Mshale Newspaper May 1 2023

Books for Africa celebrates 35 years of promoting literacy

By Panashe Matemba-Mutasa Mshale

Books for Africa (BFA), the world’s largest shipper of donated books to Africa held its annual spring luncheon on Friday to celebrate 35 years of fighting illiteracy in the continent. The event, which was themed “Reading for All,” was held at The Town and Country Club in St Paul and was attended by various dignitaries, including Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota.

“Books for Africa represents the philanthropic values of our state, and the power of the [African] diaspora here in Minnesota,” Walz said.

The World Population Review reports that 9 out of 10 least literate countries in the world are in the African continent. Only 67% of people in Sub-Saharan Africa can read and write, according to the World Bank. But the number is a significant improvement from the 49% recorded in 1985, thanks to organizations like BFA, which as has shipped more than 57 million books to every country in Africa since its founding in 1988.

BFA founder Tom Warth remembered the organization’s early days. He got the idea when he visited a library in Uganda that had nearly empty shelves. So far this year, BFA has sent 3.3 million books to Africa. By comparison, it sent 3.2 million books for the entire 2022, and is not on course to surpass its goal of shipping 4 million books by the end of 2023. In recent years, BFA has begun shipping computers and electronic devices to provide access to eBooks.

“Every child should have a book,” Warth said. “My ambition is for every child in Africa to have a book.”

Malawian inventor, William Kamkwamba, was the keynote speaker of the event. He spoke about how his humble beginnings inspired his journey as an inventor and education advocate. After dropping out of high school because his family could not afford to pay for his education, Kamkwamba 14-year-old Kamkwamba used to sneak into his school’s library to read book. Using the books, he taught himself and build a windmill that used bicycle parts to generate electricity, which his farming community used to pump water from a well to grow food crops during a severe drought. Kamkwamba’s remarkable story was documented in his book, “The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind,” which was adopted into a film by the same name in 2019.

Kamkwamba said that Africa is full of talented young people whose potential could be unleashed by giving them the tools they need to excel.

“There are so many talented kids, but if we don’t give them the opportunities to read, their dreams and desires will die before they can see the light of day,” Kamkwamba said.

At the conclusion of the event, Peris Outa, a nonprofit coordinator and BFA volunteer, joined others as they raced to the line to be photographed with Kamkwamba. Outa spoke about her passion for the mission of BFA.

“I started volunteering [at Books for Africa] in my college days,” Outa said. “It was such a good experience, and I’m glad to still be supporting years later.”

Rosemond Sarpong Owens, a Ghanaian-born author whose company Lion’s His-

Malawian inventor William Kamkwamba after keynoting the annual Books for Africa fundraising luncheon in St. Paul, Minnesota on Friday, April 28, 2023. Mshale Staff Photo by Panashe Matemba-Mutasa

Literacy

torian publishes Afrocentric children’s books, said she understood the value of books firsthand. While she recognized the transformative impact of the organization, she said that she would like to see more involvement from local Africans.

“I see Books for Africa becoming very innovative in the future, but we need diasporans to be even more involved first,” Owens said.

“We need this now more than ever,” Sannes said.

Kimberly Sannes, a local business owner, beamed as she made small talk with other attendees. She said the first time she heard about BFA was when a friend invited her to the Friday even event. She said that she was most impressed by BFA’s wide reach.

Guests at the Books for Africa luncheon in St. Paul, Minnesota listen to Gov. Walz of Minnesota speak.

Photo: Panashe Matemba-Mutasa/Mshale

Author Ms. Rosemond Sarpong Owens awith husband Mr. Isaac Owens at the ammual Books for Africa lucheon in St. Paul, Minnesota on Friday, April 28, 2023.

Photo: Panashe Matemba-Mutasa/Mshale

Guest Commentary by Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr.

The obesity crisis is not a hopeless fight for Black America

Whether we accept it or not, obesity continues to be a complex, chronic disease that kills thousands of Black Americans every year. Indeed, nearly half of Black Americans live with obesity, so we cannot afford to ignore this national emergency any longer.

