Sadiq Khan Scores Four Out of Five in African Culture Quiz, but Manchester Trips Him Up

Sadiq Khan knew his Nollywood from his Amapiano, but a question about one of the defining moments in Africa’s fight against colonial rule sent him looking in the wrong cities.

The Mayor of London finished with four out of five in a quiz hosted by All Things Africa at the grand opening of EbonyLife Place London. Bisi Akins, the organisation’s founder, set the questions, which covered African film, music, philosophy and history.

Every question was drawn from Khan’s five-day trade mission to Nigeria, Ghana and South Africa. The trip, from 14 to 19 July 2025, took him to Lagos, Accra, Johannesburg and Cape Town, with the aim of strengthening commercial, cultural and investment links between London and the three countries.

He started strongly. He named Nollywood as the popular label for Nigeria’s film industry and placed the birthplace of Amapiano in South Africa, a sound that has travelled far beyond its local roots. He also knew that Ghana was the Gold Coast under British rule until independence in 1957, and he got Ubuntu right, the southern African philosophy summed up in the phrase “I am because we are.”

The last question undid him. Asked where the Fifth Pan-African Congress was held in 1945, Khan went for Accra and London. The answer was Manchester.

He took it with good humour. “Andy Burnham, I am so sorry if you are watching this. Don’t punish us because I got that one wrong,” he said, a nod to the Mayor of Greater Manchester, whose city hosted the gathering.

The congress ran from 15 to 21 October 1945 and became a landmark in the story of modern Pan-Africanism. Activists and thinkers from Africa and the diaspora met while much of the continent was still under colonial administration. Kwame Nkrumah, who would go on to lead Ghana to independence, was among those associated with the meeting, as were Trinidadian-born George Padmore and Kenya’s Jomo Kenyatta. The calls for self-government made there helped feed the movements that would later challenge colonial rule across the continent.

Away from the quiz itself, the comments under All Things Africa’s Instagram post told a second story. One woman asked why the questions centred on Nigeria, Ghana and South Africa, saying she had been waiting for something on other parts of the continent.

The organisation replied that the choice was deliberate. “These questions were specifically tailored towards the Mayor’s trade mission to Nigeria, Ghana and South Africa to see what he learnt, knew or remembered from those specific visits,” it said. It added that it runs plenty of Know Your Roots quizzes covering the “breadth, depth and diversity” of Africa, and that this edition was meant to stay narrow.

The exchange points to a tension anyone writing about Africa will recognise. Focusing on a few countries is reasonable. Letting three stand in for 54 is not, and audiences notice.

The setting added its own weight. EbonyLife Place London was founded by Nigerian media entrepreneur Mo Abudu and builds on the EbonyLife brand’s work in film and entertainment, bringing African and Black storytelling into the capital. Its opening reflects how closely Africa’s creative industries and London are now linked, in a city whose cultural and commercial life owes a great deal to communities from across the continent.

For All Things Africa, Know Your Roots is a way of getting those conversations out in public, using music and film as an easy way into questions of history, identity and shared heritage.

Khan’s Manchester slip supplied the laugh of the night. But the debate that followed showed why the questions matter beyond the score. African history is vast, and even a five-question quiz can prompt people to ask what gets remembered, what gets missed and whose stories get told.