[Music]
[Applause]
this is not going to be a talk that will
present a fantastic solution or a magic
bullet to a pressing problem instead I
will present a conundrum that I’ve been
struggling with as a young African a
conundrum that I believe many of you and
many other Africans are also facing
while I will offer areas of possible
intervention I’m also hoping that those
watching and listening across the world
will be able to do the same with me I
admit I am stuck and I need your help
I am reaching out to invite you all in
this significant moment in the lives of
hundreds of millions of Africans to
interrogate Africa’s past present and
future and to interrogate how we’re
going about building this Africa
let me give you some context the early
2000s were of fantastic time in Nairobi
very hopeful the one-party dictatorship
of Daniel torie teacher of Moines who
had been president since the 1970s came
at the end of the Cold War and there was
a return to multi-party politics in the
1990s and those an end to his
dictatorship in 2002 there were limited
returns to agricultural Goods due to the
economic downturn of the 1970s and in
the 1980s there were structural
adjustment programs that followed
however this was replaced by improving
economic conditions and debt forgiveness
this changing circumstances opened up
opportunities for the elite for the
elites and the middle class to grow but
also created a population influx into
the cities and a growing gap between the
rich and the poor these political
economic and social changes that Nairobi
was going to were perfectly captured in
a few moments as my family and I sat in
our secondhand Toyota waiting for the
light to change in the city center my
mother was driving and I was sitting
beside her my sister was in the backseat
it was a hot afternoon so we had our
windows down and my mother and I were
involved in some type of discussion out
of nowhere a slightly to shoveled young
boy who must have been about ten years
old walked up to my mother’s window
holding human feces and threatened to
throw it at her unless she gave him
money
I don’t quite remember exactly what
happened in those tense moments but I
recall that my mother was calm and did
not raise any alarm these incidents were
common at the time the public toilets at
the City Council had built were not
regularly cleaned and nairobi ins had
been extending stories in their living
rooms about how to escape the situation
unharmed in those tense moments I
remember thinking that hmm how will we
end up getting this that’s not off our
clothes
how will we end up cleaning our car
perhaps we’ll have to get it
professionally clean for some reason the
possibility that my mother would
actually hand over money did not occur
to me
the next thing I knew my mother had
accelerated and sped and sped off later
I remember thinking that maybe the light
must have changed as I was wandering and
my mind wandered and even though I was
full of fear I had somehow escaped
years later when I was older I wanted to
share this shitty story with my friends
with my friends but I hesitated by then
I was in developed countries and I was
outside the continent and I knew that
telling this story would only make
Africans look bad after all these are
the same spaces were people in all
seriousness asked me do you keep pets as
wild animals do you live in trees and
huts do you live in some kind of poverty
that somehow makes you so weak it cannot
swat off a fly from your lip this story
would have only served to confirm
problematic stereotypes even if I try to
carefully couch it in some type of
explanation some type of contextual
understanding of the social political
instances that led to what happened well
at least that was the rational
explanation I gave myself well it was
true it was only much more recent that I
came to realize that there was a more
nuanced reason for this hesitation I was
unsure of myself not only because I was
young but also because I did not know
what was expected of a young African in
the 21st century when I talk to my
friends and my families and my
colleagues and my students I realized
that I’m not the only one undergoing
this identity crisis where apparently
involved in a debate on what we Africans
need to be what we need to give up what
we need to do for us to take our
rightful place on the world stage what
do we need to do to become McKinsey’s
lions on the move or to realize the
battlecry african solutions to african
problems what does it mean for us to
feel vindicated respected and no longer
dependent and self-sufficient what does
it mean for Africa to rise and what is
my role in that so far it seems like we
have two options
on one hand we need to become modern
developed and to achieve it we need to
give up our backward traditional
practices we need to become more formal
we need to become more high-tech we need
to celebrate the markers of development
and progress the skyscrapers the
highways the weaves the suits and the
apps let’s not forget the apps
on the other hand we are told that we
have lost our way by seeking these
markers of modernity and we need to go
