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Stephen Onyango Ouma, "Africa Unbound: Decolonial Pathways to Sovereignty and Liberation" (Brill, 2026)
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Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
Welcome to the New Books Network.
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Emi Sabakuri
Hello and welcome to the New Books Network. I am Emi Sabakuri, one of your hosts. Today I am pleased to talk to Dr. Steven Onyango Uma to discuss his new book, Africa the Colonial Pathways to Sovereignty and Liberation, published by Brill in 2026. In this thought provoking book, Dr. Stephen Onyangu Uma invites readers to reconsider the meanings of freedom, sovereignty and liberation in contemporary Africa. Stephen, welcome to the New Books Network. I am so delighted to have you here.
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Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
Thank you so much. My name is Steven Olango. I am happy to be with you here. Thank you.
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Emi Sabakuri
Thank you so much. So, before we dive into the book itself, I would like to begin with you. Could you introduce yourself to our listeners? Your background, the work you do, and how you came to be interested in questions of decolonization, Pan Africanism and African futures. I mean, there are so much more teams, but let's stick with this for now.
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Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
Thank you. Thank you very much indeed. They are very interesting teams. As I said. My name is Stephen. I am a scholar and a writer and most of my work or writings focus on the intersection of African philosophy, political philosophy and decolonial thought. This is where I center most of my research and my work is also driven. My scholarly work is also driven by the Central Question which is actually troubling us as Africans. And I try to battle with this question thinking about what would it be actually mean for Africa to be truly free? Truly free, not just politically independent like you say. Most of the 54 of them are politically independent. But economically, in terms of freedom, economically the sovereignty is not there. Intellectually we are not free. And culturally we are still being self determined. I mean self defined, for that matter. These questions actually are the ones that are battling me because when you observe across Africa, there is a persistent contradiction. Across the continent. Many African states possess the so called formal sovereignty which they are given with flags. They have constitutions, they have elections, period. I mean, you know, year in, year out, after five years, some, you know, four years. But we remain deeply constrained in the economic and policy choices that have been determined from outside. For example, if you allow me, when government, for example, look at the African government, there have been attempts to implement independent economic policies, but they are controlled from outside. They are often checked either through debt obligations or external financial pressures like imf, World banks. This reveal that that sovereignty in many African cases is still sort of negotiated, either in Washington or in Paris. We are not, you know, when you're negotiating about your independence somewhere else, then it means we've not started exercising that independentness of US African. So we see this clearly in, even in our budget priorities. In some African countries, they are shaped by debt servicing and domestic development needs. For example, there are so many instances, look at countries like Zambia, a large portion of their national revenue go towards debt repayment rather than infrastructure, healthcare or education. So this raises a deeper philosophical issue. Can a state be considered fully sovereign if it cannot freely determine how its resources are being allocated? I don't want to talk about the DRC Congo. It was a very painful situation. So generally, just to sum it up, my work is really about interrogating that gap between symbolic independence and when we talk about substantive freedom and how do we explore pathways through which African can, you know, reclaim that control, not just politically but structurally and also intellectually. So we need to carry out this discourse of decolonization as well. I think generally speaking, that's what I would say.
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Emi Sabakuri
Thank you so much. I think you feel a bit frustrated about the intellectual gap, the economic issues and all that. And I also like how you point out some examples and what is really happening on the ground, showing that. Indeed, I think in your work I might not mention it very well. So I'm paraphrasing it. You talk about how political independence has not really dissolved the structures of domination. So I really get what you are doing in the book. And it speaks of a lot of things and a lot of themes. And it's more like decolonization should be holistic, like you talk about. Also, I was wondering, so what sparked the idea for Africa Unbound? Is it this frustration or is it the historical moments or is it the intellectual gap that pushed you to say, I have to write this book?
