Please let´s spread this eye-opening speech that you can read&listen to: Not only for the youth of Africa, but the youth of the world! Build your own future with this understanding of our situation
- Wolfgang Lieberknecht
- vor 7 Stunden
- 19 Min. Lesezeit
Ibrahim Traore, President of Burkina Faso: To the sons and daughters (not only) of Africa. Please share as widely as possible!
Defending Ibrahim Traore, Burkina Faso, sovereignety of African states&a transformation for emancipation of Africans&for an equal live in dignity for all members of our one human family May 19.1.
to the sons and daughters of the
motherland i do not write to you tonight
from behind golden walls or airond
conditioned offices i write to you as
your brother as one of you a soldier who
has walked through the fire a man who
has seen the game behind the curtain a
son of Africa who has bled in the sand
and
pointo rice this letter is not official
it is not stamped with the mark of the
state it is written in urgency in truth
and in love it is secret not because it
must be hidden but because the few are
ready to hear it but you must you must
hear it before it is too late i write to
awaken you because what you do not know
is being used against you because what
you do not question is enslaving you
because if you do not rise now you may
have no ground left to stand on tomorrow
africa is not poor africa is not weak
africa is not broken it is being broken
deliberately methodically and with our
own hands yes I said it with our own
hands we have let ourselves be sedated
by imported dreams we have mistaken
communions for freedom we have confused
foreign applause with success and now
the very soul of our continent is being
auctioned to the youth of Africa those
in lagos traffic and the Nairobi slums
in the fields of Bamako in the
universities of Acra in the nightclubs
of Joberg in the refugee camps of
Tripoli in the mining pits of Katanga in
the cafes of Kari and under the neon
lights of Paris and Rome i say this WAQU
P or be erased number one the tept of
your future my brothers and sisters all
my sons and daughters in the spirit of
Africa let us begin with a truth that
should pierce the conscience of every
young African who still dares to dream
your future is being stolen piece by
piece deal by deal Y by Y not by chance
not by accident not by natural disaster
but by men in suits and uniforms by
policies dressed as progress by deal
signed in silence by the kind of
leadership that confuses servitude for
strategy and yes by your own silence and
surrender you were told that
independence was given to your fathers
but I ask you if we are free then why do
our currencies still bow before the euro
why do our resources feed foreign stock
markets while our people feed on hope
and prayer why do the brightest minds in
Aka and Alisaba build roads in Dubai
launch techups in Berlin and create art
for galleries in New York while back
home the lights flicker the taps run dry
and the schools are crumbling you were
promised opportunity but what you got
was illusion you were promised democracy
but you inherited democracies that
protect the rich prosecute the truth
tellers and sell elections like
merchandise you were promised
globalization but it came wrapped in
poverty dependency and cultural eraser
you were told you would be the leaders
of tomorrow but that tomorrow never came
it is always tomorrow and they are
hoping you will grow too tired to keep
asking when my dear African youth I must
speak to you plainly you are being
groomed for obedience not leadership you
are being shaped to serve not to shape
it you are being distracted by the noise
of social media while your destiny is
being sold in silence the oil beneath
your soil has paid for the comfort of
men who will never know your name the
lithium under your hills has powered
smartphones in Tokyo and Teslas in
California but your schools still teach
under trees and your hospitals still run
without electricity how long will we
call this misfortune instead of what it
truly is a system a system designed to
keep you focused on football matches and
fashion trends while while your economy
is auctioned off to foreign powers a
system that makes you chase visas and
celebrity lifestyles while your
ancestral lands are bought by
billionaires a system that whispers
Africa will rise but never tells you who
is lifting it and for whose benefit let
me ask you something uncomfortable when
a two 5-year-old African man sells his
vote for a bag of rice
when a two three-year-old woman trades
her future for time and influences
approval when a 20-year-old student
stops questioning the lies in his
textbook what future are we really
fighting for because a theft of your
future doesn't always come with guns and
helicopters sometimes it comes with
hashtags and scholarships sometimes it
comes with silence and silence my dear
ones is complicity you were born with
genius in your bones and fire in your
chest but they are hoping you will waste
it on Tik Tok trains and tribal fights
they are betting you will spend more
time defending politicians than
defending your people they are watching
and they are laughing because they think
Africa will always sleep but I am
writing to you now to say they are wrong
you are not the future you are the
present you are not weak you are wounded
so you are not lost you are lied to and
if you rise with clarity with courage
with unity you will become the
generation that ends this long night but
first you must admit the truth your
future is not secure it is not
guaranteed and if you do not guard it
