I finally watched the AJ (Al Jazeera) Stream “debate” on “Is Zambia’s democracy in danger?” In summary: It is a shitstorm of people shouting over each other. By the end, no one else was the wiser about what was going on in Zambia. It was exhausting just listening to these. Laura Miti was an exception, but even she could not compete with the spin. Predictably, Jeffrey Smith and his consultancy made an appearance. Where there’s “political crisis …” And these people were just party operatives and “social commentators.” I can’t even imagine what it would be like if the actual political leaders went on air. As someone said on Twitter: “Zambians don’t deserve their self-serving politicians.”

The US outsourced some parts of its occupation in Iraq to private security companies, who in turn hired former child soldiers. Yes. Because they’re cheap, it keeps overheads low: USD$ 250 per soldier. That’s after Peruvians, Colombians, and Ugandans – seemingly the usual “soldiers for hire” – were deemed too expensive.

The band Radiohead is embarking on a “World Tour.” For some bizarre reason they’ll start in Apartheid Israel. Thom Yorke, the band’s leader, has resisted requests he cancel the trip to Apartheid Israel and that he join the cultural boycott. He said, among others, he knows about Palestinian suffering because the wife of one his band members is Israeli. SMH. Nevertheless, Yorke’s prevarications reminds me of Paul Simon’s explanations for breaking the cultural boycott against apartheid South Africa to make his Graceland album.

Who is behind the slick Mawazo Institute, and why are they secretive about who funds this? Meanwhile, I am also anticipating the “this is decolonizing education in Africa” tweets and op-eds, something like the free advertising The Conversation Africa gave the private African Leadership University.

There is a new film out about Winnie Mandela, Winnie. Reviewing the film, Sisonke Msimang wrote what is probably the best thing you’ll read about Winnie Mandela in a long while. Not to be outdone, Huffington Post South Africa interviewed the Mother of the Nation. Their salacious headline about Nelson Mandela’s many extra-marital children takes away attention from what else Winnie Mandela has to say on more substantive politics. Though why Winnie Mandela repeats unsubstantiated and slanderous claims that it was ANC people who killed Chris Hani, I don’t know. On Nelson Mandela and sainthood: By now, anyone who still thinks the old man was some saint must have been living under a rock.

The best Twitter reaction to Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party’s gains in British elections (despite the media and the pollsters) came from Kitila Mkumbo, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Water and Irrigation of Tanzania: “Long live Socialism and leftism!”

This is a spot-on diagnosis of American Left politics.

Why is Vice News’s daily television news bulletin only on premier cable HBO, which is behind a paywall? That’s a shame, because it is really good.

Regular Africa Is a Country contributor Omolade Adunbi ‘s book Oil Wealth and Insurgency in Nigeria (published by Indiana University Press) has won The Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland’s Amaury Talbot Prize for African Anthropology.

I finally got to see “The Fall,” Daniel Gordon’s documentary about the 1984 Olympic 3000-meter final between Zola Budd and Mary Decker, then the top American runner. Budd, just 18 at the time, had gone from competing in whites-only races in South Africa to running for the UK, after The Daily Mail fast-tracked her citizenship so she could compete in the Olympics. South Africa, under apartheid, was banned from the Games. The race’s outcome is well known: Decker fell. She blamed Budd, and the media and crowd ran with that narrative. I hadn’t seen Budd speaking at length on camera—not just about the race, but about apartheid. I was especially eager to hear what she had to say about that. The film includes powerful footage of the anti-apartheid protests in Western Europe aimed at Budd’s participation. Back then, Budd wouldn’t admit whether apartheid was wrong, insisting that “sports and politics don’t mix.” Strikingly, the documentary shows that even decades later, she still defends that stance and sees herself as the victim—a position not uncommon among white South Africans of her generation and that before her. There’s also a moment where Budd comments on her father being bisexual or gay. All she gets out is: “He was different.”

“Sembene,” the documentary film about the great Senegalese Marxist filmmaker and former dockworker Ousmane Sembene (“the father of African cinema”) can be viewed for free until tonight.  Watch it here.

South Africa’s new Deputy Chief Justice, Raymond Zondo, and Solly Bux, who helped him get there part of the way, are both working-class heroes.

Nigeria’s elites are in a class of their own. President Muhammadu Buhari is in London again on “medical leave.”  Since January, he has spent more than SEVENTY DAYS there on two trips. An investment consultant told the Wall Street Journal: “Will he survive this year? I doubt it. You look at him, you know he’s terminally ill.” Vice President Oluyemi Osinbajo effectively runs the country, but everyone must keep up appearances. Osinbajo is a Southerner, and since the advent of democracy, northern and southern elites have passed their presidency between them. It is now the North’s turn, though, like with President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, the North feels it may be shortchanged if Buhari, too, dies in office.  “There are those who are prepared to work hard to make [Mr. Buhari] stay on as president, even if he is a vegetable.”

Meanwhile, it emerged last week that 55 top businesspeople and government officials stole US$4.4 billion from the Nigerian state since the advent of democratic rule at the end of the 1990s. And remember that story of US$43 million and another UK£27,800 cash lying around an apartment in Lagos, Nigeria? The apartment was owned by the wife of the Director-General of the National Intelligence Agency, who is being investigated for corruption. Now the government claims “no one has come forward to claim” the money so wants to keep it. Should we even trust them?

In South Africa, where the government continues its murderous assault against black people, a two-week-old baby dies during housing protests in Durban, South Africa: she inhaled tear gas fired by police.

The Guptas, the family of immigrant Indian businessmen who are the corrupt benefactors and enablers of South Africa’s President, turn out to be racist against black people, despite all their talk of black empowerment and ending white monopoly capital. Here’s from workers at a wedding the family threw:  Workers at the Sun City resort (yes, that same resort) reported that Gupta security personnel ordered black waiters to wash themselves before they could serve the wedding guests. This blatantly means that black people smell and smelly black people could not serve the Gupta guests, a resort employee told Sunday paper, City Press. The paper also added that bodyguards and butlers hired for the wedding were white.

I’m just going to leave this here: A Ghanaian church in Accra held a Thanksgiving service for Chelsea FC supporters (the club won the English Premier League). Everyone came decked out in new replica shirts. The pastor is an Arsenal fan. Not to be outdone, a Nigerian state government used public money to celebrate Real Madrid’s UEFA Champions League title win (that’s that game after which Juventus manager said about Cristiano Ronaldo: “What are you going to do? He looks like he is napping all game and then he pops up and scores two goals.”).

Here’s quick quiz: “Just compare the number of pictures of fallen trees in driveways with SUVs with the number of pictures of flooded shacks. See if there are more stories of foam on the Sea Point promenade than interviews with those injured and left homeless, and see if you can find any hard questions posed to the [Western Cape provincial government or the City of Cape Town] about what has been done since previous winters, and you’ll have your answer.” That’s my friend (and AIAC contributor) Herman Wasserman responding to my question whether media coverage of the damage caused by rainstorms in Cape Town (especially on the Cape Flats where most of its black residents live) has gotten any better since Ron Krabill and I did this mid-2000s study.

By the way, long before people got woke to “ghetto tourism,” we told you about “township tourism.

Respect to the memory of Namibian freedom fighter Andimba Toivo ya Toivo, who passed away last week. So did the famed South African photographer Ranjit Kally. They were both 92 years old.

Finally, the Ivorian footballer Cheikh Tiote collapsed on his Chinese club’s training field and died. Tiote won an African Cup of Nations with Cote d’Ivoire, but played his best football for Newcastle in England’s Premier League, where he scored this goal to tie the score against Arsenal in 2011.