On 29 May 2025, the Oxford Union assembled for its weekly debate, with this week’s motion being ‘This House Believes Africa Must Evict its Colonial Masters’. This is under the backdrop of the alleged dominance of foreign powers such as China in Africa – both traditional colonialists and new powers such as China are encompassed in this motion. While some see this as inhibiting Africa from realising its true potential, others see foreign investment as necessary for the growth of the continent, making this a very relevant debate to today.
Arguing for the motion were Dr. Umar Johnson, an American activist and the self-proclaimed ‘Prince of Pan-Africanism’; and Vusi Thembekwayo, a South African businessman who’s previously been a dragon on South Africa’s local version of Dragon’s Den. Arguing for side opposition were Errol Musk, a South African businessman and politician, well known today as the father of Elon Musk; and Professor Kenneth Mwenda, an international development expert from Zambia whose career includes a position at the World Bank, and an honorary fellowship of Exeter College.
It was anticipated that the atmosphere could be tense at the Union. Since last week’s debate on assisted dying, Anita Okunde, the Union’s president, was subject to a vote of no confidence by the standing committee. While this vote had no impact on her status as president – as shown by a speech where she stated she wouldn’t resign – it raised tensions. As well as that, this debate was to be preceded by discussion on a private business motion to do with reforming the Union’s rules. This motion had caused strong reactions both in support and opposition and, as such, controversy was anticipated even before the event began.
However, despite all this, myself and others were informed upon arrival that “the press will be entering last for security reasons”, according to the president’s Chief of Staff. Rather than simply entering the chamber after all other members to attend the emergency debate and private business motion, we were kept outside for longer. When the Director of Press eventually came to hand me my press pass, I was informed that the president had decided that no press were to be allowed in until the beginning of the debate, meaning the Press were to miss the private business motion. This was confirmed by an impromptu phone call between the two of them. While the rules of the institution should be respected, it raised questions as to whether paying members of the Oxford Union have the right to know about these motions.
As is traditional, the debate was preceded by an emergency debate, where members humorously debated the motion that: ‘This House Believes Democracy is Doomed to Fail’. After listening to the arguments from both sides, members voted against the motion.
While the emergency motions traditionally end at 8:30pm, shortly to be followed by the beginning of the main debate, this week’s emergency debate was still going as late as 8:45pm, when the results were finally announced. Another 15 minutes passed before the Union’s officers entered the chamber. They were not accompanied by the guest speakers, who remained in the library. This was because the private business motion was about to begin. There had been talk of the national press attending the debate on colonialism last night, and, presumably, the Union did not want them to be near the private business motion.
While I wasn’t in the chamber, I could hear the tension building. Big yells of ‘aye’ and ‘no’ respectively at the right times, as well as huge cheers. The testimony of some members who were in the chamber suggests that many members weren’t even aware exactly what they were voting for, instead simply attempting to follow the orders of their college’s resident Union “hacks”. The debate began with a speech in support of the motion, given by Oliver Jones-Lyons, who expressed frustration with the lack of a welfare panel since last summer, which the rule changes, he claimed, would help fix. Following him, ex-president Ebrahim Osman-Mowafy made a speech criticising these proposed changes as an attack on the power of the democratically-elected Standing Committee. Eventually, after a long voting process which included votes on amendments in the name of Osman-Mowafy, it was agreed that the private business motion should be postponed to Week 8, once this had been settled on by yet another vote. This meant that the controversy has been paused for now, but will return.
It was 9:45pm by the time this was all over, meaning that the debate could begin. After having a chance to listen to all the speeches, the Union’s members voted in an overwhelming majority in favour of the proposition, 227 voting in favour of the motion, and just 25 voting against it. Therefore, the Oxford Union has voted that Africa must evict its colonial masters. The debate was followed by a further round of debating on rules reforms. This time it was a motion designed to raise the number of members required in the chamber for quorum (enough people for a vote to be valid) to be reached. If passed, this would have the effect of restricting the chance of any further successful rule changes. Over the weekend, many Union propaganda accounts appeared, both vehemently in support and in opposition to this change.
Overall, despite the initial controversy surrounding the private motions, the debate took place as normal. While questions still remain as to whether the Union should be allowed to block the press, that is a debate for another time.