The public discourse around weight loss that has taken over recent headlines has entirely missed the mark. Our mainstream media, social media, and content providers are all either dissecting whether a movie star used weight loss medication or analyzing whether these medications are safe to take, even though they’re FDA approved.

The fact of the matter is that we are squandering a critical moment to focus on the deadly disease of obesity, and missing the opportunity to save thousands of lives, particularly Black lives. Within the next seven years, researchers anticipate that half of American adults will live with obesity. This is a personal health burden and a public health crisis, and we should talk about it as such.

Turning the narrative around on this disease, and on Black wellness overall, is critical to stemming obesity’s growth. The National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), a trade association of more than 250 Black-owned community newspapers and media companies from across the United States, has consistently been the voice of the Black community since its founding 83 years ago.

I serve as the organization’s President and CEO and right now, we’re calling on our members to elevate the conversation on the obesity crisis to one that clarifies the facts, shares reliable resources, and advocates for impactful changes for the benefit of our community’s health and longevity. We can address obesity in a way that gives hope, because this is not a hopeless fight.

To start, it’s vital that we correct the misinformation. Too often, people don’t know that obesity is a chronic disease and a long-term illness, with multiple contributing factors outside of a person’s control: environmental circumstances, inherently racist healthcare programs, poverty, and genetics. In cities across the country, like Washington, D.C., where nearly half the population is Black, food deserts and food swamps have become the norm in Black communities.

This makes it nearly impossible for many Black residents to eat well even if they

wanted to. That is to say, many people cannot access one of the key tools for combating obesity — a healthy diet — because of factors outside of their control.

It’s also important to note that obesity is a complex disease that may require more than diet and exercise. Our understanding of the disease has changed drastically over the years thanks to scientific research and advances. Where diet and exercise are not enough, some people may need the extra support of anti-obesity medications to fight the disease. Just as many of us take medications to manage hypertension, diabetes, or cholesterol — conditions you may have inherited — medications for chronic weight management may be needed as well.

Further, combating severe obesity may even require bariatric surgery. Chronic diseases are treated with a range of treatment options, and obesity is no different.

To be clear, the perception that people who live with obesity just need to take better care of themselves is false and dangerous, as it prevents thousands from receiving or seeking the care they need. Societal weight biases strain the mental health of people living by obesity, prevent people from living their healthiest lives, and contribute to our country’s stagnant healthcare policies that exacerbate obesity’s disproportionate impact on Black communities.

From less access to quality healthcare, to the exclusion of anti-obesity medications from Medicare, and most Medicaid and general insurance coverage, our healthcare systems under-prioritizes the well-being of Black Americans. And we’ve learned from history that until we make our voices heard, this crisis will continue to be brushed aside.

Dr. Fatima Cody Stanford, an expert on obesity, noted that we have been living through three pandemics: COVID-19, racism, and obesity. We must prioritize combating the obesity pandemic with the same energy we use to combat COVID-19 and racial injustice. Our lives depend on it.

Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr is President and CEO of the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), the association for Black publishers across the United States, Executive Producer/Host of The Chavis Chronicles on PBS TV stations throughout the United States, entrepreneur, global business and civil rights, and can be reached at dr.bchavis@nnpa.org

Georgia’s Stacey Abrams to join faculty at Howard University

By Jeff Amy Associated Press

ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia’s Stacey Abrams will join the faculty at Howard

University in Washington, D.C., the next step in her reemergence after the Democrat lost her second bid to be governor of Georgia last year to Republican Brian Kemp.

Howard, one of the nation’s top historically Black colleges, said it was appointing Abrams as the Ronald W. Walters Endowed Chair for Race and Black Politics beginning in September.

the first Black woman to be nominated by a major party for governor of an American state. Her place in politics now is unclear, though. Georgia isn’t scheduled to have any major statewide races on the ballot until

“Stacey Abrams has proven herself an essential voice and eager participant in protecting American democracy -– not just for certain populations, but for everyone with the fundamental right to make their voices heard,” Howard President Wayne A. I. Frederick said in a statement.

