The New Power Game - Peter Kagwanja.

Africa is no longer peripheral to global power. It is central to it. The problem is that influence does not always translate into control.In this episode of Panel 54, Waweru Njoroge and Ndu Okoh are joined by Prof. Peter Kagwanja, one of East Africa’s most influential geopolitical thinkers, to examine how power is exercised, defended, and contested across the continent.

The conversation moves through Uganda’s role as a regional security anchor, Kenya’s strategic alignment with Western partners, and Nigeria’s struggle to convert size and influence into coherent foreign policy leverage. Kagwanja also reflects on Sudan’s collapse into militarised politics and Somalia’s long entanglement with foreign security interests as cautionary tales of what happens when force overtakes governance.

China’s expanding footprint across infrastructure, finance, and diplomacy is interrogated alongside Western security partnerships, exposing how external actors operate comfortably within Africa’s governance gaps.

The discussion shows how counterterrorism cooperation and military aid can stabilise regimes while others are quietly eroding democratic accountability.At the centre of the episode is a hard truth. Africa’s challenge is not a lack of partners, but a lack of strategy, institutional restraint, and political courage.

In a rapidly shifting multipolar world, the continent risks remaining reactive unless it defines its own interests with clarity and discipline.

This is a sober conversation about China, the West, regional security, and the price Africa pays when power goes unchecked.

Lagos to Lamu. Cape Town to Cairo.A global perspective through an African lens.

📩 Contact: hello@panel54pod.com

🎙 Recorded in Nairobi, Kenya

🎧 Produced by Commex Africa and E & C Talent