Throughout history, European powers and the broader dynamics of globalization have had an enormous influence on the African continent . However, in reality, Africans themselves have always played an important role in shaping their own destiny. From my perspective, Africans have shaped their own destiny in positive and negative ways, and I would like to talk about three key moments in which Africans have shaped their own history. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why violent video games should not be banned”?Get the original essayFirst, one of the key moments when Africans shaped their own destiny was when local Africans became soldiers and served for European powers. This started happening towards the end of the 19th century. As Parker and Rathbone mentioned in their book “African History – A very short Introduction”, “the conquest was further facilitated and especially devalued by the widespread reliance on locally recruited African soldiers”. To me, I find this very ironic because Africans helped European powers kill Africans. This sounds very ironic and ridiculous, but it actually happened in Africa in the late 19th century. In fact, it is never that easy for colonizers to totally occupy and colonize another country or territory, even for the mighty Great British Empire. However, colonization would become much easier if local populations betrayed their lands, their citizens and their country. The authors also show us an image on page 98 of the book, in which this image shows us local African soldiers holding European-made weapons and helping them occupy Sudan in 1898. So, I think this is a moment key that Africans themselves experienced. shaped their own destiny, as such treacherous actions truly helped the colonizers rule this land faster and easier. The fact that local Africans served European powers was very ridiculous because they had poorly shaped their own destiny and a lot of resources had been taken by European colonizers. Secondly, the second key moment I would like to talk about occurred around 1908. At this time, Africans also shaped their own destiny in a negative direction. According to Parker and Rathbone, "the violence here was associated not with the suppression of rebellion but with a desperate attempt to extract wealth in the form of ivory and rubber from the scattered populations of the equatorial forest." and “in 1908, Leopold was forced by international pressure to cede his private fiefdom to the Belgian government.” Before 1908, King Leopold was the king of the Congo Free State and under his control, local Africans did not realize the importance of protecting the environment and resisting pressure from missionaries and journalists. Kind Leopold did not lead his people to properly manage natural resources, and therefore the Africans themselves gave the European powers the opportunity to create a bad public voice about them. This led to King Leopold ceding his power over the nation to the Belgian government. In my opinion, if kind Leopold could better protect his environment during this time, then his citizens could have very different destinies and lives. This key moment has enormous historical significance because this issue shows us that the European powers did not even resort to the military, but rather were able to govern African territory using only international pressure and.