Racism in Africa

[1] Pygmies and Bantus differ physically and genetically due to long lasting evolutionary segregation until the Bantu expansion brought them back into close contact.

In an effort to reward conversion, the colonial government confiscated traditionally Tutsi land and reassigned it to Hutu tribes, igniting a conflict that has lasted into the 21st century.

This partly reflected internal Belgian domestic politics, who later saw the discrimination against the Hutu majority as similar to oppression within Belgium suffered from the Flemish-Walloon conflict.

[17] Overt discrimination from the colonial period was continued by different Rwandan and Burundian governments, including identity cards that distinguished Tutsi and Hutu.

[17] In 1993, Burundi's first democratically elected president, Melchior Ndadaye, who was Hutu, was believed to be assassinated by Tutsi officers, as was the person constitutionally entitled to succeed him.

Collectively, these groups are locally known as Shanqella or barya, derogatory terms originally denoting slave descent, irrespective of the individual's family history.

The often socio-economically disadvantaged Oromo and Gurage are thus not considered by the highlander groups as being racially barya, owing to their similar physical features and common Afro-Asiatic ancestry.

The Anywaa (Anuak) Nilotes of southern Ethiopia consequently regard the Amhara, Oromo, Tigray and other Afro-Asiatic groups collectively as gaala in contradistinction to themselves.

In addition to the many victims among the various tribes of the northern and southern regions of the country that have perished in the ongoing conflict, foreigners residing or visiting Ivory Coast have also been subjected to violent attacks.

According to a report by Human Rights Watch in 2001, the Ivory Coast government was guilty of fanning ethnic hatred for its own political ends.

For centuries, the haratin lower class, mostly poor black Africans living in rural areas, have been considered natural slaves by these Moors.

[35] The ruling bidanes are descendants of the Sanhaja Berbers and Beni Ḥassān Arab tribes who emigrated to northwest Africa and present-day Western Sahara and Mauritania during the Middle Ages.

Many descendants of the Beni Ḥassān tribes today still adhere to the supremacist ideology of their ancestors, which has caused the oppression, discrimination and even enslavement of other groups in Mauritania.

In August, German general Lothar von Trotha defeated the Herero in the Battle of Waterberg and drove them into the desert of Omaheke, where most of them died of thirst.

[39][40][41][42][43] The genocide was characterized by a high number of deaths from starvation and thirst; the Herero who fled the violence were prevented from returning from the Namib Desert.

[71][72] Slavery dates back centuries in Niger and was criminalised after five years of lobbying by Anti-Slavery International and Nigerian human-rights group, Timidria.

As a result of pressure from UNICEF and human-rights activists, a law that would grant special protections to the Pygmy people is awaiting a vote by the Congo parliament.

In an effort to reward conversion, the colonial government confiscated traditionally Tutsi land and reassigned it to Hutu tribes, igniting a conflict that has lasted into the 21st century.

[citation needed] In 1959, Belgium reversed its stance and allowed the majority Hutu to assume control of the government through universal elections after independence.

[17] Overt discrimination from the colonial period was continued by different Rwandan and Burundian governments, including identity cards that distinguished Tutsi and Hutu.

By extension, the term is currently used for forms of systematic segregation established by the state authority in a country against the social and civil rights of a certain group of citizens due to ethnic prejudices.

[96] In the Sudan, black African captives in the civil war were often enslaved, and female prisoners were often abused sexually,[97] with their Arab captors claiming that Islamic law grants them permission.

[99] In September 2000, the U.S. State Department alleged that "the Sudanese government's support of slavery and its continued military action which has resulted in numerous deaths are due in part to the victims' religious beliefs.

[103] In 2004, it became publicly known that there was an organised campaign by Janjaweed militias (nomadic Arab shepherds with the support of Sudanese government troops) to get rid of 80 black African groups from the Darfur region of western Sudan.

However, there is little evidence of there actually being an Almoravid conquest of Ghana [114][115] In 2018, more than seven years after the fall of the Ben Ali regime, Law 50 was introduced to protect black Tunisians from racial discrimination.

[117] The most prominent case of anti-Indian racism was the ethnic cleansing of the Indian (called Asian) minority in Uganda by strongman dictator and human rights violator Idi Amin.

In August 1972, Idi Amin declared what he called an "economic war", a set of policies that included the expropriation of properties owned by Asians and Europeans.

White settlers held full citizenship rights, as well as other significant economic and legal advantages over indigenous African people.

White settlers were protected by generous provisions established by the Lancaster House Agreement, and thus continued to exert significant political and legal control over the African population.