Date Posted: 10/26/2012 8:28:09 AM
Posted By: moff J Membership Level: Silver Total Points: 485
Africa is emerging as a force to reckon with in the world. Many countries have realized that Africa is no longer to be ignored because it has huge economic potential. As other countries especially the West are grappling with economic meltdowns and financial crisis, African countries are doing quite well economically. This has seen the number of multinational companies setting operations in Africa rise exponentially because not only are they dealing with huge financial crisis in the West, but also have to deal with saturated markets which have little or no growth potential. This growth has been well articulated by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) which has forecasted Africa’s economic growth to be 5% the year 2012 and a further 5.7% in the year 2013 (Business Daily, October 16, 2012, pp 3). In the same article, Renaissance Capital, a Russian financial institution, predicts “by 2050 Africa will produce more GDP than the combined US and Euro zone do today.” One thing that comes out clearly here is that there is huge economic potential in Africa. To attain this economic prosperity Africa ought to have good leadership whose sole purpose is influencing the people positively to achieve common objectives.However, to the disarray of many people, leadership in Africa is not recognized as one of the best. There are many leadership problems which have to be identified and solutions found for those problems so as to improve governance in the continent. It is because of these leadership challenges that Africa is lagging behind other continents. So as to foster the growth of this continent then these issues have to be dealt with. As Elliot P. puts it in his report titled African political cultures and problems of government, “African countries will continue to be racked by conflicts unless leaders agree about how to govern their multi-faceted nation-states and how to distribute their economic resources equitably.” These conflicts are most a times brought about by bad governance whereby some people in a country feel marginalized, or are actually marginalized, by leaders in a given regime who the moment they get into power only try to help themselves and their communities. Reforms to improve governance are therefore essential both to improve economic sustainability and boost political stability.One of the key problems facing the African continent’s leadership is what can be referred to as “it is our time to eat syndrome”. This is a case whereby leaders once they get into power focus their efforts on enriching themselves and their confidants, who could be their communities, family, political friends and anyone who shares in their ideology. This is a major governance issue in Africa which has to be addressed and solved so as to enable the continent to develop economically, socially, environmentally and politically.The issue of corruption is very pertinent in the African continent. Corruption by itself is very wide and therefore has to be broken down into its very roots so as to be able to deal with it accordingly. One of the major forms of corruption is when leaders get into power and their main focus becomes enriching themselves and their communities at the expense of the other communities in a country. This could be in the form of land grabbing, nepotism, funds embezzlement, among others.This, according to them, is because previous leaders did it- so; “we also get our turn to do it”. It is this kind of thinking that makes Africa remain behind in economic, social and political fronts.There are many practical cases that can be provided regarding this problem. Recently, the Kenyan members of parliament passed a resolution awarding each one of them a sendoff package of Ksh.9.3 million. Though the proposal was rejected by the president, it still shows the extent to which some leaders in Africa can go to amass wealth while in power oblivious of the fact that their countries are not doing very well economically.In order to fulfill the bright projections that the world has over Africa, there has to have good governance practices. The leaders must be focused at influencing their followers into working for the benefit of everyone. To succeed therefore, the leaders have to put their self interests behind those of the country and ensure that there is a compromise that will ensure “ethnic justice” (Eliot P. African Political Cultures and Problems of Government, African Quarterly Studies Journal).
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