1920s–1930s: (Educated Agitators in French and Lusophone Africa — Tiemoko Garan Kouyate as Political Activist and Communist, George Padmore Heading the Afric…

1920s–1930s: (Educated Agitators in French and Lusophone Africa — Tiemoko Garan Kouyate as Political Activist and Communist, George Padmore Heading the African Section of the Comintern in 1927, Blaise Diagne Elected from Senegal in 1914 but Becoming an Ally of the French, Andre Matswa’s Demands for French Citizenship, and Sporadic Urban Unrest from Conakry to Lome): Wider territorial identities articulated by new educated elites emerged in the interwar years, vying with more locally rooted associations. Political debate among urban elites thrived in French West Africa in the 1920s and 1930s, and the authorities grew concerned about the possibility of mobilizing rural support. One key figure was Tiemoko Garan Kouyate, political activist and one-time communist, whose writings focused on the rise of the proletariat and African nationalism. He belonged to a new class of educated agitators across French western and equatorial Africa — men who busied themselves producing newspapers, organizing early trade unions, and corresponding with figures such as Garvey and with George Padmore, the Trinidadian activist who became head of the African section of the Comintern in 1927. Yet African politicians in this period were not necessarily opponents of the colonial system — when Blaise Diagne was elected to the French assembly from Senegal in 1914, he initially mobilized rural support but then positioned himself as an ally of the French, reconciled to the new order and a public defender of colonial policies including conscription. In the late 1920s, Andre Matswa’s society based in the French Congo was strident in its demands for French citizenship and the rights accompanying it, but by the early 1930s the administration had moved against both Matswa and his organization. Alongside this political activity was sporadic urban unrest — a dock workers’ strike at Conakry in Guinea in 1919, rioting in Porto Novo in 1923, major disturbances in Lome a decade later, and railway worker strikes in 1925 and 1938.