The 49-year-old political activist and lawyer won’t be a traditional full-time faculty member, the university says, but she will lecture, invite guest speakers, and host symposiums. Howard says she will work across multiple academic departments to focus on “real-world solutions” to problems facing Black people and other vulnerable groups. Abrams will still live in Atlanta.

“We are at an inflection point for American and international democracy, and I look forward to engaging Howard University’s extraordinary students in a conversation about where they can influence, shape and direct the critical public policy decisions we face,” Abrams said in a statement.

Abrams’ next steps have been closely watched since her loss. She was an international election observer in Nigeria in February, has been promoting her children’s book, “Stacey’s Remarkable Books,” and announced a tour for an adult book, “Rogue Justice” beginning in May. Last month. Abrams was named senior counsel at Rewiring America, a group promoting clean energy and electrification.

In January, Abrams left open a return to politics in an interview with Drew Barrymore, saying “I will likely run again,” and adding, “If at first you don’t succeed, try try again. If it doesn’t work, you try again.”

Abrams made history in 2018 as

2026. Abrams was unchallenged as leader of the state Democratic Party going into the 2022 election, with voters backing her endorsed choices for down-ballot running mates. But while she has lost twice, Georgia now has two Democratic U.S. senators, Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock.

Abrams, a Mississippi native, graduated from Atlanta’s Spelman College, another top historically Black institution, and has taught there as an adjunct professor. A former Atlanta deputy city attorney, she was also the minority leader of the Georgia House, an entrepreneur who tried her hand at multiple startups and a voting rights activist. A longtime writer who has now published 15 books, Abrams earned $5 million from books and speeches in the years between her pathbreaking 2018 gubernatorial loss and her second run in 2022.

Abrams is filling a chair named for a legendary figure. Waters was a professor of political science at Howard from 1971 to 1996 and later directed the African American Leadership Institute at the University of Maryland. As a youth, he organized a lunch counter sit-in to protest segregation in his hometown of Wichita, Kansas. He later advised the Congressional Black Caucus and was campaign manager for Jesse Jackson’s pioneering presidential bids in 1984 and 1988.

Stacey Abrams, Democratic candidate for Georgia governor, gives a concession speech in Atlanta on Tuesday, Nov. 8, 2022.

Photo: Ben Gray/AP

Harry Belafonte, activist and entertainer, takes a bow at 96

By Hillel Italie Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — Harry Belafonte, the civil rights and entertainment giant who began as a groundbreaking actor and singer and became an activist, humanitarian and conscience of the world, has died. He was 96.

Belafonte died Tuesday of congestive heart failure at his New York home, his wife Pamela by his side, said publicist Ken Sunshine.

With his glowing, handsome face and silky-husky voice, Belafonte was one of the first Black performers to gain a wide following on film and to sell a million records as a singer; many still know him for his signature hit “Banana Boat Song (Day-O),” and its call of “Day-O! Daaaaay-O.” But he forged a greater legacy once he scaled back his performing career in the 1960s and lived out his hero Paul Robeson’s decree that artists are “gatekeepers of truth.”

Belafonte stands as the model and the epitome of the celebrity activist. Few kept up with his time and commitment and none his stature as a meeting point among Hollywood, Washington and the Civil Rights Movement.

Belafonte not only participated in protest marches and benefit concerts, but helped organize and raise support for them. He worked closely with his friend and generational peer the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. He risked his life

and livelihood and set high standards for younger Black celebrities, mentoring Usher, Common, Danny Glover and many others. In Spike Lee’s 2018 film “BlacKkKlansman,” he was fittingly cast as an elder statesman schooling young activists about the country’s past.

Belafonte was a major artist since the 1950s. He won a Tony Award in 1954 for his starring role in John Murray Anderson’s “Almanac” and five years later became the first Black performer to win an Emmy for the TV special “Tonight with Harry Belafonte.”

His “Calypso,” released in 1955, became the first officially certified million-selling album by a solo performer, and started a national infatuation with Caribbean rhythms (Belafonte was nicknamed, reluctantly, the “King of Calypso″).

