The Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) expressed its concern in a article published on the Independent Online (IOL.co.za), which is one of South Africa’s leading news and information websites. In the article, “Online attacks target Muslims amid anti-immigrant sentiment in South Africa,” the group expressed its growing concern in what it describes as “a rise in Islamophobia on social media following efforts by members of the Muslim community to assist migrants who were allegedly displaced by xenophobic attacks, as well as the appointment of Yusuf Cassim as Deputy Minister of Higher Education.

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa’s appointment of Yusuf Cassim as Deputy Minister of Higher Education and Training has drawn much praise. It is the “criticism(s)” he received that “triggered” the increasing wave of Islamophobia.

Iqbal Jassat is executive member of the South Africa-based Media Review Network. He noted that “the increasing spread of anti-Muslim rhetoric (is) driven by online disinformation, political opportunism, and imported ideologies.” While the country claims a long history of religious tolerance, media narratives increasingly portray Muslims as “perpetual outsiders” regardless of their contributions to society and history of citizenship.

Another article of Independent Online titled, “Understanding Islamophobia in SA: Historical roots and current implications,” notes that “public figures and Muslim politicians frequently face targeted online campaigns aimed at questioning their patriotism and framing them as dangerous or foreign.” Even though Cassim has been called a “devout Muslim,” his swearing in as Deputy Minister triggered a wave of Islamophobia on social media.

Another example is that of Dr. Imtiaz Sooliman, head of the popular NGO (nongovernmental organization) “Give of the Givers.” Independent Online reported that for decades Sooliman was hailed across all sections of South African society “as a true patriot and champion of the underprivileged until he spoke out against the Israeli genocide, after which we saw coordinated attacks on his integrity, patriotism, motives, religion and the attempts to suggest that his funding came from ‘suspicious and tainted’ overseas funding.”

In the 2022 study: “Think-tanks and the news media’s contribution in the construction of Islamophobia in South Africa,” that was published on Manchesterhive.com, author Dr. Mohamed Natheem Hendricks, senior lecturer at University of Western Cape, noted that some of the country’s think-tanks and popular media outlets are contributing factors in Islamophobia.

According to Dr. Hendricks, “These actors are often complicit in representing African Muslims and Islam as sources of terror and terrorism.”

In the study he explains that think-tanks and the media manufacture terrorism knowledge and expertise in support of the so-called global “War on Terror” in ways that are consistent with western discourses on Islamophobia. “They represent Muslims’ identity in static and negative terms to exclude them from the constructed ‘we,’ using securitization theory as a theoretical lens he confirms that South African think-tanks and media have manufactured Muslims as a security threat and have created a climate of widespread fear of Muslims that has the potential to justify anti-Muslim racism or anti-Islamic prejudice—Islamophobia,” the study noted.

Dr. Faisal Suliman, chairperson of the South African Muslim Network, wrote on Independent Online that these patterns of social media messaging are not “organic but (are) coordinated, opportunistically riding on the wave of anti-immigrant, Afrophobic and xenophobic sentiments sweeping our country.”

He added, “We have noticed a clear pattern that the framing of Muslims as the other increased after Israel’s invasion and its genocide against the people of Gaza and the International Court of Justice (ICJ) case against Israel.”

Minister of Justice and Constitutional Development Mmamoloko Kubayi has warned that this is possibly a part of a foreign destabilization campaign. In a July 6 interview Minister Kubakyi gave to Thecommonsense.co.za, titled, “It’s an (Israeli) Plot, Claims Minister on Xenophobic Wave,” she linked recent protests in her country to South Africa’s case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ). “That court case is huge on their (Israel’s) shoulders. And they will fight back in a manner that seeks to show South Africa is not a country with moral authority to advocate for human rights.”

While Minister Kubayi “stopped short of directly accusing Israel of being complicit in backing demonstrations and did not provide smoking gun evidence to support the allegation, the minister said it would be ‘naïve’ to assume that powerful global interests would not seek to weaken South Africa’s credibility on human rights issues, thus weakening its long running genocide claim against Israel,” reported The Voice of the Cape News.

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The African continent’s influence on the FIFA (International Federation of Association Football) World Cup in 2026 has grown from peripheral participation to a core structural and cultural force. The continent’s impact is most visible in the expanded 48-team format, where Africa secured an historic 10-team presence. Those teams included Algeria, Cape Verde, DR Congo, Egypt, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Morocco, Senegal, South Africa and Tunisia.

Nine of the continent’s 10 competing teams were among the last 32 teams, a historic achievement for African football (referred to as soccer in the U.S.) at the 2026 FIFA World Cup. This is where a record nine out of 10 competing African nations successfully advanced past the group stage into the Round of 32 knockout phase. When told about this fact after Algeria’s crucial draw against Austria, Tiyad Mahrez, who plays for the North African country, told The Atlantic, “That’s amazing. It shows the quality of African football, which is not always described as really good football, but it is. It’s difficult to play in Africa, but when you see nine out of 10 teams at the biggest tournament (going through), it shows a lot. I’m so pleased.”

At the time of this writing, two African nations remained, as Egypt and Morocco had successfully advanced to the quarterfinals of the tournament.

From the outset of this year’s tournament, matches played by African teams upended expectations. According to Time.com, “Cape Verde, a nation of half a million playing in its first World Cup, held the reigning European champions, Spain, to a scoreless draw in Atlanta. Then, they took a point off Uruguay (another former World Cup Champion). Egypt led Belgium before holding on for a 1-1 draw, then beat New Zealand 3-1. Morocco, a semifinalist four years ago, drew with Brazil while outplaying them for long stretches, then dominated Scotland.”

