July 5th marks Algerian Independence Day. In 1962, it became the first African country to liberate itself from 132 years of French occupation and colonization, having waged an eight-year-long guerrilla war.

But Algeria wasn’t done fighting imperialism. It poured its energy and resources into helping other colonized countries, positioning itself as the spearhead of Pan-African and internationalist action at the time.

It is widely known that Afro Caribbean psychiatrist Frantz Fanon dedicated himself to the Algerian cause, using his experience with the National Liberation Front to formulate a theory of liberation in his books, The Wretched of the Earth and Toward the African Liberation.

It is less known that in the newly liberated streets of Algiers, you would have bumped into Black Panthers, fighters of the African National Congress, and militants from Cape Verde, Angola, Mozambique, the Canary Islands, or Namibia.

“During the War of Independence, Algeria had large support from African countries like Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, Mali, Ghana, and Congo,” filmmaker Hassane Mezine tells OkayAfrica. “It was part of the essence of the Algerian revolution to support national liberation movements from other countries. The Algerian national project of liberation was not just an Algerian project. It was an African project.”

Once the French had been driven out, around 80 international organizations were invited to mingle in the North African capital of the revolutionary, anti-colonial, and anti-fascist struggle, generously hosted by Ahmed Ben Bella’s nascent regime, which felt a responsibility to popularize its belief that non-violent resistance would never defeat imperialism.

Revolutionaries and exiled militants received training in guerrilla-style warfare, financial support, and political education. Nelson Mandela famously declared, “The Algerian army made me a man,” and Guinea’s Amilcar Cabral called Algiers the “Mecca of Revolution.”

“This was a time when Algerians met people from other places who had the same struggle with a history linked to colonialism and a need for liberation,” says Mezine. “I think that young people in Algeria are very aware of this up to today.”

When London-based Algerian cultural organizer Dénia Dimsdale wrote her master’s thesis about the 1969 Pan-African Cultural Festival in Algiers, she found that most diasporic Algerians of her generation were unaware of the great role their country played in the post-independence era.

“The festival was a beautiful moment in history where Algerians still had a fractured sense of identity - are we French or are we Arab?” says Dimsdale. “Pan-Africanism just came from the sky, gifting Algerians their African identity. But then the government at the time saw it as the perfect opportunity to hijack it and use it for its own gain.”

One of the comments on Dimsdale’s thesis was that she had arrived at an unfair conclusion, saying that the government had hijacked Pan-Africanism. “This information is so difficult to access. I found nothing [about it] online in French, English, or Arabic,” she says.

Said Djinnit, a former Algerian diplomat, witnessed post-independence Algiers, where he began his career working with foreign liberation movements. “You can choose to look at the Sahara as dividing or uniting Africa,” he says. “I’m a Pan-Africanist, I think it unites us.”

Djinnit dedicated his life to Pan-African unity, serving in the African department of the Algerian government and becoming a key architect of the ‘African solutions to African problems’ approach. “The position in Addis Ababa, Africa’s capital, is as important for Algeria as New York,” he says, refusing the divide of North and Sub-Saharan Africa and calling it “pure fabrication. Africa is geographical space, a continent. Not history, not mythology, but reality.”

Algeria was one of the founding members of the Organization of African Unity (OAU) in 1963, establishing a Liberation Committee and an African Battalion tasked with coming to the aid of revolutionary and liberation movements in need of weapons, money, or militants.

“Through people like my father and his colleagues, Algeria has kept a key role in continental peace and security architecture in the 21st century,” says Dalil Djinnit, Said’s Algerian Ethiopian son. “Based on their experience and budget, Algeria is perhaps the only country in Africa to have this capacity.”

Unsurprisingly, the post-independence era, which many may consider a revolutionary utopia, was marked by harsh realities. The rapidly changing world order left no time for a continent as vast as Africa to figure out unity while nations were still embroiled in their liberation struggles. The Pan-African spirit dwindled. Algeria was plunged into civil war in the 1990s, which led it to look inward.

“[The younger generation’s] idea of Algeria stops with the Civil War because no one wants to talk about that or anything that happened after,” says Dimsdale. A growing economic and cultural influence from the Gulf brought what Mezine calls “a counterrevolutionary influence” to the country, stirring it away from Pan-African education and towards a stronger Arab and Islamic identity.

In a survey conducted by OkayAfrica last year, asking North Africans to share the stories they grew up hearing about each other, there was a general impression that Algerians are not interested in inviting non-Algerians to their country. Considering their Pan-African efforts, this might seem counterintuitive.

“I think this can be linked to the traumatic experience of being French,” says Dalil Djinnit. “Algeria is trying to protect itself,” agrees Dimsdale, but also notes that Pan-Africanism has lost its fire across the continent.

“At the OAU’s opening summit in 1963, Ben Bella said, ‘Let us all agree to die a little … so that the people still under colonial rule may be free,” says Djinnit. “Are you hearing any such statements from any other African leader today? Now, people are in survival mode; they are not dreaming anymore.”

As Algeria commemorates its triumph over colonial oppression, all Africans and formerly colonized peoples should remember July 5th as a historic milestone and turning point for the project of African self-determination and unity.

Mezine believes that we are once again at a turning point where the fundamentals of the Algerian revolution are seeing a revival. Djinnit actively advocates for this revival.

Algeria plays a big role in the African Union, continuing to be a champion for Western Sahara’s independence from Morocco, issuing debt forgiveness to other African countries, and providing billions of dollars to Sahelian countries.

