TROUBLEMAKERS

Ep 34: Fostering Safer Spaces with Ally Baharoon

What happens when we don’t just imagine a better world, but practice it right now?
Our host Monica Kamandau speaks with Ally, a creative writer, author-activist, and community organizer from Zanzibar about building truly inclusive communities. 
Ally relates his experience with stuttering and how embracing his voice gave him a thirst for storytelling, organising, and helping others reclaim their power through words.
 
Key Ideas and Highlights
 
The power of the written word
Ally's stutter led him to discover creative writing as self-expression. His stories—fiction and nonfiction “slices of life”—blend humour and observation. They subvert traditional storytelling “beginning, middle, end” norms.
Building spaces for listening
Ally shares three common mistakes that silence people with speech differences—and how we can instead create supportive, humanizing environments.
Challenging the status quo
Fluency is often wrongly tied to intelligence or trustworthiness. Ally deconstructs this presumption. In civic spaces—especially during an election year—Ally calls for re-evaluating the harmful narratives that entrench social and political exclusion. Reassessing our blind spots helps us further democratize our societies.
 
Licensing
Anyone can use this podcast free of charge, with attribution to Troublemakers (the podcast). It is held under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License and can be used for radio or any other media. Our podcast is inspired by the Beautiful Trouble toolbox.
Credits
 
Host: Monica Kamandau
Guest: Ally Baharoon
Producer: Rodgers George
Recording: Troublemakers Team
Music: Beautiful Trouble & Mwaduga Salum.

Ep33 Consider your audience with Minentle Luthuli

"Every single time, I’m the first audience I have to think about." – Minentle Luthuli
Can you stay true to your story and still move others to act? Should you even try?
In this deep and dynamic episode of Trouble Makers, South African filmmaker Minentle Luthuli challenges the idea that artists—or activists—should start by considering their audience. Drawing from personal experience, she speaks about creating stories from the heart first, then trusting that the right people will find them.
And yet, she acknowledges a deeper truth: while authenticity gives a story its power, strategy gives it reach. Borrowing from the Beautiful Trouble toolbox, we reflect on this central tension in activism and art: “It doesn’t matter what you think about your poster, film, or protest. All that matters is what your audience thinks.”
This episode features Luthuli’s raw reflections on her debut film Heart Attack, how Sarafina! taught her about relatability in storytelling, and why platforms like Netflix often change their stories to target the largest audience possible, and end up not reaching audiences that actually care about the content of the film.
Anyone can use this podcast for free, with attribution to Trouble Makers (the podcast). It is held under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License and can be used for radio or any other media. Our podcast is inspired by the Beautiful Trouble toolbox.
 
Resources & Show Links
 
Heart Attack by Minentle Luthuli
Consider Your Audience by Beautiful Trouble
Credits
Host: Phil Wilmot
Producer: Rodgers George
Editor: Monica Kamandau
Guest: Minentle Luthuli
Recording: Samora Machel Studio
Music: Mwaduga Salum & Beautiful Trouble

Ep32: Enable, Don’t Command with Juma Erassy

There’s one style of leadership in which a charismatic, commanding figure sets the agenda, builds a vertical hierarchy, and pulls everyone else along for the ride. But what happens when leadership flips the script?
 
In this episode of Trouble Makers, we explore the power of supportive, enabling leadership through the work of Juma Erassy, coordinator of the Youth Hub at MSTCDC in Arusha, Tanzania. 
 
Key Ideas and Highlights:
Beyond the Classroom: Many university students believe their future begins after graduation. The Youth Hub challenges this, opening up career pathways in climate justice, feminism, and civic engagement, often intersecting across disciplines.
 
Not a One-Man Show: The Youth Hub avoids the trap of ego-driven leadership by formalizing partnerships with youth organizations through MOUs. This ensures it's not just Juma leading — it's an ecosystem of shared responsibility based on expertise.
 
Why Enabling Leadership Works: According to the Beautiful Trouble toolbox, a bottom-up, enabling leadership style unlocks the creativity, ingenuity, and innovation of everyone involved. It invites participants to learn new skills, take on challenges, and ultimately become leaders themselves — sustaining the movement long after one individual steps away.
 
Anyone can use this podcast for free, with attribution to Trouble Makers (the podcast). It is held under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License and can be used for radio or any other media.
 
Our podcast is inspired by the Beautiful Trouble toolbox.
 
Resources & Show Links:
 
Youth Hub Arusha: https://mstcdc.or.tz/latest/youth-hub-open
 
Youlead Africa: https://youlead.africa/
 
Read more about the Enable, don't command principle here.
 
