I attended the Bitcoin Cape Town adoption conference in South Africa,In the last two months,
The African Bitcoin conference in Kenya.
I have also visited Bitcoin circular economies in both countries, including Bitcoin Ekasi, Affribit Kibera and Bitcoin Witsand.
These experiences have opened my eyes to the fact that developers, community leaders and daily plebios in Africa are taking advantage of Bitcoin’s power to catalyze the change in their lives, and they are doing it while the spirit of the first Cypherpunks continues.
An African bitcoin manifesto
In “A Cypherpunk’s Manifesto,” Eric Hughes wrote:
“Cypherpunks writes code. We know that someone has to write software to defend privacy, and since we cannot obtain privacy unless we all do it, we will write it. We publish our code so that our Cypherpunks can practice and play with it. Our code is free for everyone, worldwide. We don’t care much if you don’t approve the software we write. We know that the software cannot be destroyed and that a widely dispersed system cannot be closed. ”
It is with this attitude that builders in Africa are building. And although not all builders in the continent are writing code, everyone is doing most of their possible work without asking permission.
Then, according to what I saw in Africa during my two recent trips to the contine Hughes manifesto could read something like this:
“African bitcoinists only build things with Bitcoin.
We know that someone has to step forward to promulgate change, because all promises of NGOs and governments have fallen short. We publish our online work test so that African Bitcoinist classmates can use it as a model and adapt it to their own unique context. Our work and/or code test is free to replicate in Africa and beyond its borders. We are not looking for the approval of the authorities;
However, we do not oppose work with them if they see the value in our projects and visions. We know that our work takes advantage of Bitcoin’s immutable and incensorable nature, as well as the indefatigable nature of the human spirit and, therefore, cannot be stopped or closed. ”
The following are some examples of projects that embody such spirit:
Bitcoin Ekasi
Bitcoin Ekasi is one of the brightest manifestations of the Cypherpunk and Bitcoin spirit in Africa. The project, started in 2021 and based in Mossel Bay, South Africa, has become a model for Bitcoin circular economies in Africa.
The project, founded by Hermann Vivier (also one of the organizers to adopt Bitcoin Cape Town) aimed Bitcoin Bitcoin’s Community. (The leader of the project community, Luthando Ndabambi, has made the latter masterfully over the years).
The purpose of the second dimension of the mission was to allow community members to spend their bitcoin within the community, ideally raising the economic state of the community as a whole in the process.
The project now works with the local Public Primary School, which recently began accepting Bitcoin for school rates, and has renewed community centers for both Bitcoin Ekasi and surfing children (partly thanks to the generous donations of Jack DORSEY and the Aubrey StroBel fund collection efforts.)
Some politicians in the country, several of whom spoke in the adoption of Bitcoin Cape Town this year, have realized the project and, as a result, are beginning to see the value of Bitcoin.
Tando
Tando is an application built by a Kenyan-based team that allows Bitcoin Lightning Wallets Interface with the Kenya M-Pesa mobile money system.
The application, which does not require KYC and is highly intuitive, is one of the best tools for financial inclusion in the country, since those who lack adequate identification papers are excluded from making payments through M-Pesa. Using tando, they can make the payment through their wallet lightning and make transactions digitally with their Kenyan companions.
Tando is also a great option for bitcoinists who visit Kenya. I used it several times during my stay in Kenya to pay the tabs called Kenya called digitally.
Get more information about the application here.
Dua de Bitcoin
Founded in 2023, Bitcoin Dua is located in Agbozume, Ghana, which is close to the border of the country with Togo. It is quickly established as one of the fastest growing bitcoin circular economies in Africa.
The project not only helps to educate the Ghanes about Bitcoin, but also provides coding and robotics classes to help the members of their community develop skills that can help them find a job that pays in Bitcoin.
The founder of the project, Mawupmor Kofi Folivi and his team received the social impact award on the African Bitcoin conference of this year, and Jack DORSEY has committed funds to help build a sports complex in the community.
Bitcoin Dua team cannot stop and will not stop.
Machankura
Founded in May 2022 by Kgothatso Ngako (KG) (also one of the organizers to adopt Bitcoin Cape Town), Machankura allows Africans to use bitcoin on lightning with phones with features (that is, cell phones before smartphones).
Technology allows users to send Bitcoin through USD, the equivalent of SMS in Africa, which gives some of the two thirds of the population of Africa that do not have access to Internet access to Bitcoin.
KG is also currently working on technology that will store private keys for Bitcoin in chips integrated in phones with functions, which essentially allowing these phones in the six African countries in which the service is available to double Bitcoin hardware wallets.
Cypherpunk Af.
Affribit Kibera
Affribit Kibera, located in Kenya, is a circular Bitcoin economy located in the largest informal settlement in Africa.
The co -founder of the project, Ronnie Mdawida, is a human rights defender and a community organizer for a long time, and is now using Bitcoin as a tool to help bring the non -bankrupt and the subsidy to the economy even more.
Mdawida and his team have incorporated 40 merchants to Bitcoin so far and have established a recycling program that rewards participants with SAT for their work.
While many of the merchants and members of the Aphribit Kibera community were presented to Bitcoin mainly as a means of exchange, many have begun to save on it, feeling more hopeful about their future as a result.
Proceeding together Apace
Although each of the projects mentioned above is incredible in its own right, which makes Bitcoin’s story in Africa really special is that members of all these projects continue to learn and build with each other.
This is the beauty not only of open source software, but also conferences such as adopting Bitcoin Cape Town and the African Conference of Bitcoin, where builders throughout the continent share their successes and challenges, as well as offer mutual support.
Also Read: https://bitcoinnewspro.com/bitcoin-the-last-coverage/
If you have not yet attended one of these conferences, I recommend that you do it, especially if you want to feel first hand the spirit of the cypherpunks or those that embody the spirit of Bitcoin.
African bitcoinists are not waiting for permission to change both their lives and the lives of those around them. Bitcoin gives them the opportunity to build a brighter future, together.