with your voice your mind and your hands
it will be taken it is already being
taken you must stop waiting for someone
to come save you no one is coming you
are the one number two the war you don't
see my dear sons and daughters of Africa
some wars are fought with guns and tanks
you hear them you see the smoke the
damage is visible the pain immediate but
there is another kind of
war a war that doesn't use bullets but
contracts that doesn't bomb cities but
bankrupts countries that doesn't send
troops it sends consultants it is the
war you are living through right now and
this war my beloved youth is more
dangerous than the ones we fought with
rifles in the bush because this one
wears a smile it speaks your language it
comes with foreign aid and free seminars
it offers scholarships and development
partnerships but behind the briefcases
and boardroom handshakes is an enemy
justice verdo as the colonial soldier
with a whip let me be even clearer this
word is for your mind your soul and your
silence they will not invade your land
they will invade your thinking they will
not shoot your leaders they will turn
them into polished agents wearing
presidential sashes they will not burn
your villages they will wret your
silence with social media fame with
imported theology with a system of
education that teaches you how to serve
not how to think look at how they fight
this war they give loans with one hand
and take back resources with the other
they build schools but write your
history for you edited diluted
weaponized they bring the NGOs and
preach about human rights while funding
puppet governments that kill protesters
in your streets this is psychological
warfare it is economic sabotage baptized
in diplomacy it is why the minerals
under your feet are extracted by
foreigners while your schools have no
chalk it is why your government signs
multi-deade mining deals that rob your
unborn children and no one is ever
jailed it is why the youth are
distracted by identity battles while
their leaders kneel for foreign
validation this war doesn't just aim to
exploit you it aims to erase you erase
your memory of who you are erase your
anger at what was stolen erase your
urgency to stand up before it is too
late and I must tell you many of your
so-called leaders are collaborators in
this war they have traded your
sovereignty for status your peoples
paying for private jets your national
wealth for foreign praise they wear
traditional clothes during independence
celebrations but sign away your
independence behind closed doors they
sing Panaffrican songs at summits but
speak in the accents of their masters
they are trained in nation building by
the very nations that build empires on
our backs in the media they are not just
telling lies they are manufacturing
forgetfulness they want you to forget
Patrice Lamba forget Thomas Sankare
forget Amul Kabal forget the fire that
once lived in our bones they want you to
remember celebrity gossip not the blood
soaked treaties that still govern your
borders they want you to argue over who
speaks better English rather than who is
selling your country to the highest
bidder but the truth is still here and I
am writing this because you must wake up
before it is too late you must realize
that every time you shrug and say that's
just how Africa is you are surrendering
every time you ignore an election stolen
in broad daylight you are surrendering
every time you scroll past corruption
and say it's not my business you are
feeding the enemy because this war
thrives on apathy it wins when you
choose comfort over confrontation it
wins when you think only of survival
never of sovereignty it wins when you
believe that this is the best Africa can
be but I am here to tell you they are
afraid not of your weapons not of your
numbers they are afraid of your
awareness because once you see the war
you cannot unsee it once you name the
enemy you cannot unknow it and once you
decide to fight back not with violence
but with clarity unity and purpose you
become dangerous the war you don't see
is real but so is your power do not
waste it do not wait for permission you
were born in the fire you were raised on
resistance and if you rise now eyes open
hearts firm this war can be won number
three Africa is not poor it is being
looted my beloved sons and daughters let
us destroy a lie today africa is not let
the world hear it let the continent hear
it let the youth whisper it to each
other in the classrooms in the markets
in the fields and across every digital
corner of our world africa is not poor
it is being looted we were never poor
before they came with their ships and
flags we had kingdoms we had systems we
had mathematics and medicine libraries
and architecture culture and dignity we
were rich in minerals yes but rich still
in wisdom in order in family and spirit
and yet today they hand statistics like
death certificates africa is
underdeveloped africa is dependent on
aid africa is unstable no the truth is
far simpler far more sinister africa is
being drained daily violently quietly
our wealth is flowing out like blood
from an open
wound while the world looks at us and
says "Why are you bleeding?" It is no
coincidence that the richest continent
in resources houses the poorest people
in the world that is not fade that is
theft our gold builds banks in Europe
but we cannot afford to pave roads our
oil fuels foreign cities while our
people cook with firewood our diamonds
dazzle fingers in distant lands but we
can't afford textbooks for our children
our cobalt powers their electric cars
while our miners die without safety gear