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Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
Yeah, of course, as I said, looking about the contradictions that are there. We purport to be independent, but ideally we are not independent our minds. So there's a book written by one of the great scholars in African philosophy called VY Mudimbe. In his book the Invention of Africa, Mugimbe talks about we being spiritually or intellectually colonized. Frank Farnum was frustrated with this in his work Black Skin, White Mask. Ideally we are Africans, but our thinking configurations are actually Western. Because the Western people are very clever. They knew when we capture them intellectually, then we dominate them. So we are dominated in all angles. Economically, we are dominated. Politically, we are dominated. Our elections sometimes are Besides somewhere else. Our economic policies are dictated from somewhere else. Our religion. Africans are proudly. They have subscribed to Western religion. We are divided. A case study is in Nigeria between the Muslims and the Africa. I mean, and the Christians. And it is very clear, telling me in any European country, the religion is issued one. You go to Italy. Italy, for example, it is dominated by when you are religiously dominated. And like one of our great scholars is called in his work African Philosophy and Religion, that is John Beatty. We had our religious systems and worldview. But when they came here, they say these are superstitious, they are backward. And therefore, in the name of civilization, we are bringing new religion and we need to accept it. And we are forced to do that. But to see we are what I call religiously colonized as well. And so these are the things that actually are pricing me. Because I need my people to be liberated. And the best way to foster this is to bring to their attention on the fact that something has to be done. We need to re examine some of these issues. So it arise, this book actually arise from that deep discomfort that I've been having with the idea that African liberation is already complete. But ideally, there is nothing absolutely when you look at history from a transatlantic trade, slave trade, I mean, that was happening when Africans were enslaved. You come to the second bit of it on the Berlin conference, where the European in their hedonic system sat down, divided Africa with a stroke of a pen. Africa was conquered at that point. And it is quite frustrating because we were organized structurally all the way before economies. Our economies were redesigned for exception. Our identities were reshaped and our knowledge system displaced. So the moment institutionalized fragmentation like that happens. Borders drawn, language. I'm now holding, holding this interview with you, eloquently talking English. I wish we could have one African language. Africa is divided. Francophone. You know, we talk about francophone, talk about the Anglophone. You move to one country, you have to speak another language. You move to another country, you require another passport. Traveling in Africa is hectic. You can't talk to your brother in the next. It's quite frustrating because borders were drawn without regard for cultural or linguistic consideration or political realities, making tension that persist today. For example, conflict in regions like Sahel or part of Central Africa are often rooted in colonial boundaries that forced a group of people, you know, like in Kenya, from Kenya. In Kenya, we have the Maasai of Tanzania and the Maasais of Kenya. And then they want to go and greet their brothers on the other side. They have to look for a passport. And this thing brings tension because those political fragmentation, those boundaries, fragmentation of people. 1 People who are in one unit suddenly has no connection. So take, for example, the case of Congo. Leopold ii. Brutally, you know, actually Leopold took Congo as if it was his own state. He brutally killed millions of Congolese who are lost. We lost lives. Nobody's talking about that. Million lost just because he wanted to extract rubber was not just. Was not just a strategy. I mean, a tragedy. It was. So when you look all these things, really, we are talking about independent, but we are not independent. We are not. Africa is still within the grip of the chains that were put way, way back from Berlin conference up to date. That cause is still haunting us. So we need to break those chains. So this. This is why I'm a little bit focused on how can we liberate ourselves. So if. Because I believe if a system of exploitation continue in the new form, whether it is neocolonization, can we really call that a freedom? No. This question become, you know, the foundation of most of my writing. And it is what is really, really pressing me to liberate my people. Thank you, Amsa.
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Emi Sabakuri
Thank you so much. Stephen. The title itself speaks to what you are saying, because the title says Africa Unbound, which is so powerful. And I wanted to take a moment to, like, touch on the unbound. I know you've talked about the Berlin conference, the transatlantic slave trade. Is it. So is the Africa unbound In this title, is it freedom from domination. Or freedom to imagine new futures? Or is it both?
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Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
When it is both, it is both. We need to do away with the freedom of domination. In any form that it comes. But as we talk about freedom from domination. Whether linguistically Africa is, you know, language, that very important thing. When you are linguistically dominated. There are things that you cannot think outside your language. Or you distort them when you imagine them in another language. And this is a problem we are also having on translation. Where most of our works have been distorted. One classical African philosopher that I would like to or recommend or have act on this very comprehensively on the distortion of African languages. Talking about decolonizing the mine. Okot Bitek of Uganda, a conceptual analyst in his work the Religion of the Central Luo. Talks about how the European anthropologists. Were systematically stand to come. And distort our conceptions and our worldviews. About God among the lower people. And so, as we talk about this domination. Whether it is linguistic domination, Whether it is a political domination. Whether it is whichever economic domination. We need to reimagine the future. And the possibility of how Africa can get out of that age.