Belafonte befriended King in the spring of 1956 after the young civil rights leader called and asked for a meeting. They spoke for hours, and Belafonte would remember feeling King raised him to the “higher plane of social protest.” Then at the peak of his singing career, Belafonte was soon producing a benefit concert for the bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama, that helped make King a national figure. By the early 1960s, he had decided to make civil rights his priority.

“I was having almost daily talks with Martin,” Belafonte wrote in his 2011 memoir “My Song.” “I realized that the movement was more

important than anything else.”

The Kennedys were among the first politicians to seek his opinions, which he willingly shared. John F. Kennedy, at a time when Black voters were as likely to support Republicans as they would Democrats, was so anxious for his support that during the 1960 election he visited Belafonte at his Manhattan home.

When King was assassinated, in 1968, Belafonte helped pick out the suit he was buried in, sat next to his widow, Coretta, at the funeral, and continued to support his family, though they later became estranged.

“Much of my political outlook was

Actor, singer and activist Harry Belafonte from the documentary film “Sing Your Song,” poses for a portrait during the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah on Jan. 21, 2011. Belafonte died Tuesday of congestive heart failure at his New York home. He was 96.

Photo: Victoria Will/AP File

See Belafonte on Pg. 9

Unite to Fuel Change

We live in a world where divisions and poverty affect everyone but when we unite as changemakers we can create a community where all people thrive.

One insider and one outsider are finalists for Minnesota State chancellor position

By Mshale Staff

Minnesota State, the state’s largest highest education system that runs seven state universities and 26 community and technical colleges, is closing in on hiring a new chancellor. Dr. Devinder Malhotra, the current chancellor is scheduled to retire this summer.

The system announced Dr. Tonjanita (Tonja) Johnson and Dr. Scott Olson as the two finalists that were scheduled to come to Minnesota State for interviews last week.

Former state finance commissioner under Gov. Jesse Ventura, Ms. Pam Wheelock and Mr. George Soule, vice chair of the Minnesota State Board of Trustees, cochaired the search committee.

In a news release, the system said Dr. Johnson has served the University of Alabama System since 2019 as senior vice chancellor for academic and student affairs. Previously, she served the University of Tennessee System as the executive vice president/chief operating officer from 2016 to 2019 and as vice president for communications and marketing from 2013 to 2016. Previous engagements include serving the State University of New York at Stony Brook as chief deputy to the president from 2010 to 2013, Middle Tennessee State University as associate vice president for marketing and communications from 2008 to 2010, and

Mississippi Valley State University from 2001 to 2008. She holds a bachelor’s degree and a master’s from the University of Alabama and a doctorate from Jackson State University (MS).

Dr. Olson has been the president of Winona State University since 2012. The university is one of seven under the Minnesota State system. He previously served Minnesota State University, Mankato as provost and vice president for academic and student affairs from 2003 to 2012. He also served the Minnesota State system office as interim vice chancellor for academic and student affairs for 13 months from 2010 to 2011. Previous engagements include Ball State University in Indiana as dean of the College of Communication, Information, and Media from 1998 to 2003, and Central Connecticut State University as a professor and then administrator between 1985 and 1998. He holds a bachelor’s degree, a master’s, and a doctorate from Northwestern University in Illinois.

The Board of Trustees will have a special meeting on May 9 to review feedback received from interview participants and appoint a new chancellor.

If an appointment is made on May 9, the new chancellor will start on August 1.

Dr. Tonjanita Johnson, left and Dr. Scott Olson. Photos: Courtesy of Minnesota State

US Embassy in Sudan closed indefinitely as special forces evacuate American diplomats

By Tom Gitaa Mshale

American special forces, numbering just over 100, flew into Sudan from Djibouti Saturday (April 22) morning at 9 a.m. Eastern to evacuate American diplomats and their dependents, as fighting intensified between the two sides led by Gen. Abdel Fattah Burhan, head of the armed forces, and Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, the leader of a paramilitary group known as the Rapid Support Forces.