“The [Algerian] government is aware that there is a real need to have people getting back to their relationship with the southern neighboring countries first and then to the rest of the continent,” says Mezine. “Governments know that the African people are the red line of liberation.”

“When I was a young diplomat and attending the OAU meetings, there was a sense that we were together, building our common destiny,” says Djinnit. “I attended the last African Union summit, and honestly, it looked like a panel discussion. We need an African moral rearmament.”

The African Union (AU) has finally expressed concerns over a new travel ban imposed by the U.S. government under the leadership of Donald Trump following a prolonged period of silence. Ten of the 19 countries affected are African countries, including seven whose citizens have been banned from traveling to the U.S.

In its statement, the AU lamented “the potential negative impact of such measures on people-to-people ties, educational exchange, commercial engagement, and the broader diplomatic relations that have been carefully nurtured over decades.” The commission also called on the U.S. government to engage in a constructive dialogue with the affected African countries; however, that appeal may fall on deaf ears considering Trump’s stance on immigration and general attitude towards Africa.

The order prevents citizens from 12 countries from entering the U.S. entirely, while those from nine countries are subject to heightened visa scrutiny and entry restrictions. Eritrea, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Libya, Somalia, and Chad are the six African countries with outright bans on immigrants.

Trump’s order statement alleges visa overstay rates from these countries, inadequate passport systems, and disregard for U.S. immigration laws. Chad was implicated for having “one of the highest overstay rates,” with nearly 50 percent of tourists and 55 percent of students alleged to be offenders. In return, Chad’s President Mahamat Idriss Déby has announced the suspension of visa issuances to U.S. citizens “in accordance with the principles of reciprocity.”

Somalia and Libya were also included on the ban list for facing ongoing terrorism threats, while Eritrea is accused of refusing to accept deportees.

Intending travelers from Togo, Burundi, and Sierra Leone will face heightened visa screening and restrictions, with visa overstays cited as the main reason for these countries’ inclusion on the list. Laos, Cuba, Turkmenistan, and Venezuela are also on the restricted list, while an outright ban extends to Haiti, Iran, Afghanistan, and several other countries.

Several exceptions have been made, such as competing athletes, as the U.S. is set to host next year’s soccer World Cup, and Los Angeles will be the host for the 2028 Olympics. Exceptions also apply to Green card holders, dual citizens, those granted asylum, and individuals from banned countries who are applying for visas through family members who are American citizens.

The number of affected African countries is lower than the initially speculated 22 African countries that could be affected, based on an initial draft list from earlier this year. However, some countries not on this ban list are already being affected by the Trump administration’s antagonizing stance towards immigrants from Africa and the global south.

In April, the U.S. government announced that it had revoked the visas of all South Sudanese immigrants, saying its government was unwilling to accept its deported citizens, despite the U.S. not being certain of the nationality of the person deported. The Department of Homeland Security also said it would not renew the temporary protected status (TPS) of nearly 8,000 Cameroonians who came to the U.S. as asylum seekers.

For now, the priority of the U.S., where immigration from Africa is concerned, is bringing in Afrikaner refugees despite clear evidence that there is no white genocide going on in South Africa.

When U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced in April that President Donald Trump's administration had revoked visas for all South Sudanese citizens, citing South Sudan’s failure to accept deportees “in a timely manner,” it sounded like South Sudan was being punished for refusing to cooperate.

But the reality was far more ridiculous and unfair.

The problem centered on a single passenger: a man on a U.S. deportation flight whom South Sudan refused to accept because he was Congolese, not South Sudanese. Yet America didn’t care.

Even after South Sudan capitulated days later and agreed to take in the Congolese man, “in the spirit of friendly relations,” the U.S. has kept the visa revocation in place. Friendly relations, it seems, are one-sided.

Across social media, South Sudanese described it as American bullying. South Sudan’s Information Minister, Michael Makuei Lueth, told the media that the U.S. was “attempting to find faults with the tense situation” in the country.

“No sovereign nation would accept foreign deportees,” he said.

South Sudan is the world’s youngest country and is on the brink of renewed civil war, threatening over 11 million people.

And yet, from the African Union and other African heads of state? Silence.

That silence is telling and extremely dangerous.

South Sudan’s visa crisis came amid rumors of a draft U.S. travel ban list in which most of the countries are African.

This is just one example of how Trump’s second-term “America First” agenda has hurt Africa, with little pushback from leaders. Since returning to office, he has frozen billions of dollars in aid, ended Power Africa, and imposed new tariffs that threaten African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) trade and jobs across the continent. His policies are also threatening African students studying in the U.S.

Even South Africa, already punished after Trump suspended aid and controversially offered asylum to white Afrikaners, stood alone as it expelled the U.S. ambassador. There is no solidarity from neighbors. No AU statement.

Some may see America stepping back as a push toward self-reliance or simply wish to avoid Washington’s ire. And the African Union may still be adjusting under new leadership. The newly elected AU Commission Chairperson and commissioners took office in March.

But history shows the AU can speak up. In 2017, then-AU Commission Chair Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma condemned Trump’s travel ban on several Muslim-majority countries.

“The very country to which many of our people were taken as slaves during the transatlantic slave trade has now decided to ban refugees from some of our countries,” she told the AU summit in Addis Ababa. “What do we do about this? Indeed, this is one of the greatest challenges to our unity and solidarity.”

Today, the challenge remains, but unity and solidarity seem missing.

If Africa’s institutions won’t stand up for their citizens, who will?