It has become far too common for westerners to look upon the plight of Africa as a “permanent state of underdevelopment, poverty and famine” from which no genuine solution may ever arise. Citizens of the west are told repeatedly that giving $1/day is the only way they may play some positive role in alleviating Africa’s immense suffering. Policy makers are told that facilitating microloans via western financial institutions remains the best and only solution.

What remains constant among all cases, is that no actual systemic solutions are made available which either 1) take into consideration the ACTUAL historical, cultural and geopolitical dynamics shaping Africa, or 2) challenge the intentional structures and ideologies committed to keeping the continent weak, poor and exploited. Without these realities in mind, no genuine, durable remedies exist and no honest discussion dealing with solutions may possibly arise.

In this Rising Tide Foundation presentation, Lawrence Freeman (President of Africa and the World and leading Africa expert), breaks from this cynical mode of thinking by providing a comprehensive overview of Africa from pre-colonial times to the present- and always with a strong view to the future.

In conducting this exercise, Lawrence uses his five plus decades of experience as an activist, government advisor, teacher and economist to help his audience gain a greater appreciation of the beautiful African traditions which have consciously been scrubbed out of historic memory. Furthermore, Lawrence explains how imperialism has continued to persist through the past 75 tumultuous post-WWII years, even though the world has been led to believe that African nations are somehow “free and independent”.

Even though courageous visionaries such as Kwame Nkrumah, Patrice Lumumba and Sheik Ante Diop strove to bring Africa into the modern age with the support of great republican presidents like Franklin Roosevelt and John F Kennedy, the systems of empire that stained human history with slavery, war and colonialism successfully de-railed their efforts and re-absorbed the continent back under the controls of exploitation and economic colonialism which must be corrected if humanity will regain the moral fitness to survive into the 21st century and beyond.

Disabused of the myth that Africa’s problems are somehow “self-induced”, Lawrence then brings his audience to a higher understanding of the real potential for Africa. This is done by painting a beautiful picture of the possibilities for a new African renaissance which China’s Belt and Road Initiative has created involving a holistic approach to value, long term planning, self-interest, win-win cooperation and respect for sovereignty than anything emanating from the west since the death of President John F. Kennedy in 1963.

BIO: Lawrence Freeman is an outspoken opponent of the current policies of neo-colonialism. He is a highly respected researcher, writer, and speaker on a variety of topics concerning Africa. An outspoken critic of the ICC attacks on African countries, Freeman led a delegation of American State Legislators to Sudan, who subsequently exposed the charges that the Khartoum government was engaged in slavery as fraudulent. Insisting that Africa no longer be forced to live in a dark age, he has consistently brought African governments a roadmap for transformative infrastructure projects. As the author of dozens of articles and reports on Africa, having traveled to the continent 25 times, Freeman served as a member of AFRICOM’s Advisory Committee under U.S. General Kip Ward.  Most recently, he was appointed Vice Chairman of the Lake Chad Basin Scientific Committee and is currently working on a project to replenish the shrinking Lake Chad. Presently, he is teaching  courses on the history of Africa, utilizing his decades of experience and knowledge.

His website is: http://lawrencefreemanafricaandtheworld.com/