back to our roots we need to return to
their traditional grains like sorghum
and millet because all this modern food
is making us sick we need to wake it
hangar and the shiki’s made of kanga and
let go of that relaxer and leave our
natural hair out and proud the story of
those moments at that Nairobi bustoff
made it very clear that I was unsure of
what narrative what caricature I was
supposed to live up to in order to
contribute to Africa’s promising reality
would I choose this version of modernity
the skyscrapers and such Oh would I
choose a version of authenticity with my
natural hair
now there many problems are come along
with this type of choice right first of
all this is a lot of pressure I’m not
only supposed to be the first person in
my nuclear family to go to university
but also apparently I’m supposed to
represent 1.2 billion Africans um second
of all some of you I’m sure were talking
with me or listening to me you already
realize that there is some form of a
false dichotomy that I’ve created that
the choice are presented is not quite as
dire as it is while I understand this
and will address it later we cannot deny
that these caricatures and the
assumptions that they’re based on create
large parts of the reality that we live
in everyday let me show you what I mean
from a young age my middle-class
upbringing meant that I was on the path
to university university was important
because it meant I would be part of the
twenty to forty percent of Africa’s
labor force who end up in the formal
sector as policymakers civil servants
doctors nurses bankers and other
professionals it’s not easy to become
part of this group of professionals
first you have to hope that you’re not
part of the 20% of African children aged
6 to 11 who never have access to school
then you have to find a way to make sure
that you’re not part of the 33 percent
of 12 to 14 year olds who either never
complete primary school or do not end up
joining second reason
if that’s not enough you also have to
figure out how to not be part of the 60%
of 15 to 17 year olds who never complete
high school
if all of that works out and you can
afford it then you’ll be part of the 7%
of Africans who are able to pursue
higher education
and just when you thought you’re all set
you realize that there’s actually a up
to a 50% chance that you will not be
able to get a job even if you go to
university
so you have to hope that you live in
South Africa or Mauritius where you have
a six or eight perchance we only have a
six or eight percent chance of not
finding a job compared to let’s say
Ghana in Tunisia where you have a 41 and
50 percent chance of not getting a job
if you’re a university graduate
and so whether by luck by wealth by
hardwork or by some combination of all
these things you end up in this select
group of professionals in the formal
sector
this however leaves us with the sixty to
eighty percent who end up in the
informal sector these are the farmers
the market women the day laborers the
builders the metal workers these are the
people who read professionals either
pity because of the dire circumstances
and suffering already ride for their
failures
we say things like that ethnicity is
backward they don’t bind your education
their parents didn’t have besides the
importance of education so they chose to
graze cattle or dig instead
they refused to work hard they failed
their exams they played around and they
got pregnant
beyond these statements we go on to
praise the many truly gifted people and
institutions that have come up with
innovative solutions to help these poor
informal people through their education
journey so we come up with innovations
like investments in schools and
education infrastructure we make sure we
add Career Training and secondary school
education and university education we
make sure that we encourage self
employment and entrepreneurship by
allotting funds to youth to women and
other vulnerable people through these
interventions these poor unfortunate
ignorant lazy sixty to eighty percent
can be uplifted can be civilized can be
developed
now what does all this have to do with
writing Africa’s future building it well
whether by the laws that we pass or the
policies that we enforce whether it is
through the license and taxpaying
Kannamma activities that we run through
the curriculum that we write and teach
or through the prescriptions that we
give we the 20 to 40% of professionals
have so far been tasked with actively
writing Africa’s future this future is
bounded by the same narrow definitions
that have created us these definitions
are shaped by denying Biden it itemizing
by demonizing certain aspects of the
African reality those that we call
informal but we do take the time to
tokenize the few who are able to make
that crossing from the informal to the
form
within these narrow definitions of
modernity and development we see
ourselves as heroes and civilizing signs
of africa’s prosperous future
through our words and our actions we
make it clear to non professionals that
they are not equipped to actively write
Africa’s future they’re living a reality
