Jamilah Conteh Speaks — Sunday, October 25, 2026. From Freetown, Sierra Leone: the African Group rejects “fixed regional seats” at the UN and holds out for two permanent Security Council seats; Sierra Leone and Cuba talk health, education and farming; a $150 million Sahel climate project takes shape in Niamey; Salvadoran troops land in Haiti; Burkina Faso restores the death penalty; one hundred young Sierra Leoneans train for electric vehicles; and two Write About It posts on feeding ourselves and reading the sky — ten minutes of SJOL News.
Today’s rundown
0:00 — News lead: at the table, not on the menu. Per UN Meetings Coverage (GA/12797), Namibia’s delegate, speaking for the African Group at the General Assembly’s debate on Security Council reform on Thursday 22 October, said “Africa needs to be at the table, not on the menu” and restated the continent’s “unchanged and unambiguous” demand of two permanent seats, with all the rights and privileges, and five non-permanent seats, as set out in the Ezulwini Consensus and the Sirte Declaration; Burkina Faso’s representative said: “The machinery needs to be rethought.” Per the Namibian Broadcasting Corporation, Ambassador Penda Naanda said: “Africa, however, does not accept the bridging proposal of ‘fixed regional seats’. A seat held on elected, renewable and reviewable terms is not a permanent seat within the meaning of the Ezulwini Consensus, the Sirte Declaration or the UN Charter,” and: “Africa has waited eight decades.” Mediacongo also reported the African Group’s rejection. Home desk: Per the African Union Assembly decision of 18 February 2026 (Assembly/AU/Dec.976(XXXIX)), President Julius Maada Bio presented the report of the Committee of Ten (C-10) Heads of State and Government on UN Security Council reform. Per Sierraloaded, Planning Minister Kenyeh Barlay received Cuba’s Ambassador Norma Sánchez Águila to deepen cooperation in health, education, agriculture, fisheries, training and investment, including a proposed diabetes centre. Sahel progress: Per the Climate Commission for the Sahel Region (CCRS), a regional technical retreat closed in Niamey on Friday 23 October after shaping a $150 million multi-country climate resilience project for Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger — the three Confederation of Sahel States members — and Senegal, to be submitted to the Green Climate Fund with the West African Development Bank (BOAD); the roadmap foresees national consultations in early 2027 and a concept note in October 2027.
1:30 — Platform support. Nobody handed us this seat — we built the table ourselves: donate, subscribe, and invite one friend who builds, at Soul Journey of Life.
2:00 — Channel sparks (attributed, fair use — watch the originals).
- Neferkare Dessalines — “El Salvador Troops Arrive in Haiti on American Planes” (title as published; the “American planes” claim is only partly confirmed). Per the Miami Herald (also carried by Tribune News Service), four planeloads carrying 350 Salvadoran troops landed in Haiti on Friday, a day after 100 special forces arrived; one aircraft was a US military C-130 provided by the Pentagon at the State Department’s request, and the report did not establish who provided the others. Per the same report, the troops are searching for four Salvadoran aviation technicians missing since a gang ambush, and UN figures show about 10,000 more people displaced.
- Zack Mwekassa — “DEATH PENALTY IN BURKINA: THESE 3 REASONS WILL GET YOU DEATH PENALTY!” (title as published; “three reasons” is the channel’s framing). Per RFI, all 71 members of the Transitional Legislative Assembly voted on Tuesday 20 October for a new penal code restoring the death penalty for terrorism, espionage and treason, and for importing expired or banned products that cause death. Per Human Rights Watch, which opposes capital punishment in all circumstances, the code also covers parricide; the death penalty had been abolished in 2018 and the last known execution was in 1988; Justice Minister Edasso Rodrigue Bayala said armed groups told recruits they would face no more than life imprisonment.