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Emi Sabakuri
Thank you so much. So, based on Ngugu Watango and your own debates on language and language politics. I was wondering that what might African languages do when it comes to intellectual liberation? And how is this connected deeply to language? I know you've touched on it, but I wanted you to build upon it for us. Especially in education and publishing. And they tell me now I'm speaking to you in English. Perhaps I could have spoken to you in Swahili or. Or Akan or another language from Africa. But I just wanted to take a moment at this point. To like, discuss what epistemic conquest, as you used in your book. Really, really means. Especially looking at language.
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Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
Yes, thank you so much. I use that word, epistemic conquest. To show that we are. Like I said, we are conquered. I mean, I don't know what the last time. Right time to use. But we are being conquered in all forms. Now, let me just go back to that. The issue of language and the epistemic conquest. Language, according to Ngukiwadiyong, is a very crucial tool. Language can be used for domination. And language can also be used for liberation. And like I told you, when you look at Africa, generally speaking. It is a very worrying trend. Here in Kenya, we speak English. Sometimes when I teach my students, I tell them I'm a little bit. I expressed my discomfort with deliberating my classes in A foreign language. I was thinking them. What if I was to make this lecture in my Dunuo language or in any African language? I would feel very proud. So epistemic freedom. I use it to show that we need to reclaim Africa, must reclaim our authority to define knowledge and reality. Because when we lose that focus, then we will still remain in that domination aspect. As I told you, Ngugi Wabiongu argues, colonialism did not end with political independence. It persists in how people think, learn and interpret the world. That's very key in practice. Epistemic freedom would mean education system that integrates African philosophies. History in Kenya. Here we are now forcing our students to focus more on stem. That means on sciences. And forget about history. History is a very powerful tool which most of our university does not encourage because it is through history. When you know your history, you become a revolutionary. In Africa, we say, he who is ignorant of his history is a slave. So why are we not exposing our children to learn about their history? They can be good experts or good doctors. But if you are ignorant of your history, then you will just perpetuate the domination tendency. That epistemic aspect of the history must be there. And knowledge systems, our traditional knowledge system must also be, you know, be in the global frontline. So it would also actually mean we need to value our indigenous knowledge in areas like medicine, agriculture, and in conflict resolution. So if I give you another, I mean an example, in some African community, traditional ecological knowledge was very important and actually has been proven to be more sustainable than these externally exposed agricultural models. Yet such knowledge is often dismissed because it does not fit within the dominant Western scientific framework. So epistemic freedom is very key if Africa want to realize her potential. It is therefore about restoring the balance, recognizing that African knowledge is equal to the Western knowledge and they are not inferior like they show it outside there, but they are equal and also valid and necessary for for Africa. So unless we dive into that epistemic freedom to reclaim our authority to define our knowledge and our reality, then I also think that decolonization and liberation can be illusionary. I get so many headaches every month.
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Emi Sabakuri
Thank you so much. That is so fascinating because in your book you really talk about the epistemic conquest where colonialism did not just seize land and resources, but it shaped knowledge and why there is the need for epistemic freedom in our everyday life, in everyday African life. So, and you make this very, very clear. Epistemic justice, indigenous knowledge, systems, language and politics are all very important to African sovereignty. I want to take a moment to also talk about Pan. Okay, please go ahead.