our land grows food for export while our
children go to bed hungry they do not
give us aid they return to us a fraction
of what they steal and they want
applause for it and that is why they
fear you awakening because if the youth
of Africa ever said no more if we ever
united our voices our strategies our
visions the looting would stop and the
empire built on our backs would begin to
tremble so do not ask how can I help the
poor continent ask who is stealing from
us and how do we stop them do not aspire
to flee to their lands aspire to build a
continent so strong so just and so
sovereign that no African must ever flee
again africa does not need charity
africa needs justice and that justice
must begin with you the youth refusing
to be complicit refusing to be silent
refusing to inherit chains wrapped in
modern packaging stand to the speak
study the systems question everything
organize yourselves hold your leaders
accountable because Africa is not poor
it is being looted and you were not born
to be robbed you were born to restore
the psychological occupation my dear
young Africans we have spoken of stolen
resources and invisible wars of
manipulated economies and bleeding lands
but there is a war far more dangerous
than what bullets can bring a
colonization more subtle than any flag
planted in the ta the soil it is the
colonization of the African mind the
psychological occupation the eraser of
selfworth you may think you are free
because the soldiers have left and the
colonizers have gone home but when your
enemy leaves behind a school system that
teaches you to hate your skin mistrust
your brother the glorify your oppressor
and aspire only to escape your
homeland then the colonizer never truly
left he just moved into your mind they
rewrote your history they painted your
kings as savages and your sages as witch
doctors they told you civilization
started in Athens not in Timbuktu they
told you the pyramids were built by
aliens not by your ancestors they turned
your story into their trophy and fed you
lies until you believed them they
renamed your children they mocked your
languages and called them dialects they
ridiculed your attire your dances your
music until you were ashamed of yourself
they taught you to bleach your skin
straighten your hair and call that
progress they sold your dreams of escape
they told you the future lies in Paris
London New York never in Bamakaco Kegali
Aka or UA they planted a seed of
inferiority so deep that even when you
win you still feel second class this is
not accidental this is programming and a
colonized mind will protect the chains
around its own neck and call it
tradition you scroll through social
media and see success as foreign yachts
luxury brands English accents Ivy League
diplomas you do not see your local
farmer teacher or entrepreneur as a hero
you do not see your own village as
worthy of building because you've been
taught to dream in someone else's
language young African they give you
mirrors that reflect back shame not
pride but I tell you today there is
nothing wrong with being African there's
something wrong with being taught to be
ashamed of it they've taught you that
corruption is African that war is
African that incompetence is African but
they do not teach you that it was
European powers that drew artificial
borders across your continent ignited
tribal wars assassinated your best
leaders and armed dictators in exchange
for control no they will not teach you
that part because if you knew the full
truth if you understood the full weight
of what they did and what they are still
doing you would rise up you would
reclaim your mind you would unlearn
their lies you would start building a
new you see the final battlefield is not
land it is identity and that is where
the war is raging the most in your
subconscious in your values in your
dreams this is why they bombard your
media with violence chaos and
hopelessness so you will believe that is
all Africa is this is why African
excellence is never celebrated in their
textbooks or news cycles so you will
believe you are cursed to always be
behind but you are not behind you are
being held back by a mental cage and
here is the most painful truth a cage
you do not see is a cage you will never
try to escape so my beloved youth I ask
you what are you consuming who is
telling you who you are what images
shape your perception of self in your
continent and when will you begin the
inner revolution because until the
African mind is free no amount of
foreign aid new infrastructure or change
governments will ever set you free
freedom must begin in the mirror we must
restore our pride we must rewrite our
story we must build an education system
that teaches truth not colonial echoes
we must celebrate our languages our art
our indigenous knowledge we must raise
children who do not dream of fleeing but
dream of staying and transforming the
youth are the mirrors through which the
soul of a continent reflects so I ask
you what reflection are you showing the
word is it a reflection of borrowed
culture borrowed goals borrowed voice or
is it a reflection of ancient wisdom
reborn in modern strength decolonize
your mind or others will weaponize it
against you number what must be done now
my dear sons and daughters of this
ancient powerful continent you now
understand the war you've seen the
stonewolf you've felt the manipulation
you've looked in the mirror and seen the
scars of a colonized mind but knowledge
alone is not liberation awareness
without action is surrender in disguise
so let me speak now not just to your