- Make Afrika Great — “TRAORE 2.0 UNLEASHED: Botswana President BOKO Drops a POWERFUL LECTURE” (title as published; the “Traoré 2.0” comparison is the channel’s framing, and we could not confirm when or where the lecture was recorded). Per President Duma Boko’s 60th Independence Day message, published by News&All Botswana: “To the young people of Botswana … You are not merely the leaders of tomorrow. You are our partners in building Botswana today”; he also said “unemployment remains unacceptably high.”
4:00 — Culture, tech & spirit. Per OkayAfrica, South Africa’s Young Stunna has released his second album, Busisiwe; the duo Rush-Awa (DJ Sliqe and MashBeatz) released a 15-track self-titled debut that answers talk of disunity in South African hip-hop by gathering many of the country’s top rappers; and Ghana’s King Promise is back with “Melody.” Per Sierraloaded, the UNDP in Sierra Leone, with the Ministry of Youth Affairs and the Armed Forces Technical and Education College (AFTEC), has launched a two-week programme for 100 prospective Sierra Ride drivers covering electric vehicle operations, road safety, charging systems and vehicle management; an initial fleet of 50 electric vehicles is expected to operate in Freetown. Per the Associated Press, as carried by the Los Angeles Times, Virginia Theological Seminary makes annual cash payments to descendants of people who laboured on its campus during slavery and Jim Crow; its director of reparations, Ebonee Davis-Hayes, said: “The moral repair, the healing aspect is as great as the monetary one.” Spirit note (opinion): healing begins when someone finally says your name at the table.
5:30 — Marketplace & learning. Vendors and instructors who serve our people with dignity: sell your produce, cloth, books and art, and teach farming, coding, history or language. Build it, sell it, keep the value at home. Visit The Shoppes on Soul Journey of Life.
6:00 — Write About It + SJOL take. Fresh this morning: Feeding Ourselves (per ABC11 as cited, the Fertile Ground Food Cooperative broke ground on Saturday 24 October in Southeast Raleigh for a member-owned grocery store and community centre; per the post, the co-op reports 1,044 member-owners and $4.5 million raised toward an $11 million goal; per Bham Now as cited, the Fountain Heights Farms Cooperative in Birmingham plans to open We All Eat Market on Saturday 7 November, and co-founder M. Dominique Villanueva said “we’re doing it on our own terms with our own people”; per the Tulsa Regional Chamber as cited, Oasis Fresh Market has opened its fourth store, downtown; and per the Houston Chronicle as cited, 95 heirs now share Robert Tatum’s remaining 80 acres in East Texas). Also on Write About It: Read the Sky (a Bini, or Edo, folktale of the sky that moved away when people wasted it, labeled by the post as folklore, paired with Dr Warren M. Washington, who per the post helped build some of the first computer models of the whole Earth’s atmosphere, described himself as the second African American to earn a PhD in the atmospheric sciences, and received the National Medal of Science in 2010). Jamilah’s take (opinion): what feeds you, you must own and understand.
8:00 — Closing opinion. From Freetown: per the United Nations list of regional groups, the African Group counts 54 member states, and not one of them holds a permanent seat on the Security Council. Hold the line: a seat you must win again every few years is a guest chair, not a seat at the table. Per the Namibian Broadcasting Corporation, the Secretary-General has called Africa’s absence unjust and indefensible — so stop asking patience from people who have waited eighty years. Sierra Leone carries this file for the Union; carry it loud, and let that spirit run our own tables too. Black America: per the Associated Press, Robin Rue Simmons is spreading Evanston’s $25,000 housing-grant reparations model to more than 100 communities even as the Justice Department has joined a lawsuit against it, and more than 120 countries backed the UN General Assembly’s March resolution calling the trafficking of enslaved Africans “the gravest crime against humanity.” The world is setting a table — pull up your chair. Permanent five: a council shaped in 1945 cannot keep the keys forever. Young people: learn the rules of the room, then change them. At the table, not on the menu. (Opinion.)
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Jamilah Conteh Speaks is SJOL News’ daily noon brief from Freetown, Sierra Leone. Every quote and factual claim is attributed on air; opinion segments are labeled. Full source list available on request.
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