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Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
I just wanted to add something a little bit about that because that also is actually the core of actually my book. Because if we don't focus on that, then I think whatever we have been discussing about here will be rendered useless. True liberation. In the heart of this book, what I try to point out is that political independence without structural transformation is, if I may say, illusion. True liberation must happen across what I call four levels. Economic, political, cultural and epistemic. All those has to be in an interplay. So this builds from thinkers like Frank Farnham, I told you in his work Black Skin, White Mask, and even another work that he wrote on the wretched of the earth to people like Walter Rodney, Europe, underdeveloped Africa, who showed that domination operates beyond is they call political control. Our presidents proudly think that political freedom is all about freedom. No, but they are being controlled from outside. Their policies are dictated from outside. So Western countries, African countries, they hold elections regularly, yet still they lack control over its currency, our currency. Kenya shimming, Nigeria, they naira. We don't have control of those currencies. They're being controlled from outside. When the dollar goes up, our currencies are sometimes rendered useless. Again. The other thing is trade policies. This is where organizations like W is called the one which stands for trade. Who they declared most of our trade policies industrial directions. They direct how we operate. In such cases, democracy exists procedurally, but not substantively. This is evident in several African economies where policies positions are constrained by external lending conditions or global financial institutions. So again, when you talk about cultural. Because epistemic freedom also encompasses cultural freedom. So cultural the situation is equally complex. Many African societies continue to measure progress using, you know, they call them external benchmarking that might not actually align with the local realities. Again, epistemic freedom also encompasses educational systems that prioritize foreign epistemologies while actually sidelining our indigenous knowledge. Very traumatizing. So this creates a disconnect between the formal knowledge and the lived experience. You cannot impose a system on a people. So I don't know what to say. But liberation must be holistic, like I told you, without transforming the underlying structures that shape the economic production, knowledge and governance. Then when we surely we cannot talk about independence, it actually remains incomplete. Yes.
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Emi Sabakuri
Thank you so much. I think you were highlighting also about the IMF and the World bank and international financial corporations and all their roles they play and how it impacts. Unfortunately, it's on balance when it comes to African countries or what they call Global South. I also wanted to talk about Pan Africanism, especially in the 21st century, because it's a major trend running throughout your book and it's actually associated with Kwame Nkoma Julius Nyerele and Patrice Lumumba. But then I was wondering, what does Pan Africanism mean in the 21st century today? And I'm more curious about this because the world is increasingly shaped by geopolitical competitions. Global North, Global South, United States, China, Russia, Europe. And do you think Pan African solidarity is becoming more agents or even more questioned?
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Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
Thank you very much. Pan Africanism should come proclaim at this point because like you mentioned Kwame Nkrumah, among others who are associated with Pan Africanism. We have Kwame Nkrumah and even those from diaspora like WA Du Bois and so on and so forth. They created for us an ideology that I think when we use or when put to use properly, can actually contribute to the African liberation. I use it in my work as a tool for liberation. Pan Africanism seen today of youth in contemporary Africa today must move from being historical ideal into practical framework for collective transformation. Let us stop viewing Pan Africanism as an ideology, but transform it to practical framework that can help us in the transformation of Africa. So leaders like Kwame Nkrumah understood that. That for Africa to be liberated, then the fragmentations that were brought as a result of the Padin Conference was a great, a greatest threat to African liberation. So that fragmentation was its greatest vulnerability. Because tell me, a country like Ken cannot do a serious economic business with usa. They are not on the same side economically. But imagine a united Africa having trade negotiations with America, then that makes sense. Countries like Djibouti, countries like Lesotho, in their small size, want to have a trade agreement with China. Where else can that happen? You cannot put the two in the ring. So we need to use Pan Africanism today to envision Africa that can define its own term in today's global system, where power like you say is organized China and all that, like the European Union or other emerging alliances that are coming together, individual African states often lack the skills to compete with them effectively. That one cannot happen, otherwise they will dictate the terms and conditions. So we are beginning to see a practical step in the Pan Africanism towards envisioning a Pan Africanism idea, or rather transforming that into a practical situation with emerging trade organizations like what the African countries passed sometime back on. Continental African Free Trade Area. African Continental. I don't know. It's called African Continental Free Trade Area. Yes. Which aims to actually increase the intra African trade and reduce dependency on external markets. Very important. I see that as an aspect in the spirit of Pan Africanism. And if fully realized, it would fundamentally reshape the production patterns across the continent. Because one thing we have to put clear, Africa must stop being what one of our greatest scholars say is called that African produces what he doesn't consume and consume what he doesn't produces. We have to make sure that Africa become an industrialization powerhouse. Because how long are we going to be dependent? We cannot just be producers. Let us also set up factories, Let us have industries. Let our goods not just be extracted and taken outside. And then they brought to us finished. Good. Look at oil in Nigeria. Nigerians produce oil, but they import the finished oil. I mean, petrol for their cars. You know, it's a contradictory. A state that produces oil, imports petrol and other energies to support itself. It's a total contradiction. So we have to, for example, encourage that spirit of African continental free trade area, which actually I see it in the spirit of Pan Africanism. And also, for example, instead of exporting raw cottons to Europe and re importing refinished textiles in Kenya, secondhand clothes are doing better than the one we made locally. Surely African countries must build their industries. African country could build integrated value chains within the continent if they are supposed to be free. This would not only retain the wealth, but also generate employment and also our industrial capacity. So Pan Africanism ambition today, therefore is not just about unity in principle. It is about economic coordination, shared infrastructures, and also strategic collaboration. That's what we need in the spirit of Pan Africanism. Thank you.
