This week, you might not have heard, but there is a revolution against the West brewing in Africa right now. And this one man from Bikina Faso is the reason why. Let me introduce you guys to 37-year-old Ibrahim Triayor. He is the second youngest head of state in the world right now. And what his supporters say he represents is simple. African independence. Because here's the truth. Africa is the richest continent in the world in terms of resources. from gold, diamonds, and oil to cobalt, lithium, and rare earth materials that power your smartphones, my camera, our electric cars. Yet, at the same time, most African countries rank among the poorest in the world. So, what's up with that? Well, partly, and remember, there's many reasons for one thing to be true. One of the reasons is that for over a century now, multinational corporations and foreign powers, although have been extracting Africa's wealth without building long-term prosperity. Couple of examples for you. Mining contracts often send up to 90% of profits abroad and leaving behind environmental devastation. Foreign companies often win billion dollar worth infrastructure deals like to build roads, airports, and railways. But then rather hiring locally, they import workers and send profits home. France has even charged former colonies so-called colonial debt and still controls 14 African countries currencies through their CFA Frank. And there is like endless examples of this. And I'm not even talking about the new wave which is the tech industries. And they are just scooping up all of the lithium and the cobalt to transition to green energy while the African countries themselves rarely get more than a cut of the raw material price. And this is where Ibraim Triayor comes into the picture. You see, Bino Faso is a former French colony. And when he rose to power in 2022, he began accusing France of neocolonialism, which in other words is when a country is still kind of trying to control the other, but now through more harsh means than just directly. So things like propaganda, government destabilization, coup attempts, assassinations, things like that. So when Triori came into power, he made a whole bunch of major changes. He ordered French troops to leave the country, ending military agreements with them. He banned the use of British and French colonial style judicial wigs in effort to decolonize their judicial system. Although this is largely symbolic since Bikinopasa in particular doesn't necessarily use them. It's more like Kenya, Nigeria. But he's also been making changes far larger than banning wigs. He started cutting ties with foreign companies involved in Bikinopasa's infrastructure development like roads, airports like I mentioned before. And now he started replacing them with locally equipped and trained workers. also buying almost 1,000 roadbuilding machines for them to use. He's introduced policies to boost local control over food production and processing. He's pushing for greater state control over their own energy, particularly electricity, so they reduce dependence on foreign suppliers and improved access. And then this is probably the clearest statement to the West yet. He's been buying back a number of the country's major gold mines. And buying back being the key word because they were previously owned by foreign entities. And the thing is, he didn't just take it back with force, with military control. He bought it. He paid $80 million for two of the country's gold mines. He called the purchases a reclaiming of national wealth from exploitative foreign ownership. But the story gets crazier, right? Of course it does because what started in Bikina Faso is now become something much bigger. They have now joined forces with Mali and Nishair to form the alliance of Sahel states. basically saying, "We've got each other's backs and we're all done with Western influence." Nisha themselves ended an agreement with the US that allows the US troops to operate in their country. Ivory Coast and Senagal are now also pushing to remove foreign military bases. And a former Nigerian senator described Trayor's actions as the spirit of a continent yearning to be free, dignified, and prosperous. And I think that is exactly why we are seeing it slowly transition from one country in Africa into Africa as a whole. Because a major question that many of these countries are still asking and increasingly asking is why is a country that's so rich in resources and literally powers the world so poor themselves? Now here is the major problem with this because we we've seen this before. We've seen revolutions in Africa and they haven't turned out well. For example, and this is a pretty crazy one, back in the 1980s, Thomas Sankara led Bikinop Faso with almost the exact same vision Triayor has now. He started rejecting foreign aid, nationalizing roads and railways and called for a true African independence. And you want to know what happened? Just 4 years later, he was assassinated. his policies were reversed and those French firms regained contracts for roads, railways, and ports in Western Africa. So, is Triori walking that same dangerous path? Well, we don't know. But there are reports that he has survived 19 assassination attempts in just 2 years. However, it's important to note that not all of these claims have been verified. One of the most widespread reports, which is also very hard to verify, is that the head of his security was apparently and allegedly offered $5 million to kill Triayor, but he rejected it. We don't know who offered him that money, and we also don't even know if this is true. But this is what's so tricky in these situations because it's very hard to differentiate between valid geopolitical criticism and straight up lies and propaganda, especially if you're from the outside looking in. For example, earlier this month, General Michael Langley, the head of the US military in Africa, accused Triori of using Bikinasu's gold reserves to benefit his military juna uh at the expense of his population. Now, Triayor supporters were not pleased with this at all. And crowds of protesters started gathering and chanting long live Captain Triayor. Now, one of those people who turned up at that protest, a musician named Oibi John, said something that probably represents a lot of what his supporters believe. He said, "Because Colin Powell lied, Iraq was destroyed. Barack Obama lied and Gaddafi was killed. But this time, their lies won't affect us." It's also important to know, and this is probably a factor when it comes in with propaganda and what side to believe and what side not to believe. While Bainaso is severing ties with the West, they're also strengthening ties with Western enemies, particularly Russia. And yeah, I'm not going to lie, they're not going to like that. Now, it's only fair to note that Triayor does have his critics. Some people call him a dictator because he did rise to power in a coup. In fact, Bikinafaso has had the most coups out of any African nation. Technically, he was never elected by the people. In fact, he's postponed elections. He's also known to crack down on disscent and critics, saying no country is ever developed under democracy. And he's also banned pretty much all Western media. So, it leaves you questioning, is that because they have genuine criticism that he wants to silence, or are they actually pushing colonial agendas in the country like he accuses them of? There's also this huge wave, and this one's kind of just hilarious, but these false claims made online, not by Triori himself, but by his supporters. They're making claims like he's paid off all of Kinoasu's debt, that he's already made healthcare and education completely free. And then there's also bizarre. There's all of these AI generated videos of musicians like R. Kelly, Rihanna, Justin Bieber, Kanye West, Eminem, Beyonce, all singing songs about him when of course they haven't. Point is, there's a lot of videos about him making false claims. And it's not him saying that, but it makes this whole situation really, really tricky to be like, what is real, what is not? But either way, this is an incredibly interesting topic that I would love to hear your thoughts about. What do you think? Is this just another dictator grappling for power? Or is Triori the man to ignite a long needed change for Africa? Let me know your thoughts in the comments. I hope you enjoyed the video and I will see you real soon. [Music]