The Time article continued, “And Folarin Balogun, born in New York to Nigerian parents, scored twice in the United States’ opening win, a reminder that African talent shapes this game far beyond the continent’s own teams. None of this is a fluke. It is the latest evidence of something the rest of the world has been slow to price in.”

Ivory Coast, recognized by FIFA as Côte d’Ivoire, has appeared on four occasions: 2006, 2010, 2014, and 2026. Nicknamed the Elephants and winning at the Africa Cup of Nations tournament three times, they got the job done, defeating Curaçao 2-0, guaranteeing their place in the knockout stages of the World Cup for the first time before losing in a competitive match against Norway.

The year 1934 marked Africa’s participation in the inaugural World Cup. Still under colonial rule, the continent sent Egypt across the Mediterranean to Italy to represent it. As Egypt was eliminated, according to ESPN, “amidst a cloud of injustice,” the continent would be denied participation for the next 40 years.

During the 1960s, as a movement for independence swept across Africa, FIFA ruled that “Africa, Asia, and Oceania would have to share a single qualifying spot for the 1966 World Cup,” reported the BBC. In response, 15 African nations staged a historic, continent-wide boycott of the tournament. “The continent, summoned by CAF (Confederation of African Football) President Abdel Aziz Moustafa, withdrew in protest, in a decision that reflected its intensifying emotional current,” noted ESPN.

Moustafa’s presidency led to greater FIFA recognition for Africa and to the successful advocacy for more World Cup slots for African nations, reported Pulse Sports.

Eventually, African talent in football (soccer) came to supplement European teams. There were years of expansion and European academies filled with African talent, and players starred for the world’s biggest clubs (teams).

“It was also in the 1990s that this trend of postcolonial immigration would leave its indelible mark on world football, as France lifted its first World Cup on home soil with a squad composed of several African-descended players like Zinedine Zidane, Patrick Vieira and Marcel Desailly. The team would be fondly called Black-Blanc-Beur (Black-White-Arab) in praise of its ethnic diversity, reported olayafrica.com.

In this 2026 World Cup, African-descended European players are among the most extraordinary talents on the pitch, but addressing the imbalance in African participation has potentially awakened a sleeping giant.

Examples of Africa’s ability to compete were evident in Cape Verde, which produced one of the biggest shocks in the competition’s history by drawing with the European champions, Spain, in their opening game. Ghana produced a disciplined performance to earn a point against England. South Africa recovered from a painful defeat to Mexico to finish second in their group and advance, The Athletic reported. The DR Congo, who, at their first World Cup, had a draw with Cristiano Ronaldo’s Portugal and also progressed as one of the best third-placed teams.

The growing participation of African nations in the World Cup has excited people on the continent.

Veron Mosengo Omba, the newly-elected president of the Congolese Football Federation and former general secretary of the Confederation of African Football, said the scenes had moved him: “Even in the occupied areas of eastern Congo, you see people coming out into the streets to dance. It’s incredible … What these young players have given us is an unexpected gift,” reported The Guardian.

Democratic Republic of Congo President Félix Tshisekedi struck a similar note, which speaks volumes for all of Africa. “Every victory, every flag raised, strengthens our pride, our national identity and the invisible foundations of our unity,” he said.

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Dr. Sachs, who frequently appears on international media outlets, heavily criticizing mainstream Western news organizations and their biased, one-sided reporting, is an economist and public policy analyst, a professor at Columbia University, and the current director of the Center for Sustainable Development.

At the February summit, he warned that Africa must integrate its markets and become a singular geopolitical bloc. He stressed that Europeans and American colonial-era divisions leave the continent’s 55 countries fragmented and vulnerable, while a true union or integration of African nation-states unlocks the scale needed to compete and excel.

Integrating the trajectory of Africa’s population growth with “the most amazing acceleration of technological know-how in history,” Dr. Sachs projects that Africa’s population is so young that there is a tremendous population growth built into Africa till the end of the century. He calculates that “Africa’s population will be two and a half billion people at mid-century.”

Comparing Africa’s population growth to that of China and India, he said that by the end of the 21st century, China’s population will be under one billion, and India’s, he estimates, will stabilize at 1.7 billion. Dr. Sachs explained that according to him, “on the current extrapolation with a gradually declining fertility rate, Africa reaches about 3.7 billion people by the end of the 21st century, and that is about 35% (or one-third) of the world population.”

Everything has accelerated, he explained. “If you launch ChatGPT one month, within the next month there are 100 million users. Within six months, there are 500 million users. We’ve never had an uptake of technology at this speed in history. So, if this technological know-how is properly utilized, the ability of Africa to achieve what China achieved, double-digit growth for four decades, is absolutely realistic. This is the main point. Africa can achieve a dramatic advance,” he argued.

The entire African continent must be in learning mode, he pointed out. “This is a continent with a 19-year median age. Half the children are at school age. I mean half the population is at school age in this continent. Make sure they’re learning and then you transform your dreams into reality,” Dr. Sachs said.

Africa needs investment. “The most important (investment), every child on this continent should complete at least upper and secondary school with real learning,” he continued. Dr. Sachs explained that the continent as a unified body needs to “figure out how to do that.”

He also spoke on how electronic devices and technology can help in that effort, including having some classes online.

“It’s virtually free to do this. If you actually work out the capital costs, there should be no limits of teachers in rural areas or teachers that are under-qualified, or can’t do a math problem because we don’t need the traditional delivery as the only delivery of education right now. We’re in a digital world. You can leapfrog. Be creative. Be inventive. But take the basic idea. Don’t let the budget constraint stand in the way of universal quality education. It’s by far the number one resource of this continent and it’s growing very rapidly, and there is no demographic dividend of a young population if it is not educated. None at all. Only a burden,” he argued.