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Emi Sabakuri
Thank you so much, Simon. I think at this point, and with all you've said about Pan Africanism, we can now talk about the futures. Because you really point to African futures at this point. And so I would like to ask you, you devote a lot of significant attention to the African youth, and rightly so. But I have a question about this. We've seen movements such as NSAs in Nigeria, youth led tax protests in Kenya, students movements across the continent. What do you think African youth are doing? Are they beginning to redefine what political participation looks like? Or does this speak to the African futures, youth futures that you are thinking of? Or if you are thinking of something very different.
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Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
Thank you so much. You know, the youth movement in Africa is also just built on what I've said before on Pan Africanism. I also see it in the spirit of Pan Africanism.
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Emi Sabakuri
Yeah, I think
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Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
the generation, the youth generation for that matter, have become game changers in the African political scene. Because what excites me is that this generation is refusing inherited limitations. They are not bowing. They have been cheated enough and enough is enough. They want to reclaim their sovereignty and through activism, the activists who are not vowing to the inherited limitations that came as a result of colonialism across the continent. When you look about this, what is interesting about this movement across the continent, young people are challenging the authorities, organizing movements and using digital platform to demand accountability from their leaders. We saw it in Kenya with the Finance Bill 2025, which actually forced the president to drop it because it was disastrous. And the youth say, no, we are not going to pap. We saw youth protest, like in Kenya, like you said in Nigeria, NSAs, and the civic activism in countries like Senegal and also in recently Uganda, we saw it. So these movements are not isolated. You should not think about them in isolation. They are interconnected. You see, these guys are coming through digital platforms. They're sharing ideas, they are organizing strategies on what to move. Like in Kenya, I saw they were organizing protests from all over the country. And you wonder, you know, the Internet have also become a blessing in disguise in this revolution. So because through those digital platform, they allow ideas, strategies and solidarities to move across borders more rapidly than the government intelligence could foresee, creating a new form of lived Pan Africanism. So this generation is also redefining our identity. They are less bound by colonial categories and more open to, you know, hybridization, what I can call hybridization, that means the dynamic form of being African in a globalized. While, you know, and I think this is one of the medicine to these puppet leaders, African leaders who are being put to power through internal, I mean, external interference. We are having elections. They are not free and fair. The youth comes out to demand for accountability, which actually our fathers, the last generation, were not able to do that. So Africa is rising and the youth are on the center stage demanding for accountability, sending a serious signal to our leaders that if you're not doing the right thing, then you must be in for it. And I think this is something that we need to embrace as Africans. We are now going beyond intimidation.
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Emi Sabakuri
Thank you so much, Steven. And since we are talking about digital systems, you mentioned about digital imperialism in your book, and that's the growing control of African digital infrastructures. And it made me wonder if beyond the dangers of digital imperialism, are there opportunities with digital technologies to create the sovereign, genuine, sovereign Africa that you look forward to?