that must be changed they do not fit
their collection of wants and needs they
need to be empowered they need to be
closed they need to be educated they
need to be fed they need to be healed
they need to be trained to become some
version of professionals these beliefs
are so internalized that parents tell
their children not to be like there is
no future in being like me there’s no
future in being like us in following the
ways that came before us
so we accept the progress lies in
changing to become this version of
modernity he went to the city she went
to America at best the modernity that we
live that we champion was fashioned by a
small group of elites who participated
in creating these definitions
at worst these definitions these modern
standards we aspire to were created by
others sometimes imposed in other times
willingly adopted
as you can see and are no doubt aware
these are serious and complex issues
that are occupying the hearts and minds
and the visions and missions of
political movements and institutions on
the continent and across the globe but
even as we acknowledge these initiatives
it is clear that we have put a lot of
eggs in this modernization basket and we
need to make sure that we are over at
least find that we have not put or
gotten the resources that we wanted from
that basket
we listened when we were told that all
the things needed to change for us to be
modern and developed we built entire
systems and economies invested millions
if not billions of US dollars on their
assumption and expectation that by
creating these pathways our young people
will end up as part of this group of
professionals they will work in offices
they will dress in suits they will drive
cars they will live in three-bedroom
houses with quarters in the back for the
help they will have health insurance
they will travel for their holidays they
will enjoy all these perks of being
modern some of us realized or came to
the conclusion that this panacea of
modernity was too good to be true not
worth all the changes that were expected
and so we chose to go to the so-called
wisdom of those who came before us and
so incorporate traditional architecture
into our homes revert back to farming
which ham P&R and natural hair secrets
between these two caricatures is where
most of us live constantly constantly
negotiating our Africanist trying to
live within these narrow definitions
that are presented definitions are many
of us live by but never have the time or
the opportunity to interrogate
if we continue on this path that we are
most of the continents population will
continue to be locked out of the process
of being able to participate
meaningfully in constructing these
definitions because they are considered
too needy or too ill-equipped to
participate
we also cannot go back to the past
because very few people who are alive
then are alive now
and we cannot unlearn what we have
learned or we have seen what we have
heard what we have eaten all such an
approach would do is create a
restrictive fundamentalism that would
create a painful and violent reality
especially to those who are most
vulnerable in society
so what do we do now that we find
ourselves in this conundrum do we ride
this modernity train and take it
wherever it takes us or do we hop over
to the one that takes us back to our
roots or do we change the terms of the
discussion altogether and rise above the
dichotomy that is before us
you
we pick the third one then one question
we can ask ourselves is what does
deliberate an inclusive discussion of
Africa’s future and look like if they’re
deliberate discussions happening already
let us ask where are they happening in
government offices in Parliament’s and
cities at civil society conferences in
academic journals in summits hosted in
European cities in languages and
vocabulary only understood by a select
group of people is it an auditorium such
as these where people pay for the
opportunity to hear great thinkers and
innovators tell us their big ideas
if so if we agree that perhaps they are
deliberate but not inclusive then we
should go on and ask what would it look
like if you were more inclusive in this
conversations what if agronomists told
farmers that the wisdom of practices
such as protection and mixed farming in
seed exchanges actually correlated
scientific findings and together come to
address the issue of food security on
the continent and across the globe
what if economists and manufacturers and
lorry drivers and shopkeepers in market
women came together on a regular basis
to explore and understand economic
behavior in a given community
what what are the discussions about the
investments in human resources for
health actually recognized and included
the thousands of women and girls who
every year sacrificed their labor for
others in the home
lots of ideas worth spreading were
hosted in homes in local halls in
football pitches in churches and mosques
advertised on the radio through local
leaders and influences and were led by
your neighbors and your brothers and
sisters
what is
[Applause]
[Applause]
