This October 22 and 23, history will unfold in Nairobi. For the first time, Africa will host a Pan-African festival dedicated to reparations for slavery and colonial crimes. The event, titled Wakati Wetu – Swahili for “Our Time” – will bring together more than a hundred artists, musicians, policymakers, activists, scholars, and philanthropists from across the continent and the diaspora. Co-organized by African Futures Lab, Reform Initiatives, Baraza Media Lab, Deep South Solidarity Fund, the festival comes at a timely moment, as the African Union embarks on its Decade of Reparations dedicated to the liberation and justice for Africans and people of African descent. ALSO READ: Reform global financial system now or risk societal collapse Since we announced the dates for the festival, one question we have heard: Why a festival on reparations, and why now? The timing matters. Western engagement with Africa is shrinking – marked by the withdrawal of international aid, restrictive migration policies, persistent racial hierarchies and selective public outrage at the plight of white South African farmers that ignores the struggles of a Black majority. At the same time, we see a second scramble for African resources, for Chinese lithium batteries and European hydrogen dams, fuelling energy transitions that benefit others. ALSO READ: Africa demands ‘fair international finance architecture’ Wakati Wetu is our response. The festival draws on the power of art, culture, and intellect to reclaim the imagination that colonialism sought to erase, to envision a new global order free of the colonial structures entrenching racism, extraction, and debt that still bind us. It begins with rejecting the systems that created Africa’s dependence and claiming the power to shape its future on its own terms. ALSO READ: Biased Western media eroding investors' confidence, stunting Africa’s growth – study The African continent today faces intersecting crises of climate, debt, and security each rooted in a colonial past that never truly ended. Africa contributes less than 4% of global carbon emissions, yet bears the brunt of climate: floods, droughts, eroding biodiversity, and collapsing harvests. By 2030, 50 million Africans could fall below the poverty line, and 100 million may be displaced from their homes. This is not an accident of history. It is the predictable outcome of centuries of racialized extraction and dispossession. Debt tells the same story. Today, 22 African countries are already in or near distress, and more than half the continent’s population lives in nations that spend more on repaying external creditors than investing in education or healthcare. Some African states are forced to borrow at rates 12 times higher than their European counterparts, yet the global financial system remains unchanged. The global institutions that were inherited from colonial rule have proven incapable, or unwilling, to address these injustices. The United Nations Security Council, for example, continues to dictate Africa’s political futures without African representation. Nearly eight out of 10 of the Council’s resolutions concern African situations, yet the continent has no permanent seat, no veto, and little voice. As a new global order emerges, Africa must claim its place within. The demand for reparations is not merely about financial compensation but about structural transformation: dismantling the institutions and ideologies that were built on the exploitation of African lives and resources, and that continue to define global hierarchies today. By bringing together artists, activists, and scholars from over 20 countries across Africa and its diasporas, Wakati Wetu opens a space to imagine an Africa free from exploitation and dependency. A future where the dignity of its peoples is restored through our cultures, our knowledge systems, our languages, and our economies. It is also a call to build lasting solidarities between Africans on the continent and those in the diasporas of Europe and the Americas. The writer is the co-founder and executive director of African Futures Lab, an international research-based think tank that works on global inequalities across Africa and Europe.