Another major investment is physical infrastructure. “That includes developing the power sector, the transport sector, the digital sector, social housing, water and sanitation, the key infrastructure. There needs to be an Africa-wide strategy that reaches down to every part of the continent,” he argued.

Dr. Sachs encouraged the energy or power sector to tap Africa’s wind, solar, hydro, and geothermal potential. “This continent has enough high-quality solar to power the entire world. As you know, we’ve all seen the ‘little box’ in the Sahara that has enough solar energy to power the entire world,” he said, referring to the Sahara Desert.

According to several published reports, the potential is limitless.

In a 2021 article in Forbes.com titled, “We Could Power The Entire World By Harnessing Solar Energy From 1% Of The Sahara,” it stated in part, “The Great Saharan Desert in Africa is 3.6 million square miles and is prime for solar power (more than 12 hours per day). That means 1.2% of the Sahara Desert is sufficient to cover all of the energy needs of the world in solar energy. There is no way coal, oil, wind, geothermal or nuclear can compete with this.”

The Sahara receives roughly enough sunlight in six hours to power on all of human civilization, for at least an entire year. Theoretically, this “box,” covering just 11.5 miles by 11.5 miles with high-efficiency solar panels, could meet the entire world’s electricity demand.

What will it take for Africa to achieve this kind of dynamism? According to Dr. Sachs, “Basically, be like China or be like India, unified, integrated structure, working on a continental scale economy with a continental scale policy and plan.”

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Historically, the occupier state of Israel has been on a so-called charm offensive focusing on the continent of Africa, whose 54 nation-states represent the UN’s largest voting bloc. Last year, 45% of UN Security Council (UNSC) resolutions addressed crises in Africa.

Africa’s views of Israel are highly fragmented and are characterized by a complex mix of historical solidarity, economic pragmatism, and religious ties. While some countries on the continent actively deepen security and agricultural partnerships, others—most notably South Africa—view Israel’s policies in Gaza as severe human rights violations and have championed the Palestinian cause.

According to reporting from Al Jazeera, “African perspectives on Israel are deeply divided, reflecting a mix of strong diplomatic partnerships, religious ties, and vocal condemnations of the war in Gaza. While no African nation has officially cut all diplomatic ties (with Israel), continental opinions span from vehement opposition to pragmatic bilateral alliances.”

A June 4 Pew Research Center survey of global negative views of Israel has limited survey findings regarding the African continent. Africa, a continent with 54 nation states, is only represented in the survey by Nigeria as the one African country that was lumped in with others, including Australia, Italy, Poland, and the United Kingdom, in the category of very “unfavorable views” of Israel.

In another category in the Pew survey, “confidence in Netanyahu” included responses from Kenya and the Philippines. These, according to the Pew Center, are the only surveyed countries where more than half of the country’s public has “confidence in Netanyahu,” who is a global war criminal with an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court (ICC), accusing him of war crimes and crimes against humanity for the atrocities committed against the Palestinians in Gaza.

The Pew survey notes, “views of Israel are among the most positive in some of the sub-Saharan African countries surveyed.”

The occupier state is still working to embed itself more deeply into the African continent under the guise of security.

To give more context, South African governance analyst Dr. Reneva Fourie explained to Al Jazeera that by embedding itself into regional security structures, Israel gains allies who are less likely to challenge its military occupation. She explained that these so-called counterterrorism partnerships are used as a public relations tool to normalize Israel’s international standing while obfuscating the violence it inflicts upon Palestinians.

“These partnerships normalize Israel as a counterterrorism ally while deflecting attention from the fact that it is the perpetrator of state terror against Palestinians,” she noted.

“By embedding itself in African security structures, Israel not only profits from instability but also gains partners less likely to challenge its brutal military occupation and its genocidal atrocities,” she told Al Jazeera.

But even as the world watches in real time, Israel’s continued massacre of Palestinians and now the Lebanese people, the regime’s right-wing government continues to attempt to make more inroads in Africa.

Israel also has its sights on Sudan and is involved in the current war in the African country, and according to published reports, it represents an external, outside influence fueling the current conflict in Sudan. A headline from an op-ed published on the Middle East Monitor website notes, “Sudan crisis not accidental: Rogue regimes UAE (United Arab Emirates) and Israel complicit in the genocide.”

What is currently unfolding “extends to reshaping the balance of power in the Horn of Africa and not surprisingly involves Israel and the United Arab Emirates (UAE),” the Nov. 4, 2025, article noted. “Haaretz noted in August 2025 that Israel was exploiting Sudan’s war to justify military expansion in the Red Sea under the banner of ‘protecting global shipping lanes from Houthi threats,’’’ continued the article, referencing the Israel-based publication.

It is also being reported that Israel has leveraged the Sudan crisis to deepen its political footprint in Ethiopia and Eritrea, “as part of its broader plan to contain Iranian influence extending from Tehran to Sana’a and Khartoum,” the Middle East Monitor article continued.

Countries in Africa should proceed with caution when dealing with Israel and be careful about engaging in relationships under the guise of counterterrorism and security, as the Israeli regime continues to try to expand its footprint and influence in the region.

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In the 2026 media study, “Enabling Atrocity in the MENA (Middle East, North Africa) and Sudan: Sockpuppets, Bots and Digital Information Harm in Wartime,” Marc Owens Jones, an associate professor of media analytics at Northwestern University, who specializes in disinformation and digital authoritarianism, especially as it pertains to the Middle East, examined three distinct yet interconnected influence networks comprising thousands of fake social media accounts operating throughout Sudan and the wider MENA region.