The fighting has killed over 400 people as of Sunday.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III said the evacuation was under the command of U.S. Africa Command and conducted in close coordination with the U.S. State Department. “I’m proud of our extraordinary service members who executed and supported this operation with outstanding precision and professionalism,” he said.

The special operations personnel with their aircraft — including three MH-47 Chinooks spent less than an hour on the ground in Khartoum in their mission, the Pentagon said in a statement.

The evacuation came after the embassy posted Saturday on its twitter account that it has suspended operations due to “the continued threat from armed conflict in Sudan.”

But more than 16,000 Americans remain in Sudan, and that is just the

number that is registered with the embassy as not every American takes time to do so, or indicate when they have left the country.

“In the coming days, we will continue to work with the State Department to help American citizens who may want to leave Sudan,” said Christopher Maier, the assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low-intensity warfare.

“One of those ways is to potentially make the overland routes out of Sudan potentially more viable. So, DOD is at present considering actions that may include use of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities to be able to observe routes and detect threats,” said Maier.

What Americans in Sudan can do following embassy closure

Following the closure of the US Embassy in Khartoum, the State Department in a pinned tweet on the shuttered embassy’s Twitter account, offered the following guidelines to Americans still in Sudan:

To inform U.S. citizens of options to leave Sudan as security conditions permit, we need to know your information. If you are a U.S. citizen in Sudan, please fill out the following form: https://cacms.state.gov/s/crisis-intake

(There is no need to submit this information again if you have already submitted information concerning yourself or a U.S. citizen family

member to U.S. Embassy Khartoum).

When communicating with the U.S. Department of State, please include: Your full name as spelled in your U.S. passport, Your passport number,

Your current location in Sudan, Your local telephone number, Your email address.

Please also include this same information for any U.S. citizen family members currently with you in Sudan.

Smoke is seen in Khartoum, Sudan, Saturday, April 22, 2023. The fighting in the capital between the Sudanese Army and Rapid Support Forces resumed after an internationally brokered cease-fire failed. American special forces evacuated US diplomats on April 22, 2023 and the Khartoum embassy closed indefinitely.

Photo: Marwan Ali/AP

28 countries critiqued by watchdog for religious freedom violations

By Adelle M. Banks Religion News Service

A watchdog for global religious freedom has used its new annual report to call out the Iranian government for targeting women’s rights protesters during demonstrations last year. The report also points out the country’s “decades-long campaign” against religious minorities.

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom criticized Iran for repressing the religious rights of people of a variety of faiths — from Baha’i to Zoroastrian — and nonreligious communities and decried the use of violence against girls and young women who protested in the wake of Mahsa Amini’s death. Amini, 22, perished after the country’s morality police detained her last year based on an accusation that her visible hair breached a headscarf law.

“While religious freedom conditions in Iran were extremely poor even before protests began in September 2022, they have deteriorated considerably due to the government’s severe brutality against Iranians peacefully asserting their religious freedom,” said USCIRF Chair Nury Turkel, during a Monday (May 1) virtual event when the 2023 USCIRF report was released.

“Iran’s security forces have shot and killed peaceful protesters, detained and tortured others and engaged in a systematic campaign of sexual and gender-based violence against not only women and men, but boys and girls as well.”

Continued from Pg. 5

already in place when I encountered Dr. King,” Belafonte later wrote. “I was well on my way and utterly committed to the civil rights struggle. I came to him with expectations and he affirmed them.”

King’s death left Belafonte isolated from the civil rights community. He was turned off by the separatist beliefs of Stokely Carmichael and other “Black Power” activists and had little chemistry with King’s designated successor, The Rev. Ralph Abernathy. But the entertainer’s causes extended well beyond the U.S.

He coordinated Nelson Mandela’s first visit to the U.S. since being released from prison in 1990. A few years earlier, he had initiated the allstar, million-selling “We Are the World” recording, the Grammy-winning charity song for famine relief in Africa.

