lies. He did it first at the “1900 Paris Exposition” exhibit of the accomplishments of Black Americans. Then in his dissertation which was turned into the historic 1934 book, “Black Reconstruction in America.”

Huntington is woefully wrong in claiming Africa, the mother of civilization and the owner of much of the world’s natural and mineral resources, is not yet worthy of a seat at the global civilization table.

Misinformation, African heroes and De Beers

De Beers, owned by the Oppenheimer family of German Jewish descent, is known for its diamond fortune and 720 square miles of conservation land across South Africa, Botswana and Zimbabwe.

The Oppenheimer family is backing the Brenthurst Foundation, which is a backdoor into Zionist influence in Africa and growing Israel’s relationship with countries on the continent.

Brenthurst Foundation public relations personnel are using African freedom fighters in a convoluted argument as to why Africans should give up their right to a neutral position on Ukraine and serve Western interests.

The foundation states unequivocally that Africa should support Ukraine.

African leaders have not been lockstep with Western countries and NATO in isolating Russia and pushing sanctions against Vladimir Putin’s regime. Some African leaders have been willing to meet with Russia’s leader to discuss matters in the context of Africa’s interests.

Not only does the foundation misuse such African freedom fighters as Patrice Lumumba, the Congo’s first democratically elected leader, to make the false argument, but it fails to mention Israel’s 1961 break-up of a peaceful demonstration in the Zionist state. It was a march towards the Belgian embassy to protest the killing of Lumumba and the march was held February 20, 1961, according to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. Belgium had played a role in the destruction of Lumumba and his efforts to achieve full and complete freedom for his country.

The Oppenheimer’s foundation tries in some unbelievable, unjustifiable ways to make its dubious point. It uses Tanzanian leader Julius Nyerere, never mentioning that the freedom fighter was among the first African leaders to recognize the Palestine Liberation Organization under Yasser Arafat.

Nyerere told El Massawar, “They (Palestinians) have been deprived of their own country; they are a nation without a land of their own. They, therefore, deserve the support of Tanzania and the entire world.”

Also included in this media frenzy and pressure campaign is recently reelected French president Emmanuel Macron and his three African-state visit.

Macron visited the presidential palace of his counterpart, “corrupt dictator” Paul Biya, 89, who has ruled Cameroon with an iron fist for nearly 40 years. Biya has refused demands for federalism and cracked down on rebellions by separatists.

While visiting Cameroon’s capital Yaoundé, Macron cited Russia’s blockade of Ukrainian ports and alleged attacks on grain warehouses have disrupted global grain supply. His intent, again, was to have Cameroon and African nations follow the West-NATO lead and isolate Russia.

Reuters news service reported on Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov’s African tour aimed at strengthening ties with the African leaders who refuse to join Western condemnation and sanctions over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Then there was U.S. President Joe Biden calling for a December African summit, which could be summed up as symbol with no substance. Why announce a planned summit twice, once by the secretary of state and then the president without any details? It’s like offering a dinner guest a blank menu.

Follow @jehronmuhammad on Twitter.