The Spectator's prestigious, economic, Innovator of the Year award in partnership with InvestTech are now in their sixth year.

Wherever you're based in the UK, we can't wait to hear about the success of your business and the impact you're making on the economy and society in 2023.

Applications are now open and will close June 16th.

To learn more and apply, please visit

spectator.com.uk forward slash innovator. Hello and welcome to Spectator Outloud. Each week

we choose three pieces from the magazine and ask their writers to read them aloud.

I'm Oskredington and on the podcast this week.

Michaela Rong asks if anywhere is safe for Kagami's critics.

Emily Rhodes charts the rise of fake libraries and Cindy Yu reviews a new exhibition at the British Museum on China's Hidden Century.

Up first, Michaela Rang.

After weeks of travelling, first Paris, then Kinshasa, I was looking forward to my evening

at the L'Rloge du Sud in Brussels.

Known for its Poisson-Libouquet, fish wrapped in banana leaf and other African specialities,

the restaurant is popular with the city's African diaspora.

I'd been invited by a pan-African think tank to discuss my book on Rwanda.

But it was not to be.

The day before, I got a call from the Benin journalist due to chair the event.

He sounded rattled. The restaurant owner, he said, had been receiving complaints from pro-government

Rwandan groups in Brussels, along with threatening emails and anonymous calls from Rwanda itself.

His organisation was telling the owner to hold fast,

but in its history of staging contentious African debates, it had never experienced this level

of intimidation. Tell him this is just the way dictatorship silenced debate, I said.

...