this is not going to be a talk that will
present a fantastic solution or a magic
bullet to a pressing problem instead I
will present a conundrum that I’ve been
struggling with as a young African a
conundrum that I believe many of you and
many other Africans are also facing
while I will offer areas of possible
intervention I’m also hoping that those
watching and listening across the world
will be able to do the same with me I
admit I am stuck and I need your help
I am reaching out to invite you all in
this significant moment in the lives of
hundreds of millions of Africans to
interrogate Africa’s past present and
future and to interrogate how we’re
going about building this Africa
let me give you some context the early
2000s were of fantastic time in Nairobi
very hopeful the one-party dictatorship
of Daniel torie teacher of Moines who
had been president since the 1970s came
at the end of the Cold War and there was
a return to multi-party politics in the
1990s and those an end to his
dictatorship in 2002 there were limited
returns to agricultural Goods due to the
economic downturn of the 1970s and in
the 1980s there were structural
adjustment programs that followed
however this was replaced by improving
economic conditions and debt forgiveness
this changing circumstances opened up
opportunities for the elite for the
elites and the middle class to grow but
also created a population influx into
the cities and a growing gap between the
rich and the poor these political
economic and social changes that Nairobi
was going to were perfectly captured in
a few moments as my family and I sat in
our secondhand Toyota waiting for the
light to change in the city center my
mother was driving and I was sitting
beside her my sister was in the backseat
it was a hot afternoon so we had our
windows down and my mother and I were
involved in some type of discussion out
of nowhere a slightly to shoveled young
boy who must have been about ten years
old walked up to my mother’s window
holding human feces and threatened to
throw it at her unless she gave him
money
I don’t quite remember exactly what
happened in those tense moments but I
recall that my mother was calm and did
not raise any alarm these incidents were
common at the time the public toilets at
the City Council had built were not
regularly cleaned and nairobi ins had
been extending stories in their living
rooms about how to escape the situation
unharmed in those tense moments I
remember thinking that hmm how will we
end up getting this that’s not off our
clothes
how will we end up cleaning our car
perhaps we’ll have to get it
professionally clean for some reason the
possibility that my mother would
actually hand over money did not occur
to me
the next thing I knew my mother had
accelerated and sped and sped off later
I remember thinking that maybe the light
must have changed as I was wandering and
my mind wandered and even though I was
full of fear I had somehow escaped
years later when I was older I wanted to
share this shitty story with my friends
with my friends but I hesitated by then
I was in developed countries and I was
outside the continent and I knew that
telling this story would only make
Africans look bad after all these are
the same spaces were people in all
seriousness asked me do you keep pets as
wild animals do you live in trees and
huts do you live in some kind of poverty
that somehow makes you so weak it cannot
swat off a fly from your lip this story
would have only served to confirm
problematic stereotypes even if I try to
carefully couch it in some type of
explanation some type of contextual
understanding of the social political
instances that led to what happened well
at least that was the rational
explanation I gave myself well it was
true it was only much more recent that I
came to realize that there was a more
nuanced reason for this hesitation I was
unsure of myself not only because I was
young but also because I did not know
what was expected of a young African in
the 21st century when I talk to my
friends and my families and my
colleagues and my students I realized
that I’m not the only one undergoing
this identity crisis where apparently
involved in a debate on what we Africans
need to be what we need to give up what
we need to do for us to take our
rightful place on the world stage what
do we need to do to become McKinsey’s
lions on the move or to realize the
battlecry african solutions to african
problems what does it mean for us to
feel vindicated respected and no longer
dependent and self-sufficient what does
it mean for Africa to rise and what is
my role in that so far it seems like we
have two options
on one hand we need to become modern
developed and to achieve it we need to
give up our backward traditional
practices we need to become more formal
we need to become more high-tech we need
to celebrate the markers of development
and progress the skyscrapers the
highways the weaves the suits and the
apps let’s not forget the apps
on the other hand we are told that we
have lost our way by seeking these
markers of modernity and we need to go
back to our roots we need to return to