He made news years earlier when he compared Colin Powell, the first Black secretary of state, to a slave “permitted to come into the house of the master” for his service in the George W. Bush administration. He was in Washington in January 2009 as Obama was inaugurated. But Belafonte would later criticize Obama for failing to live up to his promise and lacking “fundamental empathy with the dispossessed, be they white or Black.”

He was married three times, most recently to photographer Pamela Frank, and had four children. He is also survived by two stepchildren and eight grandchildren.

A New York City native, Belafonte began performing on stage in the 1940s

These circumstances were determined by USCIRF to be “systematic, egregious, and ongoing” religious freedom violations, which qualify Iran to remain on the State Department’s list of “countries of particular concern,” or CPCs.

The watchdog has called for the redesignation of a total of a dozen countries as CPCs: Myanmar (which the department and USCIRF refer to as Burma), China, Cuba, Eritrea, Iran, Nicaragua, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan.

In addition to Iran, USCIRF drew special attention to violations it has observed in Cuba and Nicaragua, two nations that were added to the State Department’s list last year.

“In Cuba, religious freedom conditions in 2022 worsened considerably, with the government seeking total dominance over religious life in the country,” the watchdog said in its report. “Additionally, the regime in Nicaragua has sharply increased its persecution of the Catholic Church by imprisoning clergy, shuttering church-affiliated organizations, and prohibiting Catholic rituals.”

In its new report, USCIRF recommends five other nations be considered as additional CPCs: Afghanistan, India, Nigeria, Syria and Vietnam.

Turkel expressed the commissioners’ disappointment that the State Department had not listed Nigeria nor India in its recent lists of CPCs. He noted that parts of Nigeria are “hotbeds of persecution” and said the Indian government “enforces religious

and by the following decade was also singing, finding gigs at the Blue Note, the Vanguard and other clubs — and becoming immersed in folk, blues, jazz and the calypso he had heard while living in Jamaica. Starting in 1954, he released such top 10 albums as “Mark Twain and Other Folk Favorites” and “Belafonte”,and his popular singles included “Mathilda, “Jamaica Farewell” and “The Banana Boat Song,” a reworked Caribbean ballad that was a late addition to his “Calypso” record.

Belafonte made history in 1968 by filling in for Johnny Carson on the “Tonight” show for a full week. Later that year, Belafonte performed on a pre-taped TV special and was joined by British singer Petula Clark for a performance of the anti-war song “On the Path of Glory.″ At one point, Clark placed a hand on Belafonte’s arm. The show’s sponsor, Chrysler, demanded the segment be reshot. Clark and Belafonte resisted, successfully, and for the first time a white woman touched a Black man’s arm on primetime television.

Mindful to the end that he grew up in poverty, Belafonte did not think of himself as an artist who became an activist, but an activist who happened to be an artist.

“When you grow up, son,” Belafonte remembered his mother telling him, “never go to bed at night knowing that there was something you could have done during the day to strike a blow against injustice and you didn’t do it.”

nationalist policies, including restriction on citizenship, religious conversion, interfaith marriage and cow slaughter” that negatively affect people of a range of faiths.

USCIRF Vice Chair Abraham Cooper added that, while the commissioners appreciate the efforts of the Biden administration and Congress to address religious freedom, they would like to see the U.S. government do more to address the most egregious violations.

“For example, we continue to urge the administration to use the CPC designation tool more effectively, as too many of the State Department’s CPC countries are repeatedly named as such each year, but results in little to no substantive change,” he said during the event. “Accordingly, we recommend that the State Department impose meaningful consequences on violator governments when it actually names its CPC list, such as by not reissuing the waivers based on other U.S. interests that have so far allowed Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan to avoid penalties and other repercussions.”

Other commissioners spoke of continuing concerns about blasphemy laws across the globe and ongoing Islamophobia and antisemitism, especially in Europe. They also addressed the violence aimed at clergy and religious institutions in Ukraine since the invasion by Russia, as well as the destruction of holy sites there.

