It’s time you bought a ship
Yes, you heard me right.
I was initially going to share about the forgotten naval battle of Lake Tanganyika. A dramatic story of WWI, where European powers shipped gunboats across the African interior to fight on a lake. Germans. Belgians. The British. All scrambling to dominate a water body in the heart of Africa.
It was interesting. But something didn’t sit right.
Where were the Africans in that story?
Not as colonial footnotes. As the people whose lives, towns, and futures were shaped by these waters.
That question took me on a detour.
I stopped digging into the war and started looking at the boats.
That’s when I found MV Liemba. A German warship built in 1913 that is still ferrying passengers in Tanzania today.
Over a century later. Still floating. Still working. Still needed.
That stopped me in my tracks.
If we’re still using vessels from the colonial era...
If our lakes, rivers, and coasts are still dependent on someone else’s shipbuilding...
What does that say about us? And what we’ve chosen to ignore?
So I flipped the script.
A mini-app.
One that lets you explore the vessels that shaped Africa’s maritime history.
The ones still floating. The ones forgotten. The ones rusting quietly in the corners of ports and memory.
You can search by country, lake, type, or era.
Each one tells a story. Each one reveals what we’ve inherited and what we’ve failed to build.
Because here’s the truth:
We are still depending on these old boats.
And we shouldn’t be.
Africa doesn’t just need new ships.
We need to build them. Fund them. Own them.
There’s a maritime economy waiting for anyone bold enough to care.
Start here.
Start by exploring the vessels that still float.
And imagine the ones we could create next.
🔗 Click here to explore the mini-app
I can’t wait to add a vessel built, funded, or co-owned by one of you to this list.
Because this isn’t just about ships.
It’s about legacy.
Let’s tell stories that float.
And build ships that last.
Till next time,
Mike
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