President Donald Trump’s declared agenda is to put America first in world affairs. That seems to have frightened some people as it suggests the so-called leader of the free world is not interested in promoting multilateralism. But, as a matter of fact, when has America ever been interested in internationalism? When has America ever championed interests other than its own?

In spite of all of the horrible things they continue to experience, the Afrikan people of Haiti keep fighting to be free.  Haitian resistance to entrenched U.S. interference has not ceased for over 200 years. The latest attempt to kill Haiti’s freedom by aborting her dreams of democracy via the electoral process was designed to prevent landslide victories for the popular Fanmi Lavalas party.

Canada’s announcement that it intends to send 600 troops on a peacekeeping mission in Africa has elicited little enlightened discussion about Ottawa’s history in the continent. In addition to Canadian extensive mining interests, the country has a growing military footprint in Africa over the past decade - working closely with the new United States’ Africa Command (AFRICOM).

The Trump phenomenon points to a civilizational shift; namely, the slow, painful demise of the Western Empire. If this shift breaks down the European Union, dismantles NATO, weakens the Empire’s financial control over the global South, and opens a space for a new moral and political order to emerge, then it is an opportunity all revolutionary forces must seize.

With Trump’s America First campaign, African nations need to craft a coherent regional foreign policy approach for development and security cooperation with external actors to benefit Africans. Meanwhile Australia should take every step to ensure its investments and security engagement do not result in the destabilisation of African countries.

On 20 January 2017, Donald Trump will be inaugurated as the 45^th President of the United States of America. Will he succeed in carrying America’s “imperial burden”? It is too early to say, but it will, undoubtedly, be a compromise between what he and his inner circle of policy advisers intend to do, and what the military-industrial-financial complex wants him to do.

Relations among the BRICS member states could destabilise to breaking point this year. While the Brasilia, Moscow and New Delhi regimes are shifting towards Washington, Pretoria and Beijing continue spouting well-worn anti-imperialist rhetoric, just as Donald Trump and his unhappy mix of populists, paleo-conservatives, neo-conservatives and neo-liberals take power on January 20.

Facts are overrated – who has them anyway? World Bank reports, IMF figures, Human Rights Watch narratives, national GDP figures, CIA fact files, entries in the Lancet, government stats, etcetera are not facts in any benevolent sense. As means of control and manipulation, they are instead the most supported (and perhaps most persuasive) opinion of the day.

The future is still largely open-ended. Trump could try to make a difference, but whether he would succeed or not depends on many systemic and structural constraints at both national and global levels.

The amalgamation of a failed private sector with kidnapping, drug trafficking, and bad government constitutes the most important reason that explains Haiti’s failure in its quest to build a nation-state. Unfortunately, the United States government, symbol of nation building, is often on the wrong side of history in Haiti.

In his 20s, Castro already attempted to liberate his country from the grip of a military dictatorship. Eventually he succeeded. And once in power, his single agenda was to serve the Cuban people - and humanity through internationalist solidarity. What are the masses of young people languishing in poverty and hopelessness under misrule throughout Africa and the Global South waiting for? Arise!

In the battle of ideas, we inherit from him a wealth of revolutionary weapons of theory and real experiences to defend and guide our struggle against capitalism, imperialism and all forms of reactionary ideas and practices.

Trump’s victory signals the inevitable implosion of the liberal order. This will pave the way for construction of the alternative, which comprises: at the national level, the abandonment of liberal economic management for the benefit of sovereign projects, giving rise to social progress; and at the international level, the construction of a system of polycentric globalization.

Two nights before a much awaited national show, two carloads of armed men drove into Marley’s Hope Road yard and shot up the place. Whether the CIA was connected to the attack is unclear. But Marley was stirring up the populace with lyrics of resistance and revolution, inciting the people to think breaking from “the system” was a good idea.

Tax evasion merits serious attention and global efforts to bring the perpetrators to justice. But there is a clear lack of willingness by the beneficiaries to support such efforts. A resolution on tax evasion and the need to return the stolen assets to the so-called "developing" countries was adopted at the UN Council of Human Rights on 24 March 2016. No European state voted in favour.

The fact of the matter is that all US presidents are one and the same, irrespective of whether they are Democrats or Republicans. They follow US foreign policy hook, line and sinker. As some of their leaders said, the US has interests, not friends. To them, this world is about a fight for resources, not about benevolence.

For more than two decades, Russia has been struggling to regain its Soviet-era economic influence, but such efforts have hit stumbling blocks which policy experts and Russian authorities themselves attribute to inadequate knowledge of investment and economic possibilities in Africa.

Africa barely got a mention in the US presidential election. This is good. If Trump succeeds in purging the factions that advocate war, interventionism and imperialism from the US government he will have done all that he needs to do for Africa. We can ask no more than to be left alone by the world hegemon.

In order to maintain any semblance of what is perceived as economic stability and growth, Trump’s administration must continue the existing capitalist relations of production and international relations. The failure of this phase of imperialist domination could provide renewed opportunities for world solidarity of the working class and oppressed.

Donald Trump’s ascension to the US Presidency has stunned many across the globe due to his strange views and prejudices. The Conversation Africa business and economy editor Sibonelo Radebe asked Professor Patrick Bond to unpack implications for Africa.