their traditional grains like sorghum
and millet because all this modern food
is making us sick we need to wake it
hangar and the shiki’s made of kanga and
let go of that relaxer and leave our
natural hair out and proud the story of
those moments at that Nairobi bustoff
made it very clear that I was unsure of
what narrative what caricature I was
supposed to live up to in order to
contribute to Africa’s promising reality
would I choose this version of modernity
the skyscrapers and such Oh would I
choose a version of authenticity with my
natural hair
now there many problems are come along
with this type of choice right first of
all this is a lot of pressure I’m not
only supposed to be the first person in
my nuclear family to go to university
but also apparently I’m supposed to
represent 1.2 billion Africans um second
of all some of you I’m sure were talking
with me or listening to me you already
realize that there is some form of a
false dichotomy that I’ve created that
the choice are presented is not quite as
dire as it is while I understand this
and will address it later we cannot deny
that these caricatures and the
assumptions that they’re based on create
large parts of the reality that we live
in everyday let me show you what I mean
from a young age my middle-class
upbringing meant that I was on the path
to university university was important
because it meant I would be part of the
twenty to forty percent of Africa’s
labor force who end up in the formal
sector as policymakers civil servants
doctors nurses bankers and other
professionals it’s not easy to become
part of this group of professionals
first you have to hope that you’re not
part of the 20% of African children aged
6 to 11 who never have access to school
then you have to find a way to make sure
that you’re not part of the 33 percent
of 12 to 14 year olds who either never
complete primary school or do not end up
joining second reason
if that’s not enough you also have to
figure out how to not be part of the 60%
of 15 to 17 year olds who never complete
high school
if all of that works out and you can
afford it then you’ll be part of the 7%
of Africans who are able to pursue
higher education
and just when you thought you’re all set
you realize that there’s actually a up
to a 50% chance that you will not be
able to get a job even if you go to
university
so you have to hope that you live in
South Africa or Mauritius where you have
a six or eight perchance we only have a
six or eight percent chance of not
finding a job compared to let’s say
Ghana in Tunisia where you have a 41 and
50 percent chance of not getting a job
if you’re a university graduate
and so whether by luck by wealth by
hardwork or by some combination of all
these things you end up in this select
group of professionals in the formal
sector
this however leaves us with the sixty to
eighty percent who end up in the
informal sector these are the farmers
the market women the day laborers the
builders the metal workers these are the
people who read professionals either
pity because of the dire circumstances
and suffering already ride for their
failures
we say things like that ethnicity is
backward they don’t bind your education
their parents didn’t have besides the
importance of education so they chose to
graze cattle or dig instead
they refused to work hard they failed
their exams they played around and they
got pregnant
beyond these statements we go on to
praise the many truly gifted people and
institutions that have come up with
innovative solutions to help these poor
informal people through their education
journey so we come up with innovations
like investments in schools and
education infrastructure we make sure we
add Career Training and secondary school
education and university education we
make sure that we encourage self
employment and entrepreneurship by
allotting funds to youth to women and
other vulnerable people through these
interventions these poor unfortunate
ignorant lazy sixty to eighty percent
can be uplifted can be civilized can be
developed
now what does all this have to do with
writing Africa’s future building it well
whether by the laws that we pass or the
policies that we enforce whether it is
through the license and taxpaying
Kannamma activities that we run through
the curriculum that we write and teach
or through the prescriptions that we
give we the 20 to 40% of professionals
have so far been tasked with actively
writing Africa’s future this future is
bounded by the same narrow definitions
that have created us these definitions
are shaped by denying Biden it itemizing
by demonizing certain aspects of the
African reality those that we call
informal but we do take the time to
tokenize the few who are able to make
that crossing from the informal to the
form
within these narrow definitions of
modernity and development we see
ourselves as heroes and civilizing signs
of africa’s prosperous future
through our words and our actions we
make it clear to non professionals that
they are not equipped to actively write
Africa’s future they’re living a reality