pain but to your potential let me speak
not just of what has been stolen but of
what must now be rebuilt this is the
hour of the great reversal and I speak
these words as a brother not a ruler as
a man who bleeds the same African dust
who weeps the same tears and who
believes in the unstoppable power that
lies dormant in
you education our education systems are
still colonial in spirit we teach our
children to memorize the glories of
other empires Rome Britain France and
call it world history but we do not
teach them about the universities of
Sancor the Zula resistance the
brilliance of Queen Enzinga or the
strategy of Sunia Takareta this must end
we must Africanize our curriculum not to
isolate ourselves but to ground our
youth in truth to teach them they are
heirs not beggars that their ancestors
were architects astronomers warriors and
poets not the caricatures they've been
shown the start local build community
libraries host storytelling nights with
your elders record the oral histories
before they vanish bring back the
villages the first classroom two
organize economically stop waiting for
permission sex buy from each other
promote Africanmade goods fund
businesses that employ your brothers and
sisters if 1 million youth each
contributed $1 to a pan-African
cooperative that is $1 million to build
your own tech incubator your own
clothing brand your own agricultural
revolution use your phone not just to
scroll but to sell connect educate and
organize the same internet used to
spread confusion can be used to build
empires don't just apply for jobs create
them don't just consume products
manufacture them we must graduate from
survival to sovereignty three unite
across borders are you artificial lines
drawn by colonial rulers mean nothing
you were not born Burkin Nigerian or
Kenyon you were born African your roots
braided in the same soil you future
bound by the same sun we must stop
fighting each other over names the
colonizer gave us we must stop echoing
the tribalism they fed us like poison
you must know that a youth in Ghana is
your brother that a woman in Somalia is
your sister that an injustice in Sudan
is an injustice in Sagal let no flag
come before your humanity pan-africanism
is not a slogan it is a survival
strategy use technology to break the
borders build networks across countries
mobilize for a shared vision stand for
each other rise together for hold your
leaders accountable do not romanticize
revolutionaries test them question them
even me do not mistake resistance to the
west for love of the people true
leadership is humble transparent
compassionate it listens it serves it
sacrifices if your leader builds palaces
while your schools collapse that is not
a liberator that is a looter with a
different passport demand that vote
wisely to refuse to be used resist both
foreign puppets and domestic predators
you are not too young to change a
country you are too important to wait
any longer five healed spiritually and
emotionally the trauma of slavery the
betrayal of colonialism the
disappointment of postindependence
corruption these have left us deeply
wounded but we must heal not through
denial not through bitterness but
through truthtelling through community
through art through faith let us weep
where we must but let us rise after a
healed generation cannot be manipulated
a united generation cannot be broken a
fearless generation cannot be erased my
beloved African youth what must be done
now is clear you must wake up you must
link out you must start where you are
with what you have do not wait for
foreign saviors do not wait for miracles
become the answer you were praying for
and as your elder your brother your
fellow dreamer for this continent I will
walk beside you i will protect your
voices i will fight for your right to
rise but the future is no longer in the
hands of presidents or parliaments alone
it is in your hands now what will you do
with it the final warning to my sons my
daughters my reason for sleepless nights
and my fire for each new dawn i now
speak to you not only with the love of a
father and the duty of a soldier but
with a weight of time pressing upon my
soul this final part of my message is
not a prophecy it is not even a threat
it is simply the truth a truth written
in the blood of history carved into the
silence of forgotten graves and
whispered to you the screams of a
continent still gasping for breath let
me now tell you plainly if you do not
rise now you may not rise at all because
dear child of Africa there's a clock
ticking not one that hangs on your wall
but one that tolls for your freedom your
language your soil your very identity
one you are being rewritten every minute
you delay someone else writes your story
they label your resistance as terrorism
they call your cries for justice
radicalism they erase your heroes from
textbooks they replace your name with
numbers and they program you to forget
that you were once royalty they are not
waiting to conquer you again with chains
they are conquering your mind with
distraction with false glory with
illusions of inclusion with technologies
designed not to connect you but to
consume you if you do not rewrite your
own narrative you will wake up one day
as a stranger in your own land speaking
foreign thoughts in your native tongue
applauding your own while calling it
progress this is not fiction this is not
fear-mongering this is the final chapter
they are writing and they are almost
done two the systems are closing in
global systems economic military digital
are being designed without you in the
room you will soon find yourself in a
