[UNLOCKED] Alliance of Sahel States Ep. 1: Burkina Faso – An Anti-imperialist Introduction w/ Prudence Iticka

Imperialism is the primary contradiction facing the globe—and the split of the world into two poles, the imperialists and the anti-imperialists, is going to continue to shape our revolutionary struggles moving forward. This anti-imperialist struggle is occurring all over the Global South, and perhaps nowhere quite as prominently as in Africa's Sahel region, where the countries of Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger have been waging a struggle against neocolonialism and building a movement towards pan-Africanism through the Alliance of Sahel States—an alliance that has received the praise of anti-imperialists across the globe, and which has also raised the ire of imperialists who are not happy to see Africans fight to take back control of their resources and their labor.

In this episode, we've brought on Prudence Iticka, a Camaroonian pan-Africanist and member of United African Diaspora and The Coalition for the Elimination of Imperialism in Africa, to tell us more about the AES and the struggle it's currently undertaking.

We begin with a brief history of Burkina Faso during the colonial period, and explore the rise of Thomas Sankara and the anti-imperialist movement he led, his assassination and the neocolonial puppet that replaced him for three decades, and the recent rise of the revolutionary leader Captain Ibrahim Traoré. We talk about the Alliance of Sahel States (AES)—Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger—and how they are the seeds for a pan-African future and the leading spear in the fight against imperialism and neocolonialism. We explore imperialism as the primary contradiction in the world, how imperialist propaganda infiltrates Africa and what the AES are doing to combat it, and much, much more.

Although the episodes in our series build on each other in certain ways, all of our series are designed so that each episode can be listened to as a standalone.

Further resources:

• United African Diaspora
• The Coalition for the Elimination of Imperialism in Africa (Instagram)
• The Coalition for the Elimination of Imperialism (Substack)
• Comité de Kinshasa
• Defending the AES, report back from Africa's liberated zones
• Alliance of Sahel States (AES) Solidarity Fund
• A United Front Against Debt, speech by Thomas Sankara
• The Thomas Sankara Library

Related episodes:

• Our ongoing series on the Alliance of Sahel States
• Western Marxism w/ Gabriel Rockhill
• Listen to our ongoing series on China
• The Fight for The Congo w/ Vijay Prashad
• Walter Rodney, Marxism, and Underdevelopment with D. Musa Springer & Charisse Burden-Stelly

Upstream is a labor of love — we couldn't keep this project going without the generosity of our listeners and fans. Subscribe to our Patreon at patreon.com/upstreampodcast or please consider chipping in a one-time or recurring donation at www.upstreampodcast.org/support

If your organization wants to sponsor one of our upcoming documentaries, we have a number of sponsorship packages available. Find out more at upstreampodcast.org/sponsorship

For more from Upstream, visit www.upstreampodcast.org and follow us on Instagram and Bluesky. You can also subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcasts.