Oscar-winner Lupita Nyong’o is the latest top star set to join previously announced cast members in Christopher Nolan’s next film which has been shrouded in mystery, in news first reported by industry publication The Hollywood Reporter.
Other actors that were announced earlier are Matt Damon, Tom Holland, Anne Hathaway and Zendaya.
Nyong’o first came to prominence when she starred in Steve McQueen’s 12 Years a Slave which won her an Academy Award. She later went on to star in the blockbuster Black Panther and the sequel, Wakanda Forever.
Nolan is the director of Oppenheimer which won seven Academy Awards including Best Picture at this year’s Oscars. The film grossed $976 globally at the box office.
Nolan’s new film will have an Imax release of July 17, 2026, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
This will be the first time the Kenyan thespian will be working with Nolan. Her recent appearances include that of being the voice of Star in The Wild Robot, which was released in September and is an adaptation of Peter Brown’s book by Universal arm DreamWorks Animation. It has grossed almost $300 million since its release. Nolan’s upcoming film is also with Universal.
Nyong’o was this year also in A Quiet
7.
The Wild Robot won the Audience Award at the Savannah Film Festival last month.
Place: Day One, an apocalyptic horror film directed by Michael Sarnoski. It came out in June and grossed more than $260 million at the box office.
In September, Nyong’o released Mind Your Own, a podcast that navigates what it means to belong, told from an African perspective.
Lupita Nyong’o attends the Chanel Spring/Summer 2025 collection presented Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2024, in Paris. She is set to star in the next Christopher Nolan film coming out in July 2025.
Photo: Vianney Le Caer/Invision/AP
Guest Commentary by Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis Jr.
We must work together to support the sustainability of HBCUs in America
Earlier this year the U.S. Department of Education sent all colleges and universities across the nation a notice, reminding them that they need to comply with the newly updated cybersecurity regulations published by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).
The regulations – which include specifications such as implementing critical controls for information security programs, maintaining oversight of service providers and designating an individual to oversee a school’s cybersecurity infrastructure – came in response to an uptick in ransomware attacks on schools around the United States.
While these regulations are certainly warranted in an age where personal data is becoming increasingly vulnerable to cyber-criminals, the penalties for failing to comply with the regulations – especially the withholding of federal needs-based funding under Title IV – pose an existential threat to schools operating under tight budgets.
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Take historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs), which have throughout their existence struggled to find the substantial funding that many state and private predominantly White institutions (PWIs) of higher education enjoy and who are already steeling themselves to deal with an expected surge of applicants following the Supreme Court’s regressive decision to effectively end affirmative action admission programs.
The loss of Title IV funding would drastically affect around 80 percent of the student bodies at HBCUs and would have a consequential negative impact on the future of these vital institutions of higher education.
Endowments at HBCUs pale in comparison to those at the U.S.’s top ranked colleges and universities, with the overall endowments at all the country’s HBCUs accounting for less than a tenth of Harvard’s.
The gap in funding between PWIs and HBCUs isn’t just because of smaller endowments, it’s also because state lawmakers keep funds off HBCU campuses – in North Carolina, for example, legislators awarded N.C. State an extra $79 million for research while N.C. A&T – the nation’s largest HBCU – was given only $9.5 million.
When it comes to access to technology, HBCUs also face an uphill battle with 82 percent of HBCUs being located in so-called “broadband deserts.”
Despite their struggles with funding, and the fact that these schools constitute only 3 percent of four-year colleges in the country, HBCU graduates account for 80 percent of all Black judges, 50 percent of Black lawyers, 50 percent of Black doctors, 40 percent of Black members of Congress and our country’s current vice president.
HBCUs truly know how to do more with less, but they cannot be saddled with costly regulations that pose an existential crisis to their ability to operate and be given no help to deflect some of the costs. Fortunately, however, there are businesses and individuals who see the importance of HBCUs to the Black community and are willing to lend their hands – and their dollars – to support them.
The Student Freedom Initiative (SFI), a non-profit chaired by philanthropist and entrepreneur Robert F. Smith and funded by major tech companies like Cisco, has raised millions of dollars to help HBUs comply with the Education Department’s mandates. Cisco alone donated $150 million to the SFI with $100 million allocated to bringing HBCU cybersecurity system upgrades and $50 million going to establish an endowment to offer alternative student loans.
With $89 million already distributed to 42 HBCUs across the nation, the initiative has already saved around $1.5 billion in needs-based funding to these colleges and universities and is making strong inroads to helping these institutions meet the new cybersecurity regulations, but more is required if all HBCUs are to be saved.
Given the empowering impact HBCUs have on the nation’s Black community and the future promise of a more inclusive America, it is imperative that more companies support the work the Student Freedom Initiative is doing to ensure these vital higher education schools can continue to educate and inspire future generations.
As Vice President Harris said, “What you learn at an HBCU is you do not have to fit into somebody’s limited perspective on what it means to be young, gifted and Black.”
We in the National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education (NAFEO) https://www.nafeonation.org/ stand in strong support of the Student Freedom Initiative. We all should work together to ensure the sustainability of HBCUs in America.
Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr. is President and CEO of the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) and a lifelong civil rights and environmental justice leader.
Health advocates in Africa worry Trump will reimpose abortion ‘gag rule’ governing US aid
By Farai Mutsaka Associated Press
EPWORTH, Zimbabwe (AP) — Carrying her infant daughter, 19-year-old Sithulisiwe Moyo waited two hours to get birthcontrol pills from a tent pitched in a poor settlement on the outskirts of Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare.
The outreach clinic in Epworth provides Moyo with her best shot at achieving her dream of returning to school. “I am too young to be a baby-making machine,” she said. “At least this clinic helps me avoid another pregnancy.”
But the free service funded by the U.S. government, the world’s largest health donor, might soon be unavailable.
As he did in his first term, U.S President-elect Donald Trump is likely in January to invoke the so-called global gag rule, a policy that bars U.S. foreign aid from being used to perform abortions or provide abortion information. The policy cuts off American government funding for services that women around the world rely on to avoid pregnancy or to space out their children, as well as for heath care unrelated to abortion.
Four decades of on-again, off-again restrictions
The gag rule has a 40-year history of being applied by Republican presidents and rescinded by Democratic presidents. Every GOP president since the mid1980s has invoked the rule, which is known as the Mexico City Policy for the city where it was first announced.
As one of his first acts as president in 2017, Trump expanded the rule to the extent that foreign NGOs were cut off from about $600 million in U.S. family planning funds and more than $11 billion in U.S. global health aid between 2017 and 2018 alone, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress.
The money — much of it intended for Africa — covered efforts such as preventing malaria and tuberculosis, providing water and sanitation, and distributing health information and contraception, which might also have repercussions for HIV prevention.
Women’s health advocates are “uneasy” following Trump’s victory, said Pester Siraha, director of Population Services Zimbabwe, an affiliate of MSI Reproductive Choices, an NGO that supports abortion rights in 36 countries.
The policy stipulates that foreign NGOs that receive U.S government funding must agree to stop abortion-related activities, including discussing it as a family planning option — even when they are using non-U.S. government funds for such activities. During Trump’s first term, MSI did not agree to those conditions, effectively making it ineligible for U.S government funding.
Siraha said that a blueprint offered to Trump by the conservative-leaning
Heritage Foundation in its plan known as Project 2025 indicates that the new administration could enact “a more comprehensive global gag rule.”
Even NGOs in countries that outlaw abortion, such as Zimbabwe, are affected. Population Services Zimbabwe, for instance, closed its outreach clinics during Trump’s first term after losing funding due to its association with MSI Reproductive Choices. Such outreach clinics are often the only health care option for rural people with limited access to hospitals due to poverty or distance.
“It leaves women with no place to turn for help, even for information,” said Whitney Chinogwenya, global marketing manager at MSI Reproductive Choices.
Some NGOs in other African countries such as Uganda, Ghana, Ethiopia, Kenya and South Africa rolled back services, including clinics, contraception, training and support for government and community health workers, as well as programs for young people, sex workers and LGBTIQ+ communities.
Other services shut down entirely. The risk of unplanned pregnancies, unsafe abortions and related deaths increased in many of the affected countries, according to the U.S.-based Guttmacher Institute, which supports abortion rights.
Chinogwenya, the MSI Reproductive Choices marketing manager, said her organization’s donor income dropped by $120 million during Trump’s first term. The money would have provided 8 million women globally with family planning help, preventing 6 million unintended pregnancies, 1.8 million unsafe abortions and 20,000 pregnancy-related deaths, she said.
The gag-rule policy “leads to more unintended, unwanted, unsupportable pregnancies and therefore an
increase in abortion,” said Catriona Macleod, a professor of psychology at South Africa’s Rhodes University.
“This legislation does not protect life … it’s been called America’s deadly export,” said Macleod, who heads the university’s studies in sexuality and reproduction.
Trump’s transition team did not respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press.
Damage isn’t always easy to repair
President Joe Biden rescinded the gag-rule policy in 2021, resulting in Population Services Zimbabwe receiving $9 million, about 50% of its donor funding, from USAID in 2023. “But we haven’t regained all the loss we suffered,” said Siraha, the organization’s director.
“You need a minimum of five years to have an impact. If we then have another gap of five years, it means we are reversing all the gains,” she said.
Her organization estimates that 1.3 million women could lose out on the care they need in Zimbabwe, leading to an additional 461,000 unintended pregnancies and 1,400 maternal deaths if the gag rule is reinstated.
Overseas aid budget cuts by other Western governments will make it harder to find alternative funding, Siraha said.
Forced into difficult choices
MSI Reproductive Choices is lobbying world leaders and alternative donors to fight for abortion rights.
“Trump’s reelection may embolden the anti-choice movement, but the fight for women’s reproductive rights is nonnegotiable,” Chinogwenya said.
However, agencies that rely heavily or entirely on U.S funding might have little choice but “to quiet their guidelines on access to abortion” to qualify for funding, said Denise Horn, an international relations and civil society expert at Bryant University in Rhode Island.
In South Africa, where abortion is mostly legal, some NGOs, especially those without alternative funding, stopped openly discussing abortion as an option or changed their guidelines and the information they share publicly, according to an assessment by South Africa’s Rhodes University and the International Women’s Health Coalition, a New York-based NGO.
“Organizations thus have to evaluate what is most important: the nonabortion work they will still be able to do or the principle of pro-choice,” read part of the 2019 assessment report. “Ultimately, these organizations will have to make this difficult decision.”
The long lines of women at the outreach clinic in Zimbabwe’s Epworth settlement underline the dire need for family planning services in impoverished communities.
Engeline Mukanya, 30, said she is already struggling to support her three children with the $100 she earns monthly from plaiting women’s hair. Nurses inserted a birth-control implant in her left arm to protect her from pregnancy for the next five years.
Like many here, she cannot afford private providers who charge $20 to $60.
“It’s unfortunate that we are so far away from America yet we are being caught in the crossfire of its politics,” she said. “All we want is the freedom to space our births.”
19 year old Sithulisiwe Moyo, right, and a friend, carry their babies on their backs at an outtreach clinic in Epworth, Zimbabwe, Thursday, Nov. 14, 2024.
Photo:Aaron Ufumeli/AP
Applications now open to join Hennepin County’s advisory boards. Apply by December 31, 2024
By Mshale Staff
Hennepin County is looking for applicants to serve on its advisory boards. Members of the advisory boards advise county commissioners on issues and programs, help set policy, and deal with a variety of topics of concern to the county, according to the county.
All the advisory boards have varying levels of compensation which can either be per diem for each meeting of as low as $50 or an actual monthly compensation of up to $988.90.88 on the case of an appointed commissioner on the Three Rivers Park District board.
Applications, which can be found https:// www.hennepin.us/en/your-government/ get-involved/citizen-advisory-boards, will be accepted through Dec. 31, 2024. Description of the roles and responsibilities of members are also available at the same link. Applicants are advised to check their eligibility for each board.
If you are unable to fill out the application online, you can call 612-348-3081 for assistance.
As of the time of this writing (Nov. 21), eight different advisory councils are accepting applications, including an At-Large position on the Three Rivers Park District Board of Commissioners. The park district consists of seven members, five of whom are elected and two appointed by the county board of commissioners. The open position is for one of the appointed seats.
The Special Board of Appeal and Equalization is also looking for seven members to join. A critical responsibility of this board is determining whether all of the taxable property in the county “has been properly valued and classified for the current assessment.” To apply, you must
have completed the Minnesota Department of Revenue County Board of Appeal and Equalization Training within the last 4 years.
Others looking for members are the Adult Mental Health Local Advisory Council, County Extension Committee - University of Minnesota Extension, Human Resources Board, Library Board, Race Equity Advisory Council and the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act Board.
Interview with the county board
You can apply for multiple boards. Those eligible will be invited to provide a pre-recorded
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interview statement to be played for the Hennepin County Board of Commissioners during a scheduled committee or board meeting. You will have three minutes to introduce yourself and talk about why you’re interested in the position.
If you apply for more than one board, you only need to provide one interview statement.
Minnehaha
Watershed District Board
The Minnehaha Creek Watershed District Board is a joint responsibility between Hennepin County and Carver County with a seven-member composition. Hennepin County appoints six of
The watershed encompasses 178 square miles and includes Lake Minnetonka, the Minneapolis Chain of Lakes, Minnehaha Creek.
To be eligible you must be a resident of the district but you cannot be a public officer of the county, state or federal government.
Meetings happen twice a month at the district office in Minnetonka and members are compensated $125 per meeting and reimbursed for traveling.
the members while Carver County appoints one. Members serve staggered three-year terms.
Applications to serve on various Hennepin County advisory boards are being accepted now through Dec. 31, 2024. Photo: Tom Gitaa/Mshale
Some Arab Americans who voted for Trump are concerned about his picks for key positions
By Joey Cappelletti Associated Press
LANSING, Mich. (AP) — Just a week after winning several of the nation’s largest Arab-majority cities, President-elect Donald Trump has filled top administration posts with staunch Israel supporters, including an ambassador to Israel who has claimed “there is no such thing as Palestinians.” Meanwhile, the two Trump advisers who led his outreach to Arab Americans have not secured positions in the administration yet.
The selections have prompted mixed reactions among Arab Americans and Muslims in Michigan, which went for Trump along with all six other battleground states. Some noted Trump’s longstanding support for Israel and said their vote against Vice President Kamala Harris was not necessarily an endorsement of him. Others who openly supported him say he will be the final decisionmaker on policy and hope he will keep his promise of achieving an end to the conflicts in the Middle East.
Albert Abbas, a Lebanese American leader whose brother owns the Dearborn, Michigan, restaurant Trump visited in the campaign’s final days, stood beside the former president during that visit and spoke in support of him.
Now, Abbas says it’s “too early” to judge Trump and that “we all need to take a deep breath, take a step back and let him do the work that he needs to do to to achieve this peace.”
“I just want you to think about what the alternative was,” said Abbas, referring to the current administration’s handling of Israel’s war in Gaza and its invasion of Lebanon. He added, “What did you expect from myself or many members of the community to do?”
presidential
eyond promising peace in the Middle East, Trump has offered few concrete details on how he plans to achieve it. His transition team did not respond to a request for comment. Throughout the campaign, his surrogates often focused more on criticizing Harris than outlining his agenda.
And visuals of the conflict — with tens of thousands of deaths collectively in Gaza and Lebanon — stirred anger among many in Arab and Muslim communities about President Joe Biden and Harris’ backing of Israel.
NO ONE GETS A DIPLOMA ALONE.
Amin Hashmi, a Pakistani American in Michigan
who voted for Trump, urged him to stay true to his campaign commitments to bring peace.
Republican
nominee former President Donald Trump, center, listens to Albert Abbas, owner of The Great Commoner, left, as Massad Boulos looks on during a visit to the cafe, Nov. 1, 2024, in Dearborn, Mich.
Photo: Carlos Osorio/AP
Trump Cont’d on Pg. 8
Percival Everett and Jason De León win National Book Awards for “James” and “Soldiers and Kings”
By Joey Cappelletti Associated Press
Percival Everett’s “James,” a daring reworking of “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” has won the National Book Award for fiction. Jason De León’s “Soldiers and Kings: Survival and Hope in the World of Human Smuggling” won for nonfiction, where finalists included Salman Rushdie’s memoir about his brutal stabbing in 2022, “Knife.”
The prize for young people’s literature was given Wednesday night to Shifa Saltagi Safadi’s coming of age story “Kareem Between,” and the poetry award went to Lena Khalaf Tuffaha’s “Something About Living.” In the translation category, the winner was Yáng Shuāng-z ’s “Taiwan Travelogue,” translated from the Mandarin Chinese by Lin King.
Judging panels, made up of writers, critics, booksellers and others in the literary community, made their selections from hundreds of submissions, with publishers nominating more than 1,900 books in all. Each of the winners in the five competitive categories received $10,000. Everett’s win continues his remarkable rise in the past few years. Little known to general readers for decades, the 67-year-old has been a Booker Prize and Pulitzer Prize finalist for such novels as “Trees” and “Dr. No” and has seen the novel “Erasure” adapted into the Oscar-nominated “American Fiction.” In taking on Mark Twain’s classic about the wayward Southern boy Huck and the enslaved Jim, Everett tells the story from the latter’s perspective and emphasizes how differently Jim behaves and even speaks when whites are not around. The novel was a Booker finalist and last month won the Kirkus Prize for fiction.
“James” has been nicely received,” Everett noted during his acceptance speech.
“Demon Copperhead” novelist Barbara Kingsolver and Black Classic Press publisher W. Paul Coates
received lifetime achievement medals from the National Book Foundation, which presents the awards. Speakers praised diversity, disruption and autonomy, whether Taiwanese independence or the rights of immigrants in the U.S. Two winners, Safadi and Tuffaha, condemned the year-old Gaza war and U.S. military support for Israel. Neither mentioned Israel by name, but both called the conflict “genocide” and were met with cheers — and more subdued responses — after calling for support of the Palestinians.
Tuffaha, who is Palestinian American, dedicated her award in part to “to all the deeply beautiful Palestinians that this world has lost and all those miraculous ones who endured, waiting for us, waiting for us to wake up.”
Last year publisher Zibby Owens withdrew support for the awards after hearing that finalists were planning to condemn the Gaza war. This year the World Jewish Congress was among those criticizing Coates’ award, citing in part his reissue of the essay “The Jewish Onslaught,” which has been called anti-Semitic.
National Book Foundation Executive Director Ruth Dickey said in a recent statement that Coates was being honored for a body of work rather than any individual book, and added that while the foundation condemns anti-Semitism and other forms of bigotry, it also believes in free expression. “Anyone examining the work of any publisher, over the course of almost five decades, will find individual works or opinions with which they disagree or find offensive,” she added.
The National Book Awards have long taken place in midNovember, shortly after the elections, and they’re an early snapshot of the book world’s reaction: Hopeful after Barack Obama’s victory in 2008, when publisher and honorary winner Barney Rosset anticipated “a new and uplifting agenda”; grim but determined in 2016, after Donald Trump’s first victory, with fiction winner Colson Whitehead urging the audience to “be kind to everybody, make art, and fight the power.”
This year, as hundreds gathered for the dinner ceremony at Cipriani Wall Street in downtown Manhattan for the awards’ 75th anniversary, the mood was one of sobriety, resolve and willed good cheer.
Host Kate McKinnon joked that she was recruited because the National Book Foundation wanted “something fun and light and to distract from the fact that the world is a bonfire.” Musical guest Jon Batiste led the audience in a round of “When the Saints Go Marching In” and sang a few lines from “Hallelujah,” the Leonard Cohen standard which McKinnon somberly performed at the start of the first “Saturday Night Live” after the 2016 election.
Kingsolver acknowledged feeling “smacked down, at the moment,” but added that she has known despair
before. She likened truth and love to forces of nature, like gravity and the sun, always there whether you see them or not. The writer’s job is to imagine “a better ending than the one we’ve been given,” she said.
At a Tuesday night reading by awards finalists, some spoke of community and support. Everett began his turn by confiding that he really “needed this kind of inspiration after the last couple of weeks. We kind of need each other right now.” After warning that “hope is not a strategy,” he paused and said, “Never had a situation felt so absurd, surreal and ridiculous.”
It took a moment to realize he wasn’t discussing current events, but rather reading from “James.”
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This combo image shows authors Percival Everett, left, and Jason De Leon as they attend the 75th National Book Awards ceremony at Cipriani Wall Street on Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2024, in New York.
Photo: Andy Kropa/Invision/AP
“I am disappointed but not surprised,” said Hashmi, who urged Trump to “keep the promise you made to the people of Arab descent in Michigan.”
Trump picks what pro-Israel conservatives call a ‘dream team’
Those in the community with concerns have specifically pointed to former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, nominated as Trump’s ambassador to Israel. Huckabee has consistently rejected the idea of a Palestinian state in territories seized by Israel, strongly supported Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and opposed a two-state solution, claiming “there really isn’t such a thing” as Palestinians in referring to the descendants of people who lived in Palestine before the establishment of Israel. While Huckabee has sparked the most concern among community members, other Trump Cabinet picks have strongly spoken in Israel’s favor as it targets Hamas following the militant group’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack in which it killed 1,200 Israelis and took hundreds more as hostage.
Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, nominated for secretary of state, has opposed a ceasefire in the war, stating that he wants Israel to “destroy every element of Hamas they can get their hands on.” Trump’s pick to be his ambassador to the United Nations, New York Rep. Elise Stefanik, led the questioning of university presidents over antisemitism on campuses. She has also opposed funding for the U.N. Relief and Works Agency, which oversees aid to Gaza.
Pete Hegseth, an Army National Guard veteran and Fox News host, was chosen by Trump to head the Department of Defense. Hegseth has publicly opposed the two-state solution and advocated for rebuilding a biblical Jewish temple on the site of Al-Aqsa Mosque, one of Islam’s holiest sites.
The Republican Jewish Coalition, which organized
for Trump in Michigan, has been outspoken in its support for many of Trump’s Cabinet picks. Sam Markstein, the group’s political director, described the proposed lineup as a “pro-Israel dream team,” adding that “folks are giddy about the picks.” He praised Trump’s pro-Israel record as “second to nobody.”
“The days of this mealymouthed, trying to have support in both camps of this issue are over,” Markstein said. “The way to secure the region is peace through strength, and that means no daylight between Israel and the United States.”
No roles yet for key figures in Trump’s Arab American outreach
Among the reasons some Arab American voters supported Trump was that they believed his prominent supporters would
be key in the next administration.
Massad Boulos, a Lebanese businessman and father-in-law of Trump’s daughter Tiffany, led efforts to engage the Arab American community, organizing dozens of meetings across Michigan and other areas with large Arab populations.
Some sessions also featured Richard Grenell, former acting director of national intelligence, who was well-regarded by those who met with him.
Neither Boulos nor Grenell has been tapped yet for the coming administration, though Grenell was once considered a potential secretary of state before Rubio was selected.
Boulos declined to comment and Grenell did not respond to a request for comment.
“Some people expected Trump to be different
and thought Massad would play a significant role,” said Osama Siblani, publisher of the Dearbornbased Arab American News, which declined to endorse a candidate in the presidential race. Siblani himself turned down a suggested meeting with Trump after the nonendorsement announcement.
“But now people are coming to us and saying, ‘Look what you’ve done,’” Siblani said. “We had a choice between someone actively shooting and killing you and someone threatening to do so. We had to punish the person who was shooting and killing us at the time.”
Associated Press writers Mike Householder in Detroit and Meg Kinnard in Columbia, South Carolina, contributed to this report. ”
Osama Siblani, publisher of the Arab American News, is photographed in his office, April 10, 2024, in Dearborn, Mich.
Photo: Carlos Osorio/AP
Africa’s Anglican prelates say Archbishop Welby’s resignation is warning on abuse
By Fredrick Nzwili Religion News Service
” NAIROBI, Kenya (RNS) — In his sermon on Sunday (Nov. 17), Archbishop Thabo Makgoba of Cape Town, the Anglican primate of Southern Africa, warned that reports of abuse by church leaders will likely rise in the wake of the resignation of Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby over his handling of child abuse allegations.
Welby quit on Nov. 12, after an investigation found that he had not reported the sexual and physical abuses committed by John Smyth, a barrister, educator and Christian camp director from the late 1970s to the early 1980s. Smyth ran camps in Zimbabwe and later moved to South Africa, where he died in 2018.
Makgoba said the Smyth case, and Welby’s resignation, was a reminder for Anglicans to be on the watch for abuse.
but the church had never received any reports suggesting he abused or groomed young people in that time. Makgoba explained that without any evidence, the diocese could not take any action under canon law and did not know of any crime to report to the police.
“Consequently, I am consulting the Safe and Inclusive Church Commission, which pursues abuses vigorously, as well as our chancellors, who give us legal advice, to work out terms of reference of a review of whether the diocese, and I per-
“We must also not be naïve. The publicity around this case will generate more reports of abuse from the past, so far unknown to the church’s leadership,” Makgoba said in his sermon. “The Safe and Inclusive Church Commission has republished its contact details,” said the bishop, referring to a panel established in 2016 to offer resources on abuse. “I encourage anyone who knows of abuse to report it to them.”
The archbishop said that he was aware of Smyth’s presence in his diocese and said the bishop of an English diocese wrote to the Diocese of Cape Town in 2013, warning that Smyth was accused of abuse in Britain and Zimbabwe.
According to Makgoba, Smyth had worshipped in a parish in Cape Town briefly two decades ago and again toward the end of his life,
sonally, met our obligation to keep you safe, and what we could do better,” he said.
The prelate blamed “the culture of bad decision-making, marked by secrecy, of yesteryear, in which we hid such heinous acts is what has crippled us today.”
“We cannot bury our heads in the sand in shame and become invisible as the body of Christ. We are resurrection people,” said Makgoba.
The response to Welby’s resignation among Anglican church leaders in Africa has been complicated by their criticism of Welby’s position on same-sex marriage and LGBTQ inclusion, and their membership in GAFCON, a movement of Anglican and dissenting church leaders that has repudiated Welby’s leadership because of his position on sexuality.
Over the past year, clerics in the Church of England, which Welby headed until a week ago, have approved prayers to be said for same-sex couples while not changing the doctrine of the church, which says that marriage is reserved for heterosexual couples.
On Oct. 24, after saying on a podcast that he backed same-sex marriage, Welby issued a statement clarifying that he was only expressing his personal views. On Oct. 31, GAFCON leaders meeting in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, rebuked the archbishop for supporting the blessing of such unions. The primates urged Welby to repent of the denial of his vows, in which he promised to “teach the doctrine of Christ as the Church of England has received it.”
Several African Anglican bishops regretted Welby’s resignation, including the chair of the GAFCON Primates Council, Archbishop Laurent Mbanda of Rwanda, who said he was saddened by the resignation and called the developments an occasion for grief and self-reflection.
Mbanda said child sexual abuse in the church was a pernicious evil that has brought devastating, longterm effects upon survivors and their families. “Yet their trauma is only exacerbated by negligence or inaction in pursuing and prosecuting perpetrators for their crimes.
Such failures to act also grieve the heart of God and bring shame upon his church,” said Mbanda, in the Nov.13 statement.
Anglican Archbishop Stephen Samuel Kaziimba Mugalu of Uganda was more critical in his statement, saying, “Unfortunately, this is the same compromised leadership that has led to the fabric of the Anglican Communion being torn at its deepest level.”
Mugalu was one of the archbishops at the fourth GAFCON conference in Kigali, Rwanda, in April 2023, after the Church of England moved to allow the blessing of same-sex unions, where the primates in attendance announced they had lost confidence in Welby and the Church of England.
Archbishop Justin Badi Arama, primate of the Episcopal Church of South Sudan, where Welby had traveled recently to promote peace in the company of Pope Francis, is also chair of another group critical of Welby, the Global South Fellowship of Anglican Churches. In a pastoral statement released the day after Welby resigned, Arama prayed for Smyth’s victims, adding, “It is also a time of great personal challenge for the Archbishop himself and his family, who are coming under great strain. We continue to uphold them in prayer during this difficult time.”
Kenya Archbishop Jackson Ole Sapit regretted that the abuses had gone on for too long, while condemning any act of abuse, oppression and injustices and any form of cover-up. “We call upon the Church of England to extend full support to all affected and to correct such historical wrongs and prevent a repeat of such failures,” he said in a statement.
Archbishop Justin Welby, left, and Archbishop Thabo Makgoba talk in a 2018 video.
Photo: Screen grab
Justin Welby, archbishop of Canterbury, gives his first keynote address during the 2022 Lambeth Conference, held at the University of Kent in Canterbury, England, July 29, 2022.
Photo: Neil Turner for the Lambeth Conference
Art & Entertainment
Mandé Sila treats the audience of Cedar Cultural Center
By Susan Budig Mshale
Their music was magic from the first notes out of Habib Koité’s guitar on Wednesday evening, November 13th at The Cedar Cultural Center. A quartet of West African musicians graced the stage and bestowed the audience with sounds from Mali, Cote d’Ivoire, and Senegal.
Habib Koité on guitar, Aly Keita on balafon, and Lamine Cissokho on kora, and Mama Kone on calabash and djembe held the attention and entertained over 200 people for nearly two hours.
These musicians created a pop-up band and went on tour titled Mandé Sila to celebrate both Koité’s 30th anniversary as a professional musician and also to celebrate their shared Mandinka heritage.
It was instantly apparent how the calabash gourd connects all of them. The gourd is an integral component of all their instruments except the guitar. Its dried out shell serves as the main body for the kora, the body of the drum for the calabash, and dozens of them in various sizes serve as resonators to amplify the sound of the keys of the balafon.
When Events Manager and Volunteer Coordinator Jared Hemming introduced the band he told the audience we were about to hear music not heard anywhere else in the Twin Cities. With some exceptions, he was spot-on.
The Cedar consistently offers space for international acts of the highest caliber that also offers their original sound on traditional instruments.
The band performed more than a dozen numbers, some of them solos, most of them collaborative, often pingponging off of one another or challenging one another in a call and response style.
The second song, Benkau, featured Keita playing the balafon so fast, the mallets visually appeared like hummingbird wings hovering. The number was both exciting and inspiring.
They moved straight into an unusual tune, Fimani, that included a duel between Keita’s balafon and Habib’s vocals as he used both falsetto and whistling. The audience offered warm and richly deserved appreciation.
The spell was cast on all of us and we were riveted to our seats luxuriating in the sounds. I wanted to pinch myself I was so moved by their music. The dedication and skill of these musicians was readily apparent.
Koité offered his solo at this point, which I recorded in part and played back later only to put it on repeat. The song is like a warm embrace that could go on forever.
The band trouped back on stage and they played Mandé followed by Batmabe. I conclude Keita must have impressive biceps hidden under his shirt-sleeves. His playing of the balafon and how he wields those mallets is very physical and powerful.
Likewise, Kone on percussion leaves us mesmerized. The polyphonic rhythms that he produces is melodic in its own right even as he appears to attack his instruments with energy.
The band’s music makes a person happy to have ears to hear them. Several people dancing were glad for their feet as well. We’ll take these warm memories into the winter as mental sustenance.
Habib Koité on guitar, Aly Keita on balafon, and Lamine Cissokho on kora, and Mama Kone on calabash and djembe as they performed at the Cedar on Nov. 13, 2024.