world where your data is owned by
outsiders your economy dictated by
foreign your health monitored by systems
that never heard your story your
resources traded without your consent do
not let the smiling faces fool you
beneath their diplomacy is control
beneath their development projects are
pipelines that steal beneath their loans
or chains with digital walks if you
think independence was achieved in 1960
you have been lied to independence
delayed as dependency in disguise and
Africa is still being coded into
irrelevance to unless you hack the
system from within treat your silence
will be interpreted as surrender there
are moments in history when silence
becomes complicity we are in that moment
now if you do not speak up they will
assume you are content if you do not
organize they will assume you are
incapable if you do not resist they will
believe you are broken and they will
plan accordingly with conferences
agreements deals signed over your heads
and against your future the systems are
already being programmed to replace you
to reduce you to labor to extract value
to use and discard you will not even be
mourned because your eraser will have
been branded as modernization for you
must choose sleep or sovereignty this is
the final warning there are only two
futures before you one where you are
forever dependent where your food your
medicines your water your passwords your
thoughts come up from systems you did
not build and cannot control you will
own nothing and they will call it
liberation the other is painful at first
it demands sacrifice but in that future
you build your own table you write your
own history you protect your own soil
you bury fear and raise dignity that
path is not easy but it is the only one
where your grandchildren will speak your
name with pride not be so I ask you with
the urgency of a man who is seen behind
the curtain what will you choose another
decade of sleep or one year sacrifice
that changes the next hund another round
of slogans or the silent work of
building block by block until your
villages stand tall another trending
hashtag or the quiet resistance of
reading organizing unlearning and
awakening the world will not wait for
you the wolves will not wait for your
armor to be ready the systems will not
pause while you decide who you are
africa is not just at a crossroads it is
at a cliff one step forward with clarity
and we fly one more step asleep and we
fall into permanent exile from ourselves
this is the final warning but it is also
the final invitation to reclaim to
rebuild to rise you were never meant to
be erased you were meant to engrave your
names into the mountains to echo your
wisdom through time to light the path
for the world with your fire so rise
children of Sankura rise warriors of
truth rise future builders of the most
glorious Africa the world has ever seen
rise
now forever my beloved children of
Africa before I lay down my pen and
close this letter sealed by conviction
allow me to speak once more not as your
president but ask your watchmen on the
wall your elder in the wilderness your
voice echoing through time like a drum
beat of truth i speak now from the soul
of our ancestors i speak now from the
hopes buried in unmarked graves i speak
now from the sunscored soil that still
remembers your names even if you have
forgotten them to every youth reading
these words with burning eyes to every
child born into silence yet destined to
roar to every mother nursing the
revolution in her womb and to every
father breaking his back so the next
generation might stand may this
benediction ignite the warrior in your
blood i bless your eyes that they may
open and never close again to see truth
beyond propaganda to see light in the
shadow of deception to recognize your
enemy not by skin but by strategy i
bless your ears that they may hear the
cries of history to hear the unspoken
pain of stolen generations to recognize
the hidden call to leadership inside
every insult i bless your hands that
they may no longer beg but build defend
create and cradle the future of a free
Africa i bless your tongue that it may
speak not just of your struggle but of
your victory your unity your destiny i
bless your heart that it may burn not
with hatred but with holy fire the kind
of fire that purifies systems and forges
empires a new and above all to I bless
your soul with remembrance that you may
remember who you were before they told
you who to be what your land was before
they drew borders what your spirit
carried before it was colonized by shame
what your purpose is not to survive but
to transform you are not lost you are
rising to you are not broken to you are
rebirththing the time of waiting is over
the season of mourning has passed the
hour of restoration is here let the rain
of wisdom fall upon your desserts let
the bones of forgotten hero shake
beneath your feet let your minds no
longer be colonized by comfort stand
tall my African youth with courage in
your chest and your ancestors at your
back the draming the future is watching
heaven is waiting rise now and write a
new covenant with destiny for if Africa
is to rise on it shall not be by the old
nor by the foret it shall vice because
you remembered who you were may the
spirit of Sankara guard your dreams may
the winds of Nubia guide your steps may
the fire of Patrice Lumumba awaken your
blood may the tears of your mother's
water the seeds of your liberation and
may God Almighty who watches over the
oppressed walk beside you as you reclaim
what was never truly lost
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