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Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
Yes, thank you so much. As I said in my last response, that technology is a blessing, but also is a blessing in disguise for Africans, because technology offer both risks and opportunities, but the opportunities are more transformative, like we see in the case of the youth protest across Africa, if properly harnessed There is more to see in the transformative sense, or rather in what we call the opportunity side. But also we have to be very careful. The platforms are not ours. And therefore, you know, the issue of data, who control that data? So economically, digital platforms have enabled innovations like when you come to Kenya, we have MPESA which has transformed the lives of many people across Africa now. And it has also expanded our financial inclinations for millions of people across Africa. Similarly, you go to Nigeria, we have an ecosystem like fintech in Nigeria. They are creating new forms of economic participation outside the traditional banking systems. And this is product of technology. When viewed socially, technology allow African to control their narratives. You go to TikTok, I see when sometimes I browse through, I go through TikTok, like peruse through. I see Africans trying to share about their cultures, what they are doing in their cultural. You know, when you get into Internet space again, you get another class of learning. Someone is creating a context which is culturally based, trying to educate people on cultures that's on a positive sense. And so instead of being represented by external medias which have actually, I talked about it in some other chapters which have actually distorted our identity, this platform have come to represent our identities. So Africans can tell their own stories through film, music and through digital content creation. They call it content creation. And however, on the other side, this opportunity comes with challenges. Data ownership, like I told you, platform dependency. Africans do not own those platforms. None of them. TikTok, not owned by an African. Facebook, none. Instagram, none. Any of them. We are just customers. We are just customers. And so that dependency is problematic and that what we call digital inequality is problematic. So the question is whether Africans can move from being users of technology to producers and regulators of it. Because in the modern world as we speak right now, one of the gold resource that people are now looking for is data. Because once they get the data, they can even start thinking about controlling the population. They can also use it on the negative sales, I mean positive sales. They are making money through bia African Bean subscribers, their channels are growing. And so the clarion call is how can we also develop our own system that we can take control over? Other than working on people's platforms, Africans are ideally adjust customers, but not owners of those platforms. If Zuckerberg now today is closing Facebook, what will Africans do who are members? Nothing. They will lose their followers, they will lose their economic whichever what they are getting there, you know, we have to be careful. But on the other side, technology has helped us in many ways. Like I've told You MPESA vision and so on and so forth and even in medical field and so on. But we have to be very careful. These are people's platforms. Yeah, they have control over, you know, data. As I told you. There's a book written by a Nigerian called Targeted Africa which I would like to recommend people to read. And you know, it talks about how data is also very, very important because when someone has your data, he has control over you. He has. How do they always determine that? Of course we need to send more contraceptives to Africa, particularly this area. And why is it that these people have been so obsessed about controlling our population? Why? India is overpopulated, China is overpopulated. There is a synergy when there is population. Because I think if we go by this direction of controlling the population of Africa, then very soon our land will be owned by Chinese. They will be owned by foreigners who will come and own our land because there are no people. You remember at some point China had to control their population, but when they saw the population were drastically declining and most likely they are going to fade away, they had to abandon the rule. But why is it that it's a concern to control the population of Africa? And so we keep on reducing, reducing, reducing, and then foreigners will come and buy our lands, settle here, create their families. Don't we say that there will be a coup? We will be foreigners, I mean, in our own land. I think African has to think about this issue, about how the guys are extracting their data and coming to use it against them.
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Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
So good, so good, so good.
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Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
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Emi Sabakuri
Thank you, Steven. It gives me a moment to pause, to really pause. One compelling aspect of your book is your insistence that African women are not simply participants in liberation struggles, but they are architects of them. Why was it so important for you to foreground this in your book? How do you also think that African feminist thought expands or challenges our ideas of liberation?
- [49:42]
Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
