Abd al-Mu’min, Caliph of North Africa’s Almohad Berber Muslim Empire, has decided to build a new Kasbah (citadel) over the remains of a ribat (fortified monastery) that his army has destroyed. The complex will include a mosque and a palace. Construction begins on what will grow into Rabat, the future capital of Morocco.
The Roman Catholic Church gives its official blessing for the conquest and enslavement of Africa. Pope Nichols V (pic) issues a papal decree giving Portugal permission to enslave Africans as long as they are converted to Catholicism. Portugal believes a fortune is to be made trading enslaved Africans, and asks the pope for a religious justification - one which will be used over the next centuries by other European powers. Pope Nicholas obliges: “We grant you, with our Apostolic Authority, full and free permission to invade, search out, capture, and subjugate the pagans and any other unbelievers wherever they may be, as well as their kingdoms and their property, and to reduce their persons into perpetual servitude.”
Italian explorer and mountain climber Prince Luigi Amedeo reaches the highest peak of Mt. Stanley in East Africa, and names it Margherita Peak, after the Queen of Italy. He named another of the mountain’s five peaks after himself: Mt. Luigi di Savoia (Luigi of the Royal House of Savoy). However, the local people will never use these names. They will also continue to use their original name for Mt. Stanley: Ngaliema.
The colonial authorities of Dar es Salaam, German East Africa (Tanzania), honour the memory of the colony’s Chief Administrator in the 1890s, Hedwig Von Wissmann, with a heroic statue. As he stands above, an African servant drapes a German flag over the dead carcass of a lion, symbolising Germany’s subjugation of Africa. Von Wissmann was a mass murder who burned villages and destroyed agricultural land as a means to conquer Africans who resisted German rule. The British will knock down the statue in 1916 when they capture Dar es Salaam during World War I.
In Seychelles, 12,000 acres are now under cultivation as coconut groves. This year 23 million coconuts are gathered, creating the foundation for an export industry. (pic: mound of coconuts gathered on Mahé island)
Italian forces from Italian East Africa invade French Somaliland during World War II. However, France’s Vichy government, which collaborates with Nazi Germany, negotiates an armistice and takes over the colony from the Free French.
South Africa’s Separate Representation of Voter’s Act goes into effect, stripping mixed-race people (“Coloureds”) of the right to direct representation. Henceforth, mixed-race people will vote for white MPs as their representatives. The law is one motivation for the 1952 Defiance Campaign of civil disobedience against apartheid. After a court challenge, the law is upheld in 1956.
The Egyptian Monarchy is abolished by the military that overthrew King Farod in 1952, The Republic of Egypt is declared. Former General Mohamed Naguib (pic) is appointed as president. Although Gamal Nasser commands actual power, he feels his low rank of Lieutenant Colonel will not allow the Egyptian people to accept him as revolutionary leader. Nasser will rule behind the scenes as vice-chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council.
Tunisian nationalist leader Muhammad Zarqtuni commits suicide in prison by swallowing a cyanide capsule rather than reveal under torture to French foreign intelligence operatives any sensitive information about his colleagues in the independence movement. He will become an icon in the resistance movement. One of Casablanca’s main streets will be named for him, Boulevard Zerqtouni.
To draw attention to Eritrea’s fight for independence from Ethiopia, three members of the Eritrean Liberation Front attack an Ethiopian Airlines passenger jet parked at the Karachi, Pakistan airport, with the intention of damaging the plane but not to injure anyone.
Burundi and Rwanda sign the EAC Treaty to join the East African Community.
Plymouth, England renames the town’s Sir John Hawkins Square because Hawkins’ fame and fortune was acquired by raiding the West African coast for Africans to enslave in the 16th century. It is now called Jack Leslie Square, in honour of the first black footballer to represent England internationally.
A video is uploaded onto social networking site Instagram showing a barefoot 11 year-old Nigerian boy performing ballet steps in the rain, and goes viral. Anthony Mmesoma Madu becomes a global sensation for his grace and talent, and will receive a scholarship to the American Dance School in the U.S.
Omukama (ruler) of the Bunyoro people (1870-1899), in Bunyoro, East Africa. Ascending to the throne at age 16 upon the death of his father, he resisted and defeated British and Ottoman Empire efforts to colonise what will become Uganda. Britain declared full-scale war on him in 1894, but even with the assistance of the nations of Nubia and Somalia, the British army required 5 ½ years to capture him. He was exiled for 24 years to Seychelles, where he died in 1923. In 2009, he was declared a National Hero of Uganda.
Senior governmental economist and the father of Barack Obama, the 44th president of the United States, in Rachuonyo District, Kenya. He is the subject of his son's best-selling memoir, Dreams from My Father.
Second President of South Africa (1999-2008), in Mbewuleni, South Africa. In exile during the apartheid era, he was groomed by the liberation party the African National Congress to one day be a national leader. He succeeded South Africa’s first democratically-elected president, Nelson Mandel.
President of Chad (1990-2021) and Chairman of the African Union. His administration was bedeviled by attacks from rebel forces, and he died in battle while commanding government forces against one rebel group.
Gabon’s all-time football goal scorer, in Laval, France. The first Gabonese to be named CAF’s African Footballer of the Year, he led his team in four African Cup of Nations and at the 2012 Olympic Games.