Credits:
Host: Phil Wilmot
Producer: Rodgers George
Guest: Juma Erassy
Recording: MSTCDC Studios
Music: Beautiful Trouble & Mwaduga Salum

Ep31: Make New Folks Welcome with Rebecka Blomqvist

“You are invited. By anyone, to do anything. You are invited, for all time. You are so needed, by everyone, to do everything. You are invited, for all time.— The Dismemberment Plan, “You Are Invited”
Bringing in new people is essential to any activist group that wants to grow in size and capacity, but recruiting is only the first step. Integrating people into an established group can be an even bigger challenge. In this episode, architect Rebecka Blomqvist shares insights on how both organisational and physical architecture can help create spaces where newcomers feel truly at home.
 
We explore:
Why some groups struggle to retain new members and how deliberate attention and intentional design can make the difference.
Surprising tactics like removing signage to spark authentic interactions, and the power of cozy spaces that calm the nervous system.
The importance of one-on-one relationship building to help new folks feel seen and valued — and why this upfront investment can help people plug in faster and stick around longer.
 
Rebecka also invites us to imagine: what if activist groups and architects collaborated to co-create spaces that embody community, activism, and hospitality?
 
Connect with us:
Instagram: Troublemakers Podcast
Email: troublemakerspodcast@gmail.com
Connect with Rebecka: Blomqvist Architecture 
 
Licensing:
Anyone can use this podcast for free, with attribution to Troublemakers Podcast. It is held under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License and can be used for radio or any other media.
Our podcast is inspired by the Beautiful Trouble toolbox.

Ep30: Postcolonialism with Somdeep Sen

“Imperialism leaves behind germs of rot which we must clinically detect and remove from our land but from our minds as well.” — Frantz Fanon
What does liberation mean when the very language of freedom is shaped by empire?
In this episode, we speak with Somdeep Sen, political scientist and author of Decolonizing Palestine: Hamas Between the Anticolonial and the Postcolonial, about what it means to struggle for freedom in a postcolonial world. Drawing from personal experience and deep theoretical work, Sen challenges the universalist narratives of human rights, democracy, and justice that often underpin activist discourse.
We ask hard questions:
Can we be liberated within systems that define what liberation should look like?
What happens when activism reuses the same symbolic frameworks as the powers it resists?
How can we hear subaltern voices outside the scripts we've written for them?
Postcolonial theory complicates easy binaries of oppressor and oppressed. It insists that resistance must also question its own assumptions, ideologies, and categories. It urges us to find what Homi Bhabha calls the “third space” — an ambiguous, non-deterministic zone where new forms of struggle, identity, and solidarity can emerge.
Sen challenges us to move beyond performative politics and imagine a liberation that is not defined by the coloniser’s table, but by shared values, radical imagination, and transnational solidarity.
 
Resources & Show Links:
Decolonizing Palestine – by Somdeep Sen (Book) 
Beautiful Trouble Toolbox - Postcolonialism
Host: Phil WilmotGuest: Somdeep SenProducer & Audio Production: Rodgers GeorgeIntro/Outro Jingles: Mwaduga Salum & Beautiful Trouble

TM Polycrisis Prep: One Drink to Rule Them All?

“As things fall apart, what’s the one drink you’d carry into the collapse?”
In this episode, we pose the critical question of our time: if we all end up in one ecological safe zone during the polycrisis and are only allowed one alcoholic beverage for the rest of our lives... what drink are we bringing with us?
We’re joined by Mia, Maggie, and Malemi, who gamely dive into this hypothetical apocalypse:
Mia goes with... apple cider.
Maggie: Team Budweiser.
Malemi also sides with beer.
“We just hope the island beer doesn’t give us hangovers — especially if it’s unlimited. That would be a nightmare.”
There’s also a touching ancestral link to apple trees and cider... but the sugar content might make it unsustainable for eternal sipping.
 
So where did we land?
Cider: Refreshing, crisp, but high maintenance (bathroom-wise).
Beer: Reliable, social, versatile — maybe not exciting, but comforting.
Stronger stuff? A tempting shift... but we didn’t see that coming.
So now we ask you: What alcoholic beverage are YOU bringing into the polycrisis?
Tag us, write us, send a voice memo. Let’s build our apocalypse bar cart together. 🍻🌍

TM Smoke Signals: On Pro-Palestine protestors "disrupting exam studies" at Colombia University

Phil, who was a Pro-Palestine campus activist in his university days, reflects on the recent police repression of student protesters at Columbia University and how it's part of a broader assault on pro-Palestinian solidarity movements across global campuses. But beyond the headlines, this episode dives into a deeper question: what counts as learning, and does dissent not create a stronger learning environment?
 
