Summits will not fix investment problems in Africa

This past week, African leaders trooped to Washington DC for the inaugural US-Africa summit. At the summit, President Barack Obama announced 14 billion dollars worth of US corporate investments in Africa. This is all very good news. Africa’s top three needs are jobs, jobs and jobs. And anything that helps achieve this goal, regardless of where it is coming from, is welcome. But while the summit has yielded much needed foreign direct investment dollars, the whole premise behind it needs a little more scrutiny. For starters, the Summit should have been hosted in an African capital. It is bad behaviour for African leaders to continue holding summits in Beijing, Brussels or Washington ostensibly to discuss problems facing Africans. In order to demonstrate their seriousness, African leaders should host such summits on the continent. Let the potential American, European or Chinese investors visit the dilapidated government offices, and see the potholes and crumbling infrastructure.

Holding the conference away from these realities gives African heads of state the chance to continue with their heads-in-the-sand approach to tackling the problems bedevilling the continent. In Washington, many of them waxed lyrical about the “Africa Rising” narrative, even as they continued to choke businesses with unreasonable regulations, graft and lack of investment in infrastructure. The optics of the whole summit suggested a gathering of beggars for “humanitarian” investment rather than salesmen who were out to get the highest bidders for choice products. Sudanese billionaire Mo Ibrahim summed it all by challenging US businesses to google the myriad opportunities in Africa instead of sitting back and waiting to be cajoled to invest in the region.