SOCIAL COHESION: A VERY IMPORTANT INGREDIENT THAT’S MISSING IN AFRICA

SOCIAL cohesion is really about holding society together. It is about building a national identity that transcends ethnic, religion, class and gender . It is more than just a passport or an ID; it is where we achieve common purpose as citizens and when we really feel that we have equitable access and participation in the political, economic, social and cultural life of our country. It’s not about entitlement, but about equal opportunities and hope. It is about dialogue, listening and talking the Madiba Way. Madiba — Nelson Mandela — is gifted with many extra-ordinary qualities, but for me



 the most potent quality he has is his ability to build bridges; to search for and find that common ground with others. And then use that common ground to build on understanding and find solutions. That is the Madiba Way! South Africa, for instance, is the least equitable country in the world and, after 20 years of independence, what is really going on there? If we start with the issue of land, a very important issue, that country adopted a policy of willing-seller/willing-buyer. It did not work. Isn’t it time for people to seek other solutions? Isn’t it time to find a solution within the Constitution that offers an equitable solution to all parties to address that issue? The government needs to have the courage in order to deal with that. Governance is never easy, but it has to be faced and this is a very important issue and it has not been addressed in the past 20 years. The adopted Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) policy was the objective of bridging the gap between the rich and poor. Isn’t it the time to check what really happened with that? Has it really helped bridge the gap between the rich and poor? We must also talk about the youth, the largest constituency in our continent. Half of the African population is below 19 years old. This can be wonderful news but it can also be a major problem for us. Can Africa dream of being the future factory of the world instead of China? China is going to have a crunch in the next 10-or-20 years. What a wonderful prospect for us to have: that huge productivity of such young people to our factories, our land and workplace! We need to do two things. The first thing is education and training of young people. What are we preparing them for? Is our education system matching our business needs? Are we producing the kind of people that future jobs will require? Are we doing that? I am not sure. Only two per cent of African students are studying agriculture, yet 70 per cent of our people are living off the land! So, we have an issue here of matching educational and training programmes to the jobs market. How many business people are involved in the educational process? I think none. That’s the first issue. The second issue is African economic integration. Only 11 per cent of our trade is amongst Africans. We refuse to let our people travel from one country to another. We always need a visa. And I also say, sadly, although being Sudanese, whenever I travel in Africa, I always carry a British passport, because I am then welcome! With 54 countries, Africa has only 14 stock exchanges. Only 6-or-7 of them have liquidity. How can anybody start a business in a country which does not have a liquid stock exchange? There are countries that have tomatoes rotting because we cannot move tomatoes from here to there. If China was 54 different countries, would China have been where it is today? For Africa to move forward, we need economic integration, freedom to move people, goods and capital across our borders. We have a tsunami of young people, millions of young Africans coming for jobs every year. Where will these jobs come from? This is a recipe for a serious upheaval. Millions of young people without jobs — and, more important: without hope — is a major problem. If you haven’t locked up your doors and called in the army, it is a bleak future to face! I hope that our leaders across Africa can help us sleep tonight. Our future depends on how we deal with those young people. That is the mother of all social cohesion issues we face! Let’s go back to the numbers… Half the population are around 19-years old. Do you know the medium age of African presidents? If you just compare the two numbers, you can see how divided we are. Where is the social cohesion here? This may be very interesting to note. Obama became US President at 47 years; Clinton at 46 years. So, people in their 40s are being elected to run a country that is not only a super power, but it has an annual GDP of US$15 trillion: 15 times the total economy of Africa! Those guys who are 40 years old are deemed to be able to run the United States of America. One African country has a 90-year old president starting a new 5-year term. What is wrong with us? The other day I was thinking, if US President Obama went back to Kenya, where would he be today? Most probably, he would never be president of Kenya! We cannot talk about social cohesion without talking also about another important thing in our society, women. Women are actually the pillar of African economies. Seventy per cent of our population depends on land, on agriculture. Who do agriculture? Women… Women do agriculture, family, kids and also schools. Yet, women have not been allowed the dignity they really deserve in society. There still is this male-dominated xenophobia about women! Unfortunately we have a serious deficit in leadership in Africa. South Africa needs to step up and really play a better role in working with Africa. Leadership is not about bossing people around. Leadership is not about securing a seat on the UN Security Council on behalf of Africa or chairing the African Union. The leadership we are looking for is true engagement within Africa. We need a cohesive voice on the issues of transparency, tax evasion and a lesser transfer of funds. We are waiting.