Thank you very much. Any discussion, any discourse in the liberation of Africa that omits women is tantamount to, what can I say? Not complete. Women were very integral when we were fighting for our liberation and therefore we shouldn't forget about the role that women played. Now in the book I put more emphasis on women and it is very central for me because African women have always been central to social, economic and our political life. They are game changers. Even when they have been historically marginalized in the formal narrative, the role they played turned out. You know, when our ancestors were fighting in the bush during guerrilla wars, who were supplying them with food, with stone because they were in the forest, who were supplying, who were giving them the intelligence they were women. If we forget that, then we are heading to a wrong direction because they played a fundamental role. So for example, think about figures like Wangari Madai of Kenya demonstrated how environmental sustainability is important even when the government was intimidating. And you want to tell me you don't want to celebrate such figures? No. Wangari Madai also demonstrated that democracy and social justice are connected. Figures like we call her Ransom Familiao also sy mobilize women against the colonial and the patriarchal changes systems. Look at, it's called Helen Shalib. Yes. Look at Graca Machel. Is there Graca Machel? Yes. Winnie Mandela. Yes. There have been Aram person of these liberation. So today, you know, women continue to play a very critical role in grassroots organizing or I mean organization. Women are very central in entrepreneurship, in the business field. Actually women now do even are doing better. And you know, even in governance across Africa we have, in Africa we even have women, women who are presidents, something that I think even the Western world have not really accepted that they can ruled by a woman. And so we need to accept the role that women have played. But again, women are facing some structural barriers in terms of rising to this leadership position. They have limited access to resources, sometimes their political exclusion. They have Been politically excluded. And also we need to be realistic, talking about some cultural constraints that are actually not making women to rise to the global front. I mean, to the leadership fraud. We still check their full participation. So in that book I put more emphasis that true liberation requires addressing the barriers not just by excluding women in the existing system, but as forming the system to reflect more inclusive and equitable values. Because women, we cannot have men without women. They are our mothers. And so we need to accept the role that they play. I was raised up by my mother, imagine nine months if she had another different idea about me, I would not be existing. And so women are very integral. If Africa has to realize its liberation trajectory, then they have to take into account the role that women are playing. So in Kenya, for example, we talk about to third gender representation of women. It's a discussion that's ongoing. Ongoing, ongoing, ongoing. But to realize that, I think what we need to do is to create a system that allows. Unless we change the system that allows for that participation, then we will still have this discussion going in circulatory way. So women have played a big, very critical role to our liberation in whichever form of our social life as African. And we need to acknowledge that and promote women. Thank you.
- [54:44]
Emi Sabakuri
Many thanks for that. In your book, you really detail out women's political participation, education, labor safety and cultural transformation. And indeed you do mention that there should be opportunities for more because women play a big role when it comes to liberation. Now let's go to moving ahead or looking ahead. Because your book, actually I really like how you write it. You blend such analysis, deep analysis, and then sometimes it become imaginative and poetic. And I'm like, this is really nice to read and very interesting. I really like your style. And in the end you kind of move towards imagine imagining the future, African future. So let me take this moment to ask you, as you look toward Africa's future, what gives you hope?
- [55:47]
Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
Thank you very much. I employed that skill, fatalistic style of writing, because I believe that decolonization is not just a technical process, but it also deeply human and imaginative work. Because we have to write, but also imagine not just talking, but you know, you know, a lot of innovations happen because of imagination. Unless you put your readers also to imagine the future, we need that. I use that in my work also to see how do we imagine the next stage from where we are. So we need a rigorous analysis to understand systems of power. But also we need imagination. We envision the alternatives because through imagination we can see the alternatives without imagination critique that we Put across can lead to despair rather than transformation. So we get up in a commune, room of discussion, discussion after discussion. But there is no imagination. So the book actually intentionally moved from diagnosing the problem, exploring the possibilities through imagination. It invites readers not to only understand the present, but also imagine a different future for Africa. Because through that imagination we can see alternatives. So this, in my view, balance between critique and hope is very essential. It reflects the reality that while Africa faces serious challenges like we have seen, it also possesses immense creative and intellectual potentials which need to be imagined and reimagined, for that matter. So let's not just talk, but we need to act. They say action speak louder than words. We need to imagine the future. Well said. Is it better than. They say well said is better than well done, or well done is better than well said.
- [58:19]
Emi Sabakuri
Well done is better than well said.
- [58:21]
Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
Yeah. So I employed that stylistic way also to, you know, make my readers transcend to seeing the possibility, the future, on what we can, we can do again. This actually is one of the ways that if you want to take Africa to the next level, that we have to think about the alternative ways on how we are going to transform the continent.
- [58:50]
Emi Sabakuri
Your final words. If listeners take away just one message from this conversation, what would it be? And also I'm curious, are you working on another project? So this is two in one.