Bots are computerized and sock puppets are people, but they serve basically the same purpose. They falsely inflate numbers and manipulate algorithms to make something, in this case war in Sudan, appear more or less popular than the conflict between rival factions actually is.

According to experts and observers who study content creators, reasons for developing content focuses in many cases, “by any means necessary,” to garner large numbers in order to get advertising deals and increase search algorithms. Add to that, political organizations want to drive voters and encourage or suppress certain viewpoints. Corporations want to drive their own advertising and media up the search results. Additionally, the external and internal political opponents want to sow division and propaganda. Ultimately, it’s all doing the same thing: manipulating the “algorithm” with fake accounts posing as real people to push some agenda.

Produced under the auspices of the UNESCO Chair on Data, Media and Society at the University of South Carolina, Professor Jones’ study notes that, “Rather than examining misinformation as isolated content, the report analyses how networked architectures of distribution, sock puppet networks, automated amplification, and platform affordances reshape what becomes visible in times of war.”

A perfect example of this was reported by the London-based Middle East Eye (MEE), which often frames stories from the perspective that is critical of official Western and Western-allied or slanted narratives.

For example, the host of MEE’s YouTube channel recently posed the question: “Why are United Arab Emirates (UAE) targeting Sudan online?”

Footage MEE shared included showing the taunting of Sudanese civilians by a RSF militia commander, who in a video clip is seen bragging about killing over 2,000 Sudanese civilians. What is horrifying, is that after his announcement, he’s seen in a subsequent video clip executing “civilians.”

In still another video clip a UAE citizen, speaking into the camera speaking of the consequences facing those who “do not respect” Mohammed bin Zayed, (President of the UAE).

And it’s not just the United Arab Emirates. Many Israeli accounts were also quick to chime in regarding Sudan having spent a long time pointing the finger at the African nation in order to deflect attention away from Israel’s own horrific actions in Gaza.

Accusations and evidence of the beginning of the RSF massacres in the capital city of El Fasher, in North Darfur state, emerged in October of 2025. And as UAE support for the paramilitary group received considerable media coverage, these media influencers and seemingly bots have tried shifting the blame to the SAF, and away from the RSF, and its mounting slaughter of Sudanese civilians.

And although the report doesn’t absolve the SAF of atrocities, in February of 2026, according to UN News: “the UN Independent International Fact-Finding Mission for the Sudan concluded that RSF operations during the late-October 2025 takeover of El Fasher bore the ‘hallmarks of genocide.’ The mission documented ethnically targeted killings, widespread sexual violence, enforced disappearances, and the deliberate imposition of life-threatening conditions against the Zaghawa and Fur communities, finding that genocidal intent was the only reasonable inference from the pattern, scale, and rhetoric of the violence.”

According to Jones’s report, more than 27,000 coordinated fake accounts have produced hundreds of thousands of posts in Arabic, English, Persian, Turkish and French. According to Jones, they have largely been promoting “anti-Islamist,” pro-RSF, and UAE- aligned political propaganda during Sudan’s civil and proxy war, helping misinform the public about atrocities and the humanitarian catastrophe in Sudan.

“These influence networks function as tools of digital authoritarianism, deployed to manipulate perception, manufacture legitimacy, and overwhelm and confuse public discourse. Their harm lies both in the content they promote as well the deceptive means of distribution itself: coordinated sock puppet architectures that simulate authentic civic debate while operating in service of political agendas that run counter to human rights and the social good. They fundamentally undermine the free flow of credible information by crowding out legitimate news and also masking their source/agenda,” explained the report.

The report’s findings underscore the urgency for increased transparency, stronger platform accountability, multilingual enforcement capacity and sustained independent research when it comes to the continuing tragedy and atrocities facing the people of Sudan.

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On November 18, 2012, Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) President Sidumo Dlamini said, “greed,” or the wealth of the world being controlled by a few, is the root cause of the world’s economic instability. He said this while addressing the 47th National African Federated Chamber of Commerce Conference in Johannesburg. His 14-year-old remarks still ring true today.

“The current dominant world political and economic system is predicated on greed and is constructed by and on behalf of a tiny minority,” said the president of South Africa’s largest union. “Its primary purpose is to deliver profit for them.”

Dlamini explained that the vicious nature of the capitalist system scraps all “proposed alternatives” that take humanity into consideration, “in favor of those who present an opportunity to have capital continue to maximize profit even during the [world’s] worsening crisis.”

“Greed, for a lack of a better term, is good,” said the unscrupulous corporate raider played by Michael Douglas in the 1987 Oliver Stone movie “Wall Street.” What that fictional character did not say is that countless lives are sacrificed to make greed good for the few.

To provide insight into the above, we need only revisit the 2008 economic crisis, which led to the collapse of the U.S. subprime mortgage market and the reversal of the housing boom in other industrialized economies. According to Dlamini, “when we could see levels of poverty increasing, people being retrenched, and when all of us were made to carry our hands on our heads about the big economic crisis, evidence shows that during that period the world’s billionaires saw their wealth grow by 50 percent, and their ranks swell to 1,011 from 793.”

During the same period, the number of U.S. billionaires grew from 359 to 403.

The 1,011 billionaires’ combined net worth increased to $3.6 trillion, “up,” Dlamini explained, adding “$1.2 trillion from the year before.” Each billionaire, on average, had his or her wealth increased by $500 million. According to Dlamini, “The wealth of the 403 U.S. billionaires [could have] more than cover[ed] the 2008 U.S. federal deficit, with money left over for the states.”