USCIRF also is seeking for the first time that Sri Lanka be placed on the State Department’s sec-

ond-tier “special watch list,” citing “discrimination against religious minorities in the form of targeted arrests using problematic legislation and appropriation of land and property.”

The watchdog said two countries, Algeria and the Central African Republic, should be kept on the special watch list and Sri Lanka should be added along with eight others: Azerbaijan, Egypt, Indonesia, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Turkey and Uzbekistan.

The State Department currently includes Comoros and Vietnam on that second-tier list.

Overall, the bipartisan and independent advisory body assessed 28 countries for its 2023 annual report.

USCIRF’s report includes other recommendations to the Biden administration and to Congress.

Among them was a request that the administration strengthen the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program and “prioritize for resettlement survivors of the most egregious forms of religious persecution.” It also asked Congress to make USCIRF’s reauthorization permanent.

The watchdog, which was last reauthorized in 2022, has in recent years received official approval to continue within weeks of a potential shuttering.

Former Associated Press writer Mike Stewart contributed to this report.

Belafonte

Senegal’s Baaba Maal returns after years with a new album

By Lizzie Knight Associated press

Amid a changing, modernizing world with climate change threatening his home, Senegalese singer-songwriter and activist Baaba Maal is releasing his first album in seven years, “Being.”

The genre-crossing album, released by Marathon Artists last Friday, is explores those themes and showcases traditional African instruments along with futuristic electronic sounds.

The first single from the record, “Yerimayo Celebration,” is a jubilant, rabble-rousing celebration of Maal’s roots in the small town of Podor in north Senegal, and the fishing community at its heart. Maal was born into a fisherman class and was expected to follow that career path, but he befriended Mansour Seck, a griot — or traveling storyteller and musician — and was welcomed into his family.

“I never thought I would stay in one place and doing one thing every day in my life. This is why music is a really good opportunity for me to go away, first, like a young person, like going on an adventure,” he said. “And it’s a way to liberate me and

the people of my generation of this caste system where you have to stay in this place, do the same thing like your father or grandfather.”

Maal’s latest single, “Freak Out,” features vocalist Esau Mwamwaya of The Very Best. The video accompanying the track shows scenes from the Blues Du Fleuve festival, which Maal founded in his hometown on the Senegal River, bringing together musicians, artists, singers, activists and more from all over West Africa. Maal calls it “The Glastonbury of Africa.”

The veteran musician is headlining the Barbican in London for the first time in 20 years on May 30 and the audience can expect a unique experience.

“Music is a celebration and music is a party and when it comes to an African party, it has to be an African party,” he added.

As well as being a musician, Maal is also an activist on the topics of climate change and refugees. Since 2003, he has been committed to various development challenges in Africa, working with different United Nations organizations.

His NANN-K Trust recently opened a solar-powered irrigation project in Senegal to fight desertification, which is one of the main drivers of people leaving on dangerous migration routes. The project will train people to start similar schemes in their own communities and Maal is a particular believer in putting power in the hands of young people and women.

“We are chanting, we are crying, we are saying loud that we need a green Africa and a green Africa to make people to live really a normal life, to face climate change, desertification — all of that,” he said.

Maal also contributed to the soundtrack of “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” and the 69-year-old’s

participation in Marvel’s blockbuster franchise has brought him to a new, much younger audience. He believes the franchise can inspire new hope for the African continent.

The movies are set in the fictional African paradise of Wakanda, a country that is rooted in tradition and yet has the most advanced technology in the world. The visionary musician sees a template for Africa in the “Black Panther” films’ Afrofuturism.

“I have a feeling … that something great should be coming from this continent again, and something positive for the world,” he said. He characterizes it as “a door which is open for Africa, not just for Baaba Maal.”

“It’s for the continent,” he said.

His first football season, Isaiah told us, ‘Wear a jersey with my name on it. I want everyone to know you’re here for me.’

This undated handout photo shows Senegalese singer-songwriter and activist Baaba Maal. Amid a changing, modernizing world with climate change threatening his home, Maal released his first album in seven years, “Being,” on Friday, March 31, 2023.

Photo: Matthew Donaldson via AP