- [59:06]
Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
Yes, I'm working on another project. There's one which is almost on completion, which is now. I now narrow it down to Kwame Nukrumah and his political ideologies and how we can use political ideologies to transform Africa. I want now to be sent to specific African scholars, diagnosis their ideas and how we can use their ideas to transform Africa. Because Africa, in my honest opinion, does not lack resources or intelligence or creativity. What it has lacked is structural freedom like we talked about. And that is the message in that book. Africa unbound. Africa future will not be determined by how well it adapts to the world, but how boldly it redefines it. How boldly it redefines it. So we are the people. The future of Africa is on the hands of Africa. Let us not have external influences. Can we have homegrown solution for African problems other than going out to benchmark? Then you. You find out that there is. These are two different realities. Education. Most of the African curriculum are borrowed. If it is not from Britain, it's America. Don't we have African informal education which has a whole litany of knowledge from the time you are born to the time you Die. There was a whole education which was holistic. Can we embrace our worldviews other than operating on colonized greed? This is very crucial that Africans must start reimagining their own future and start relying on borrowed systems. Let us create our economic systems and take into account those regional economic blocks. Whether it is ugad, whether it is Sadiq or Ecowas or African Free Intercontinental Trade. Let us enhance those aspects. I feel very bad because when Africans want to rise to claim their right position, then the west are always there to make sure that they kill that spirit. We've seen this with the death of Gaddafi. Gaddafi was agitated. Other than other things that he did. He had an African spirit on his heart. They assassinated him because Gaddafi wrote a very good book that was actually later on getting it in the Internet is very hard because I think it was, you know, removed the green book by Gaddafi, which I think Africans would read actually. Gaddafi was agitating for one Africa with one president, one parliament, one constitution, one army, one economic system, one currency. And the west were not sitting well with this. He had proposed a gold dinner which is equivalent to the dollar. It was going to bring a threat to the dollar. And since it is Africa where the dollar is doing best, they had to employ their machineries like NATO in the name of going for humanitarian assistance of the people in that country. And in the long run, Libya has never seen peace. They did that to Kwame Nukrumah through a couple. They did that to Talman Sankara, they did that to Congo when they assassinated Kolhu, forgetting his name. The leader of the Congo was Kolho. I'm forgetting the west has never. They don't want to allow Africa to realize their potential. And that's why we see the new generation, the new generation coming in to demand that space. Look at Burkinafas. I like that gentleman because he has the spirit of Africa in him. But the moment one of us has a spirit, our spirit, then the west see it as a threat. So my, my call is that the Africans we must unite because there is strength in unity and avoid this disintegration of operating as independent. Kenya think that is equal to the United States just because it has some boundaries and some, you know, instruments of power. But ideally there's nothing they can comparable between Kenya and the US So African, for us to liberate ourselves, we need to take into account those ideas that I've discussed in my book the Africa Unbound, the Colonial Pathways, Sovereignty and liberation. Thank you.
- [64:43]
Emi Sabakuri
Thank you so much, Steven, for this insightful and engaging Conversation. Your book Africa the Colonial Pathways to Sovereignty and Liberation reminds us that liberation is indeed not a singular event of the past, but an ongoing struggle that involves knowledge, cultures, economics, governance, language and imagination and more. Thank you so much. So this has been Amis Abakuri, your host on the New Books Network and I've been speaking with Dr. Steven Onyango Uma about his new book, Africa the Colonial Pathways to Sovereignty and Liberation, published by Braille in 2026. I encourage you to read Africa Unbound and reflect on its ideas. Thank you so much, Steven.
- [65:44]
Dr. Steven Onyango Uma
Thank you so much, ansa, for also your time and also for organizing this enriching discussion. Indeed, it was a privilege. I thank you so much for creating time for me and I hope also to have more discussion with you in the future. I have other books that have also published. There is also one titled what Is Aid in Africa? If we got time, we can also talk about what is the Ail in Africa? Which was also published by Brill. Then of course there are others where I also talk about our Indigenous Systems of Knowledge, which was published by Belgrave Macmillan plus others. The one which is also under consideration of Springer on Africa Future, which is now us. Yeah, you know, there's a way I write this book and one of the way I write this book is the books because they form like a series. I started with what is ailing Africa? There's so many issues I raised there. I realized there was more to be discussed in order to solve what is ailing Africa. And that's why I came up with Africa Africa Unbound but out of Africa Unbound. I realized there was another emerging issue that we need that part of imagination. Now I have taken it and actually created a book on it, on how we can imagine the future, reclaiming the Africa's future. So I'm moving to. I'm. I'm moving upwards. So I hope generally to have another discussion with you on again, another book. Let me say thank you so much for your professionalism as well and has been very engaging discourse. Very likely. And thank you, thank you, thank you so much.
- [67:57]
Emi Sabakuri
We look forward to having you back on the New Books Network. Steven, thank you so much for your time. Scholarship Envision.
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