As of March 2026, the world community includes a record 3,428 billionaires, according to the 2026 Forbes World’s Billionaires List. This marks a significant increase from previous years, with these individuals residing in over 80 countries. More than enough to pay off the economic costs being incurred by the consequences of U.S. President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s war against Iran.

This global greed, particularly by Global North countries, has also impacted the African continent.

“When African countries got independence, they inherited the colonial power structures of the colonizers without fundamentally altering them, thus perpetuating the dominance of capitalism to the detriment of the masses: the urban poor and peasantry,” explained Takudzwa Hillary Chiwanza, a barrister, journalist and social media content professional in his 2023 commentary “Africa Shouldn’t Listen to the International Community.”

Economist, Dr. Ndongo Samba Sylla, the Senegalese head of research and policy for Africa at International Development Economics Associates, has often analyzed “greed” not merely as a personal vice, but as a structural, institutionalized component of the global financial system that perpetuates inequality and colonial-style exploitation.

In his book, “Africa’s Last Colonial Currency: The CFA Franc Story,” co-authored with journalist Fanny Pigeaud, they argue that the CFA Franc acts as a neocolonial tool that extracts wealth from so-called Francophone Africa. They outline how this monetary arrangement hinders economic sovereignty, perpetuates underdevelopment, and subordinates African nation-states to European financial policies and French geopolitical interests.

“Over forty years after the formal end of colonialism, suffocating ties to Western financial systems continue to prevent African countries from achieving any meaningful monetary sovereignty,” Sylla writes.

According to Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research, in an article headlined, “How Neoliberalism Has Wielded ‘Corruption’ to Privatize Life in Africa,” the most “referenced” socio-psychological reasons for corruption are “greed.”

“But greed is not a transhistorical concept or emotion; rather, it is shaped by the social formation in which it is allowed to grow. Capitalism has a special relationship to greed, since it fosters the ‘animal spirits’ (as the economist John Maynard Keynes put it) to reduce all human life to commodities and to centralize the profit motive as the economic motor,” the article noted.

The film “Wall Street” and Douglas’ character’s explanation of the term “greed” to justify his drive to accumulate wealth have come to be seen as the archetypal portrayal of the excesses of financial institutions. The movie, which won Douglas an Academy Award, reportedly inspired many to work on Wall Street. The lead characters, portrayed by Douglas and Charlie Sheen, and the film’s director, Oliver Stone, have previously remarked that people still approach them to say they owe their careers in the financial industry to having seen the film.

That the movie has influenced so many possible careers is a testament to how ingrained in this culture of receiving financial dividends at the expense of others it is.

The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan said it best in his 1993 book, “A Torchlight for America.” In chapter three, “Greed and Leadership’s State of Mind,” Minister Farrakhan writes: “The fundamental motivation in this society is greed and the preying upon the weak of the country and the weak of the world, versus sharing the wealth in cooperation with the weak and the poor. Greed is defined as a selfish desire for possessions and wealth beyond reason. When greed is exercised in the society, it is reflected by division among the people.”

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According to Bloomberg, Beijing has laid down the law for Chinese companies, ordering them to defy American sanctions for the first time, a step that threatens to put its banking sector in the crosshairs of competition between the world’s two largest economies. With this economic move, China has drawn a red line in the sand by wheeling out its “Blocking Rules,” ordering non-compliance with U.S. sanctions.

In response to this bold escalation of trade hostilities, China’s Ministry of Commerce (MOC) issued a formal blocking measure prohibiting domestic entities from complying with U.S. sanctions, several news agencies, including China’s news service Xinhua, reported.

“The move specifically protects five major Chinese petrochemical firms recently targeted by Washington for their alleged involvement in the Iranian oil trade,” reported ndtv.com, the digital platform for New Delhi Television.

The companies named include Hengli Petrochemical (Dalian) Refining Co., Ltd., Shandong Shouguang Luqing Petrochemical Co., Ltd., Shandong Jincheng Petrochemical Group Co., Ltd., Hebei Xinhai Chemical Group Co., Ltd., and Shandong Shengxing Chemical Co., Ltd.

In this unprecedented act that threatens to trap a vast banking sector in the crossfire as tension rises between the world’s largest economies, China has ordered its companies to ignore U.S. sanctions.

“Beijing has often railed against unilateral sanctions and pronounced them illegitimate, but it has also quietly allowed its largest companies to comply with them, in order to avoid blowback on its own economy and to preserve access to the U.S. financial system,” noted Bloomberg.com.

De-dollarization is a trend gaining momentum to reduce the world’s dependence—especially in the Global South—on the U.S. dollar, which has become the backbone of global trade and the dominant currency in global central bank reserves.

Proponents argue that de-dollarizing would free economies outside the U.S. from the risk of U.S. sanctions and give alternative tenders more sway and independence, Business Insider.com explained.

Africa and countries in the Global South need to decouple from the Western Bretton Woods imperialist model, economist Redge Nkosi, the Pretoria-based founder and executive director of First Source Money and Public Banking of South Africa, told Africa Watch. He is also a former member of South African President Nelson Mandela’s administration.

“They ought to be reformed, but reformation is unlikely because the powerful Global North nations benefit from the poverty of the Global South. Abusing its dominant position, the U.S. has done us a great favor,” he said.

The “favor,” explained Nkosi, is that the U.S. has “abused its dominant position by geopolitically weaponizing this position,” thus assuring the Global South, including Asia, Latin America, the Caribbean, and Africa, that their survival depends on decoupling from Europe and the U.S.

