In September, Frans Timmermans, the EU Commission Vice President and the man in charge of leading its work on the European Green Deal and the European Climate Law, delivered a revealing speech to a delegation of African leaders. Europeans, he explained, have their own problems and would not worry about climate impacts in Africa when…
Category: Mbong’s Memoirs
Mbong’s experiences and her perspective on news, current affairs and much more
DRC’s Forests-for-oil Sale Reeks of Neocolonialism
Behind the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s nationalist rhetoric lie big profits for global energy giants, and hurt for poor Congolese. Forests are losing out to fossil fuels and foreign finance in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). On July 28, the country’s government auctioned 27 oil blocks and three gas blocks overlapping with…
In London without you
My old friend Mike often said traveling is a privilege. As a Christian, I’ll have to say, it’s grace, one which I am grateful to have enjoyed. In my twenties, I was obsessed about traveling the African continent, so I did. Then the last decade came along with a generous supply of opportunities to explore…
My Fellow African, Who do you work for?
2020 was a dark year. As if humanity wasn’t traumatized enough by the fatalities from an evil virus, millions had to watch on their small screens a scene from a real-life horror movie, the senseless and brutal murder of George Floyd. A scene that ripped through the souls of the world and even more so,…
Why dad said fucken French
Dad didn’t quite swear but most things French took exception. Ironically, dad lived most of his adult life in Douala. Mind you, if the french policy of assimilation was effective in one city in Africa, that would be Douala. There, everyone lived to go to Paris, you had simply not arrived if you hadn’t been….
Schola & Beaufils – THE WEDDING – My Highlights
Today is two years ‘jour pour jour’ as my French folks will put it, since our special day but memories are so fresh it feels like yesterday. I have to thank the Heavens for the absolutely beautiful and sunny day that it was and indeed for making it all possible. Thanking Mama Maria, St Scholastica,…
The Little Blonde Girl in My Nightmare
It was a freezing winter morning but it wasn’t the cold or the dimness of winter dawn that scared me. For the first time in my twelve years as an immigrant in South Africa, I was in a mini van taxi, a Kombi as it’s called here and with no other passengers in sight, I…
A Call to Africanity, Identity and Self-Love
So it seems everyone else gets it. My French friends drive french cars, My Japanese colleagues Japanese cars. Trust me, my German acquaintances do the same and my Jewish and Chinese friends take the concept of identity and self love to a whole new level. Granted, there are no African cars in the market for…
The Untold Stories that Spark Outrage and Why it is Never Only About Race
In my previous blog on racism – ‘Racism Cannot Survive Justice and Humanity’ – I made the point that most blacks don’t fundamentally care about the ideology that one race might consider itself as superior to another – which is essentially the starting point for racism. This is because more and more black people feel…
Lebo wasn’t Racist
Lebo was my first black South African friend. She was bold, confident, fearless and intelligent. Our friendship was brief, it only lasted through our post graduate honours year, but it was intense, it was unique, it was an eye opener. Lebo was born in South Africa, along with its history and racially tense past. Unlike…