Europe did not become wealthy by accident. Africa, her people and her resources built Europe. For centuries, millions of Africans were kidnapped, transported across the Atlantic and forced to work on plantations producing sugar, tobacco, cotton and other commodities that generated enormous fortunes for European merchants, shipowners and plantation owners. But slavery was only part of the story. European colonial powers seized African land, extracted gold, diamonds, copper, rubber and other valuable resources, and built economic systems designed to transfer wealth from African societies to European empires. Across Africa, colonial powers plundered resources, controlled trade routes, imposed taxes and used political domination to secure economic advantages. Much of the wealth accumulated in Europe came at an enormous human and economic cost to colonized Africans. You cannot honestly explain Europe's rise without examining where its wealth came from, who produced it, who controlled it and who paid the price. Africa paid that price. Its people endured enslavement, exploitation and colonial plunder while others accumulated fortunes from their labour and resources.