Today’s dominant reserve currency is the U.S. dollar and, to a lesser extent, the Euro. This means all invoicing of international trade is done mostly in U.S. dollars. According to Nkosi, foreign exchange is also done in U.S. dollars. The consequence is that the U.S. gains inordinate financial and geopolitical power. Since all reserves are in U.S. dollars, it gives America the ability to punish at will.

Any country that does not do U.S. bidding—like Russia, Iran, Afghanistan or Cuba—is sanctioned by confiscating the reserves in U.S. dollars or by blocking those countries from accessing the ability to transmit money globally.

These monetary transactions are conducted via the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, or SWIFT. SWIFT is a vast messaging network used by financial institutions to send and receive information, such as money transfers, quickly, accurately, and securely.

In 2023, Nkosi presented at the BRICS Summit in South Africa. “De-dollarization and the construction of a new global financial monetary architecture” was the substance of his talk.

“The Global South countries are sick and tired of the hegemony and the abuse of the hegemony led by the U.S. and Europe,” he said. “And we’re determined to ensure that institutions like the IMF (International Monetary Fund) and World Bank become as obsolete as they are destined to become.”

China’s response to U.S. sanctions—including zero-tariff policies for African goods (covering 53 nations through 2028), retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods, and increased investments in tech—offers Africa a mix of new trade opportunities and potential economic risks. While enhanced access to China’s market helps boost African exports and income, heightened U.S.-China tensions can cause overall commodity price drops and currency volatility, explained Dr. Lauren Johnston, a Consultant Senior Researcher in SAIIA’s Foreign Policy Program, at SAIIA 90 (the 90th anniversary of the South African Institute of International Affairs). Dr. Johnston, who holds a PhD in economics from Peking University, wrote about her observation in an article published in The Conversation.

According to Dr. Johnston, “Substitute African products and potential exports will enjoy a price boost, and elevated Chinese support. China’s newly elevated interest in African development and market potential will bring major prospects. The question will be whether African countries are ready to grasp them, and to use that potential to foster an independent development path of their own.”

China’s challenge to U.S. sanctions comes right before the long-awaited meeting later in May between President Donald Trump and his counterpart Xi Jinping and signals a far more aggressive stance between the world’s largest economies.

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Just as the revitalized southern cotton barons and their northern affiliates trapped Black people under a new form of slave labor, the World Bank, along with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), has trapped countries in Africa and other regions in the Global South with unpayable debt, according to the Geopolitical Economy Report by Ben Norton.

The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, National Representative of the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad, teaches that debt is slavery. In a message delivered to Haitians in downtown Port-au-Prince near the National Palace on December 14, 2011, during his tour of various Caribbean islands to deliver the Teachings of the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad, Minister Farrakhan explained that while some of the anger from citizens in the Caribbean is directed toward people in power, there are other forces at play.

“But what we don’t see is that Haiti, Jamaica, Barbados, Trinidad—all of the islands of the Caribbean have borrowed money from the International Development Bank, and the International Monetary Fund. So, when we borrow their money to help develop our land, they put conditions on the loan that are destined to rob the people of their wealth; so Haiti is in debt, Jamaica is in debt, Trinidad is in debt—Africa is in debt! And debt is another form of slavery!” Minister Farrakhan said.

In David Graeber’s 2011 book, “Debt: The First 5,000 Years,” he explains that debt as a form of imperialism went global. Graeber frames the IMF as the world’s debt enforcer or “The high-finance equivalent of the guys who come to break your legs.” He also explained how modern-day capitalism encourages debt that saddles underdeveloped countries in the Global South, including nations in Africa.

“Unlike advanced (Western) economies, which have highly developed local-currency bond markets (financial market where participants can issue new debt), African countries are subject to prohibitively high interest rates and often cannot borrow from international investors in their own currency (the ‘original sin’ of sovereign-debt markets).”

Enter the United States and Israel’s unprovoked, denounced military assaults on Iran and Lebanon as flagrant violations of international law.

Recently initiated again in February of this year, the unprovoked and illegal war has had the devastating consequences of severely compounding Africa’s debt crisis by driving up inflation, surging oil prices by over 30%, and inflating fertilizer costs. As shipping disruptions continue in the Strait of Hormuz to increase import costs, many African nations face higher borrowing costs, weakening currencies, and increased default risks.

In 2024, Mark Spitznagel, co-founder and CIO (chief investment officer) of the private hedge fund Universa Investments, told Fortune magazine that “when that rising debt combines with decades of loose monetary policy that lifted asset prices ever higher, growing piles of consumer debt, and businesses’ penchant for leaning on credit during times of stress, it creates a ‘tinderbox economy’ that could go up in flames in a moment’s notice. It’s the ‘greatest credit bubble’ in human history.” He warned, “it will have its consequences.”

Though Spitznagel’s focus was the immorality of America’s reliance on debt and the fact that future generations “will bear the burden,” no mention was made of Africa’s history of dependence on those same Western foreign markets. As the saying goes, “When Western capitalism gets a cold, Africa comes down with the flu.”

One may ask, is the Strait of Hormuz the tinderbox economy set to go up in a moment’s notice?

Dr. Zainab Usman, a senior research scholar at the Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University, responded to the London-based The Guardian regarding how the war on Iran and its blockades are affecting some African countries.

“It’s very important,” Dr. Usman stresses, “to understand that while the obstruction of shipping has affected the entire world, that particular choke point” in the Middle East, “accounts for 20% of the world’s shipment of crude oil, and a good chunk of that goes to Asia and parts of east Africa.”

