There are no clean hands on either side, I reject the notion that Apartheid South Africa were the good guys, after all it birthed its own own private military corporation (Executive Outcomes), supplied a lot of mercenaries throughout global hotspots and had a nuclear program they only dismantled after it became clear that black people would be allowed to vote.

The intersection of African Liberation politics and Cold war politics was very complex, but generally the west found itself on the side of the colonial authorities. In the end, colonialism and communism lost.