Phil challenges the idea that protest is a disruption to education and argues that dissent is not just compatible with learning—it is essential to it. Drawing parallels to state repression in Uganda and the weaponization of “order” against public mobilization, we rethink the role of public space, universities, education, and protest in our society.
Key Themes & Ideas:
 
The false dichotomy between protest and academic learning
Western pedagogies vs. action-oriented learning traditions
The politics of space: libraries, campuses, and the commons
The normalization of violence against dissent
The necessity of public discomfort for public growthGet Involved:
National SJP
 
Credits:Image: pbs.orgHost: Phil WilmotProducer: Rodgers George

Ep29: Follow the Lead of the Most Impacted with Lusekelo Chinyama

What does it mean to be a good ally—and not a harmful one—in movements for justice?
In this episode, we explore the difficult but essential work of following the lead of the most impacted. Our guest reflects on the dangers of “do-gooder arrogance” and the importance of showing up with humility, not solutions.
 
We talk about how movements led by marginalised communities challenge extractive allyship and why strategic support must be grounded in consultation, not control. Examples from Lusaka—including the Youth for Parliament initiative—offer real-life examples of leadership from below.
 
This episode invites all activists, allies, and organisations to pause and ask: Are we truly supporting the people most impacted, or are we unintentionally speaking over them? Solidarity requires deep listening, humility, and the courage to be directed by others.
 
Anyone can use this podcast for free, with attribution to Troublemakers (the podcast). It is held under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License and can be used for radio or any other media.
 
Our podcast is inspired by the Beautiful Trouble toolbox, where you can read more about Principle: Follow the lead of the most impacted.
Resources & Show Links:
Beautiful Trouble Card Deck
Youth for Parliament Zambia
Troublemakers Podcast on Linktree
Credits:Host: Phil Wilmot
Guest: Lusekelo Chinyama
Produced by: Rodgers George
Jingles: Mwaduga Salum & Beautiful Trouble

TM Polycrisis Prep: Pineapple on Pizza?

Welcome to the first-ever segment of Troublemaker’s Polycrisis Prep School, a special segment of the Troublemaker’s Podcast where we debate the most “pressing” dilemmas of our turbulent times. First on the chopping board:
🍕🍍 Is it acceptable to put pineapple on pizza?
 
Joining the food fight are the Three Ms—Malemi, Maggie, and Mia.
 
Malemi is firmly in the no camp—pizza is savory, and fruit (beyond tomatoes[?]) has no place here.
 
Mia also resists the pineapple urge, despite growing up around it. Nostalgia isn't enough to justify the sweet-savory mix.
 
Maggie, on the other hand, is pineapple’s loudest defender. For her, it’s the bold contrast—the sweetness of baked pineapple meeting salty cheese—that makes Hawaiian pizza a standout.
 
It’s complicated. But if the world is ending, maybe the real question is: what wouldn’t you try on your pizza?
 
Let us know what you think! Is pineapple on pizza a culinary crime or an underrated joy?

Ep28: Jail Solidarity with Céline Lebrun-Shaath

"I have the people behind me and the people are my strength."— Huey Newton.
What does solidarity look like when comrades are behind bars? In this episode, we explore jail solidarity through the eyes of Céline Lebrun-Shaath, a committed organizer and internationalist. She speaks about the moral and political imperative to stand with those who remain imprisoned—not just by supporting their freedom, but by sustaining the struggles they were part of.
Céline tells about her abduction and deportation from Egypt, and the many-years campaign she and many others fought for the release of her husband Ramy Shaath.
We spotlight the ongoing campaign for a political prisoner:
Alaa Abdel Fattah, a renowned Egyptian activist who, despite having completed his prison sentence, remains unjustly detained. His mother has been on hunger strike for over five months. You can follow the Free Alaa campaign on social media for real-time updates and action steps.
Céline challenges us not to see imprisonment as an endpoint—but as a call to pick up the torch of resistance and press forward.
Anyone can use this podcast for free, with attribution to Troublemakers (the podcast). It is held under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License and can be used for radio or any other media.
Our podcast is inspired by the Beautiful Trouble toolbox.
Resources & Show Links:
BDS Movement: Campaign to free Ismail El Azawi
Free Alaa campaign
More from our channels
Host: Phil WilmotProducer: Rodgers GeorgeGuest: Céline Lebrun-ShaathJingles: Mwaduga Salum & Beautiful Trouble