And so, it is countries closer to the Strait of Hormuz and the Indian Ocean that have been most affected. Ethiopia, Kenya, Egypt, and some parts of southern Africa are already experiencing fuel shortages. Countries on the West Coast of Africa facing the Atlantic Ocean have not suffered from similar supply disruptions. However, a hike in fuel prices is landing across the continent. Costs have risen, Dr. Usman told The Guardian, stating that between 30 and 70%, and at the most extreme end, up to 150% in Somalia.

Africa’s inability to achieve sustainable development goals amid rising debt levels requires financial resources that the current Global Financial Architecture (GFA), by design, doesn’t allow the continent to access.

In the 2024 United Nations: Office of Special Adviser on Africa report, “Unpacking Africa’s Debt: Towards a lasting and durable solution,” it states, “Newly independent African nations inherited economies that were ill-equipped for diversified growth and socioeconomic development.”

The report continued, “As a result, they resorted to external borrowing to facilitate broad-based economic development and nation‑building. This marked the genesis of a cycle of public debt and arguably a continuation of the extraction characteristic of the colonial era. The perpetuation of this debt cycle also served to anchor the extraction-based economic model in African countries. Therefore, the issue of colonial and post-colonial debt remains a contentious and complex issue for many African countries, highlighting the need for fair and just solutions that consider the historical context of debt accumulation.”

Tendai Mbanje is a governance and elections scholar and is widely recognized for his expertise in African electoral processes. In his recent op-ed titled, “When Superpowers Clash, Africa Pays the Price: The Israel–USA–Iran Conflict,” he suggests that as Africa seeks “stronger alliances to mitigate shocks,” it must at the same time discover guarantees that prove their “effectiveness.”

“The continent may seek stronger alliances to mitigate external shocks, but these structures must prove their effectiveness. The erosion of trust in global institutions could drive Africa to advocate for reforms in global governance. The challenge lies in building resilience, asserting diplomatic agency, and demanding accountability in a world where the rules of war and peace are being rewritten,” he notes.

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In my commentary, I wrote about Jamaican columnist Betty Ann Blaine, who, in an article she wrote at the time, focused on the challenges of Caribbean politics that troubled the social, economic, and political conditions of both the West Indies and the African continent. The lack of willingness, including neocolonial impediments, prevented the building of coalitions that could have expanded Blaine’s critique to include Africa and the entire North American African diaspora. In her 2012 treatise, Blaine, a columnist for the Jamaican Observer, expressed particular concern for religious leaders and their roles.

Quoting Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and his critique of the Black church, she wrote, “In spite of the noble affirmations of Christianity, the church has often lagged in its concern for social justice and too often has been content to mouth pious irrelevances and sanctimonious trivialities.”

She continued, writing, “Any religion that professes to be concerned with the souls of men and is not concerned with the economic and social conditions that strangle them and the social conditions that cripple them is the kind the Marxist describes as ‘an opiate of the people.’”

As I wrote in my 2012 article, Blaine’s ruminations were a direct response to Minister Farrakhan’s first leg of his Caribbean tour and his past tours of Africa, including his highly anticipated address to African heads of state and delegates at the Second African/ African-American Summit in Libreville, Gabon, in May 1993.

During his 1993 message, Minister Farrakhan highlighted the need for unity between Africans in the diaspora. His weighty words focused on bridging the gap between Africa and Black Americans, fostering a “strong united hand,” and making Africa into a 21st-century superpower.

Minister Farrakhan, whose parents hailed from the West Indies, delivered a similar message in the Caribbean, calling for regional unity as the only way for Caribbean peoples to withstand the onslaught of Western economic and cultural imperialism. His message, especially geared toward the entire Black world, is to galvanize economic and political resources and synthesize ideological bents as the only way to survive.

However, Minister Farrakhan has also explained the importance of not being beholden to outside influences, something that our people in America, Africa and the Caribbean should take heed to.

The continuing “absence of moral capital” and the manifested “poverty of ideas,” as declared by Blaine in her description of the Caribbean region’s ruling class, which is being replicated in Africa, can be summed up in Minister Farrakhan’s July 10, 2010, open letter to Black leaders.

In it, he describes the inability of the wealthy and influential to effect positive changes among the masses if they are beholden to outside forces.

“However, have you ever noticed that no matter how rich and powerful some of us have become, we have never been shown how to network with the wealthy and learned of our people, pooling our resources that we may produce for our people that which would grow us from a begging position as little children to become masters of our own destiny?”

The absence of original or good ideas geared toward self-actualization and self-reliance is evident in the neoliberal directives from which some government leaders derive their marching orders. And at times, as the popularity of many Black government officials or heads of state increases, their connection to their constituents’ needs can decrease. Likewise, as their relationships with those in the past, they were critical of increases—including multinational interest groups—addressing the needs of their community, becomes co-opted. It becomes compromised by approaches that take into account the newfound support they receive from those with whom they were once in opposition.

During his address at the summit in Gabon, Minister Farrakhan referenced both the Bible and the Holy Qur’an to encourage the Black American and African leaders to seek a higher power than the neocolonialism that continues to deny Africa its ability to unify and realize its full potential.

“We are here at a summit because each one of us is losing power, authority, wealth, self-esteem, and the dignity of our own humanity because we’re in a new form of slavery called debt. Surely, man is in loss. Why, because we are not aware of the time,” Minister Farrakhan said.

“It is not the time by our watch, but the time by Allah’s (God’s) measurement of time. What time is it? We are at the time of the end of White supremacy. We are at the time of the end of White domination of the darker peoples of the world. We are at the time of the end of racism, sexism and materialism,” he said.

