Africa’s Dark Age is not about lack of potential. It is about suffocated potential. It is not about lack of talent. It is about talent being hunted and silenced. It is not the absence of light. It is the deliberate extinguishing of light. But as long as there are Africans willing to speak the truth, defend justice, confront tyranny, and stand without fear, the continent will never be conquered by darkness.
By Prof Louis Mbua
There are moments in history when the weight of injustice refuses to let the human conscience rest. In the past days, as I navigated the torrent of news updates, social-media testimonies, and eyewitness accounts from across the continent, I felt compelled to speak. What I saw was not scattered tragedy. It was a pattern. A rhythm. A system. A continent-wide choreography of brutality and betrayal. Across Africa, something dark is unfolding. Something coordinated. Something chillingly familiar.
The legitimate winner of Cameroon’s recent presidential election, Issa Tchiroma Bakary, now finds himself in exile, driven from his own land like a hunted criminal and forced to seek refuge in The Gambia. This is not political contestation. This is persecution dressed as procedure.
CNN now reports mass graves in Tanzania — silent, horrifying evidence of a state that has chosen violence as its language and terror as its policy. And only days ago, Guinea-Bissau shook once again under an alleged power grab by a leader who refused to accept defeat, jailing opponents and silencing dissent.
But the moment that pierced deepest into my heart was seeing the elderly yet indomitable Ms. Alice Nkom — Cameroon’s iconic defender of human rights — standing fragile in body but unshakable in spirit against the Biya regime. A regime that lost the election but clings to power through intimidation and the barrel of a gun.
These are not separate tragedies. They are chapters of the same story. They are signals from a continent in distress. Africa now stands at a crossroads: between a young, impatient generation that wants dignity and entrenched ruling systems determined to cling to power at all costs. This is not a crisis of talent. It is not a crisis of resources. It is a crisis of leadership — and of moral courage. This is Africa’s new Dark Age. Not because the continent lacks brilliance, but because too many of its rulers are committed to extinguishing that brilliance.
When the State Turns Predator
A society descends into a Dark Age the moment its government begins attacking its own people. Cameroon has become the clearest example of this descent. For years, the state has pointed its guns inward — at Southern Cameroonians, at young protesters, at political challengers, at anyone who dares ask for justice or truth. Arbitrary killings, disappearances, massacres, torture, and forced displacement have replaced governance.
Tanzania now follows a similarly tragic path. Reports of mass graves and brutal crackdowns reveal a leadership that mistakes cruelty for authority. In these nations, leaders act not as servants of the people but as self-appointed monarchs with the power of life and death. That is not governance. That is organised tyranny.
Poverty as a Tool of Domination
Poverty in these systems is not an accident. It is a weapon. When roads crumble, when hospitals lack medicine, when schools decay, when youth unemployment suffocates entire communities — these are not unfortunate oversights. These are deliberate designs of regimes that thrive when their populations remain desperate, dependent, and voiceless. Meanwhile, the ruling elite enjoy private jets, European villas, offshore accounts, and obscene displays of wealth stolen from the very people they were meant to serve. This is not mismanagement. It is engineered stagnation.
Opposition as a Criminal Offence
In functioning democracies, the opposition keeps the system honest. In a Dark Age, the opposition becomes a hunted enemy. Journalists disappear. Activists are arrested. Opponents are tortured or exiled. Citizens who post dissent online are treated like fugitives. These regimes preach unity while sowing terror. They promise development while expanding corruption. They declare peace while unleashing violence. They claim to be democratic while trampling every principle of democracy.
International Complicity: The Silent Partner
The most painful truth is that global powers enable these systems through silence and geopolitical self-interest. As long as foreign corporations keep mining, as long as military partnerships remain intact, as long as strategic alliances remain undisturbed, the brutality of African dictators is quietly tolerated. Africa’s Dark Age is not only African. It is internationally sponsored darkness.
The Psychological War on the People
Oppression is not only physical. It is emotional and psychological. Fear becomes the national currency.
Suspicion becomes the national language. Despair becomes the national inheritance. When a citizen knows their life can be erased at the whim of a leader intoxicated with power, hope dies long before the person does. A continent with the world’s most vibrant youth population finds its creativity suffocated, its intellect suppressed, its courage strangled. This is not just repression. It is psychological colonisation.
But Darkness Never Wins Forever
History provides only one consistent verdict: No regime built on terror survives the awakening of the people. Every dictator appears invincible — until the day they fall. Every oppressive system looks eternal — until the moment it collapses.
Africa’s youth are rising. Connected. Educated. Resilient. Spiritually aware. Politically awakened. Even in Cameroon, Tanzania, Guinea-Bissau, and beyond — where oppression seems strongest — new seeds of transformation are quietly germinating. Darkness can roar. But dawn always returns.
A Plea to the Continent’s Conscience
Africa’s Dark Age is not about lack of potential. It is about suffocated potential. It is not about lack of talent. It is about talent being hunted and silenced. It is not the absence of light. It is the deliberate extinguishing of light. But as long as there are Africans willing to speak the truth, defend justice, confront tyranny, and stand without fear, the continent will never be conquered by darkness.
This Reign of Terror may be a chapter — but it will not be the conclusion. Tyrants have their hour. Justice has its destiny. Oppressors wield force. People wield history. When the oppressed stand together, guided by truth instead of revenge, Africa’s renaissance will break through with a force no army, propaganda machine, or dictator can stop.
Prof Louis Mbua