that must be changed they do not fit
their collection of wants and needs they
need to be empowered they need to be
closed they need to be educated they
need to be fed they need to be healed
they need to be trained to become some
version of professionals these beliefs
are so internalized that parents tell
their children not to be like there is
no future in being like me there’s no
future in being like us in following the
ways that came before us
so we accept the progress lies in
changing to become this version of
modernity he went to the city she went
to America at best the modernity that we
live that we champion was fashioned by a
small group of elites who participated
in creating these definitions
at worst these definitions these modern
standards we aspire to were created by
others sometimes imposed in other times
willingly adopted
as you can see and are no doubt aware
these are serious and complex issues
that are occupying the hearts and minds
and the visions and missions of
political movements and institutions on
the continent and across the globe but
even as we acknowledge these initiatives
it is clear that we have put a lot of
eggs in this modernization basket and we
need to make sure that we are over at
least find that we have not put or
gotten the resources that we wanted from
that basket
we listened when we were told that all
the things needed to change for us to be
modern and developed we built entire
systems and economies invested millions
if not billions of US dollars on their
assumption and expectation that by
creating these pathways our young people
will end up as part of this group of
professionals they will work in offices
they will dress in suits they will drive
cars they will live in three-bedroom
houses with quarters in the back for the
help they will have health insurance
they will travel for their holidays they
will enjoy all these perks of being
modern some of us realized or came to
the conclusion that this panacea of
modernity was too good to be true not
worth all the changes that were expected
and so we chose to go to the so-called
wisdom of those who came before us and
so incorporate traditional architecture
into our homes revert back to farming
which ham P&R and natural hair secrets
between these two caricatures is where
most of us live constantly constantly
negotiating our Africanist trying to
live within these narrow definitions
that are presented definitions are many
of us live by but never have the time or
the opportunity to interrogate
if we continue on this path that we are
most of the continents population will
continue to be locked out of the process
of being able to participate
meaningfully in constructing these
definitions because they are considered
too needy or too ill-equipped to
participate
we also cannot go back to the past
because very few people who are alive
then are alive now
and we cannot unlearn what we have
learned or we have seen what we have
heard what we have eaten all such an
approach would do is create a
restrictive fundamentalism that would
create a painful and violent reality
especially to those who are most
vulnerable in society
so what do we do now that we find
ourselves in this conundrum do we ride
this modernity train and take it
wherever it takes us or do we hop over
to the one that takes us back to our
roots or do we change the terms of the
discussion altogether and rise above the
dichotomy that is before us
you
we pick the third one then one question
we can ask ourselves is what does
deliberate an inclusive discussion of
Africa’s future and look like if they’re
deliberate discussions happening already
let us ask where are they happening in
government offices in Parliament’s and
cities at civil society conferences in
academic journals in summits hosted in
European cities in languages and
vocabulary only understood by a select
group of people is it an auditorium such
as these where people pay for the
opportunity to hear great thinkers and
innovators tell us their big ideas
if so if we agree that perhaps they are
deliberate but not inclusive then we
should go on and ask what would it look
like if you were more inclusive in this
conversations what if agronomists told
farmers that the wisdom of practices
such as protection and mixed farming in
seed exchanges actually correlated
scientific findings and together come to
address the issue of food security on
the continent and across the globe
what if economists and manufacturers and
lorry drivers and shopkeepers in market
women came together on a regular basis
to explore and understand economic
behavior in a given community
what what are the discussions about the
investments in human resources for
health actually recognized and included
the thousands of women and girls who
every year sacrificed their labor for
others in the home
lots of ideas worth spreading were
hosted in homes in local halls in
football pitches in churches and mosques
advertised on the radio through local
leaders and influences and were led by
your neighbors and your brothers and
sisters
what is
[Applause]
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