Today, in 2026, for the African continent, watching from afar, the destabilization of the Western world’s economic system is not enough. Africa and Africans and Blacks in the diaspora must prepare for the possibility of a prolonged war in the Middle East and its impact. For Africa, unity would have global implications that, in turn, would impact the world.

As economist Jeffrey Sachs noted in the April 16 edition of the International Affairs Forum, on their own, 55 individual African nations are too small to achieve the kind of global role and competitiveness the continent needs.

“However, if Africa truly creates a political, economic, financial, and eventually monetary union, then it will be able to emulate the great successes of China and India. With a single market, a unified financial system, and increasing monetary integration, Africa will be well positioned to create a truly unified economic space, also deeply interconnected by transboundary infrastructure (for power, fiber, roads, rail, shipping, and ecosystem management). Moreover, with a strong union, Africa will be positioned to play a global diplomatic role as well, helping to lead global decision-making in key international forums.”

This unity also applies to the Caribbean nations and Black America, all of which should heed Minister Farrakhan’s guidance, benefiting the entire diaspora.

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“The Israel-U.S. war on Iran is engulfing the entire Middle East and could escalate to global war. The economic consequences are already severe and could become catastrophic,” noted Jeffrey D. Sachs, director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University.

And Sybil Fares, a specialist in Middle East policy and sustainable development, in their recent article published on CommonDreams.org, which also ran on the digital news platform theAfrican.co.za.

In their commentary, they argue that the aim of Israel and the U.S. is “a Greater Israel that absorbs all historic Palestine, combined with compliant Arab and Islamic governments stripped of genuine sovereignty, including on choices as to how and where they export their oil and gas.”

In Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and U.S. President Donald Trump’s strategy, bombing and killing civilians throughout the entire region is becoming the norm.

This includes the total destruction of Gaza, expanding settlements, seizing land, and intensifying military operations in the occupied West Bank, invading, occupying, and displacing over one million Lebanese, and striking Iraq, Syria, and Yemen. Add to that, the bombing of Iran, including schools, houses of worship and hospitals.

The commentary by Sachs and Fares offers BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) and its expanded membership, representing nearly half of the world’s population and more than 40 percent of the world’s GDP (Gross Domestic Product), as a way out of the approaching global debacle.

“The BRICS have the credibility, the economic weight, and the absence of historical complicity in Middle East imperialism to bring the world to its senses. The BRICS should convene an emergency summit and present a unified framework incorporating the conditions for peace and security, which in turn would be pressed at the UN Security Council,” their article notes.

Shiri Fein-Grossman is CEO of the Israel-Africa Relations Institute and an expert on foreign policy, Africa’s global role, and regional normalization. In the latest edition of the Jerusalem Strategic Tribune, Fein-Grossman writes, “Africa occupies an increasingly pivotal position in the emerging global order.”

According to Fein-Grossman, in her article titled “The Iran War Is Recasting the Red Sea and the Horn of Africa as a Strategic Battleground,” she explained that Africa is home to vast reserves of essential minerals necessary for advanced manufacturing, defense technologies, and the global energy transition.

“Cobalt from the Democratic Republic of Congo, platinum from South Africa and lithium from southern Africa are critical for batteries, semiconductors and clean energy technologies,” are just some of the resources Fein-Grossman notes.

Additionally, the African continent’s maritime corridors are key. Africa connects the Atlantic, the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean trade networks. And with the globe’s fastest-growing population, projected to reach 2.5 billion by 2050, and its expanding consumer markets, the continent is becoming an increasingly important arena for economic influence.

The war initiated by the U.S. and Israel has resulted in the Islamic Republic of Iran strategically regionalizing the conflict. “Iran is not treating the confrontation as a bilateral exchange with Israel or the U.S., but as a multi-theatre conflict in which different fronts—Lebanon, Iraq, the Persian Gulf, and maritime chokepoints—are integrated into a single strategic space.

This allows Tehran to stretch U.S. and Israeli resources, complicating their planning and creating constant uncertainty about where pressure will emerge next,” said Hamidreza Azizi, a visiting fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP) in Berlin, during an interview published on the website of The Carnegie Middle East Center.

According to Azizi, Iran is producing a new strategic equation in which the threshold for attacking the country has been raised, including fallout from the Strait of Hormuz and U.S. interests in the Middle East. Another result is that Africa’s fuel vulnerability being exposed.

One-third of the global seaborne fertilizer trade passes through the Strait of Hormuz. According to CNBC, noted Oxford Economics, “Urea and ammonia prices (from which fertilizer is produced), since the war has surged by … 50% and 20% respectively. Sub-Saharan Africa, importing over 80% of its fertilizer, is acutely affected, threatening food security and increasing agricultural costs.”

Africa’s response thus far to the war in Iran has been generic calls for restraint and dialogue, with warnings about the disastrous consequences of this intensifying war, without naming the aggressors.

In an opinion piece published on Al Jazeera by Tafi Mhaka, a social and political commentator, titled “Iran today, Africa tomorrow,” Mhaka writes that “Africa must stand up to the many faces of imperial power, including through coordinated action at the African Union and the United Nations General Assembly.”

Mhaka invoked the circumstances that led to the founding of the Organization of African Unity (OAU) in Addis Ababa on May 25, 1963. One of its core principles was respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity.

“On that occasion, Ghana’s founding president Kwame Nkrumah warned fellow African leaders that ‘independence is only the prelude to a new and more involved struggle for the right to conduct our own economic and social affairs unhampered by crushing and humiliating neo-colonialist controls and interference,’” Mhaka wrote.

To correct and adjust its affairs, Africa needs a global engagement strategy that fosters African unity, builds strong relationships with partners, and protects a multilateral system.

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