ARMA builds on the African Mining Vision (AMV) but goes further: it proposes a treaty-based authority to enforce beneficiation, ban raw exports of strategic minerals, and launch a Pan-African Mineral Exchange. Where AMV outlines aspirations, ARMA codifies obligations.

Thank you, Duncan—your article is timely and incisive. The framing of African agency as historically situated and strategically adaptive resonates deeply with our work.

That’s precisely why we’re advancing the African Resource Management Authority (ARMA)—to institutionalize that agency through treaty-based governance, beneficiation mandates, and youth-led value chains.

You’re right, Duncan. African governments do exercise agency—but often within constrained architectures. The fact that Mandelson’s consortium failed to secure the deal in Congo is a testament to that resistance. But it also reveals something deeper: agency without infrastructure is fragile.

For decades, Africa’s mineral wealth has been the object of covert deals, elite collusion, and foreign manipulation. This Epstein and Mandelson mining consortium—underscores a deeper truth: Africa’s resources are not merely looted; they are brokered in rooms where Africans are absent, or silenced.

Washington should have won it

NBA: Wizards
NCAA: Colorado Buffaloes
NFL: Commanders
NHL: Capitals/Canadiens
MLB: Nationals
WNBA: Mystics
Soccer: DC United/Spirit