Al Jazeera: There continues to be opposition to Obama's visit to deliver the Mandela lecture on Tuesday. What are your thoughts on this criticism?
Cornel West: On the one hand, Nelson Mandela was one of the great revolutionary figures but he himself ended up making neo-liberal deals with corporate elite both inside his country and outside.
We don't want to lose sight of his tremendous vision and courage as a revolutionary leader as part of a social movement, and then the degree to which he himself ended up compromising by making neo-liberal deals with corporate elites.
Now, Barack Obama - you have a neo-liberal black president of the most powerful empire in the world; he was never a revolutionary figure in the way Nelson Mandela was.
He has always been a neo-liberal politician. He was a black face of the American empire and he [has], in my view, commit[ted] war crimes with his drones in Pakistan and Yemen and Somalia and Libya.
So, I think the people have the right to protest because you don't want Obama to come in and act as if somehow he is connected to the revolutionary Mandela. Now, on the other hand, it is also true that you want a variety of voices to be heard in these lectures.
So, I don't think that everyone who comes to give a lecture - to give the Nelson Mandela lecture - needs to be a revolutionary. I believe in a variety of different perspectives.
I believe he has the right to speak, but people have to be honest about his policies, his crimes, and his vision of the world as president, as head of the empire.
I respect his right to speak, but he is held to account. People need to know the truth about what he did in the same way people need to know the truth about the arc of Mandela's own life. So, I really do stand very much in solidarity with those who are protesting.
Now, the last thing you want to do is act as if Barack Obama is some kind of grand progressive figure. No, he was a neo-liberal counterfeit.
And we have seen the backlash now with the neo-fascists in the White House with Donald Trump. If you don't speak to the poor and the working people in a progressive way, then the right wing is going to seize that vacuum.
And that's exactly what Trump did. I am glad to see my brothers and sisters of all colours in South Africa are raising their voices when the former black face of the American empire comes to speak at [the] Nelson Mandela lecture.
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But Obama didn't even do as well as Bush. So, in that sense, it's a profound disappointment and an acknowledgement again, that no matter what colour a president is or a leader is, you have to measure a leader by their courage, their vision, and how they support working people. And there I think Obama was a failure. There is no doubt about it.
