Is being the public face of donor-funded "green revolution" the best Kofi Annan can do for Africa?

by Mutumwa D. Mawere

Last week Cape Town hosted the annual World Economic Forum (WEF) on Africa meeting.

The former UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan, had to wait for the conference to announce his appointment as the first chairman of the Alliance for a Green Revolution (AGRA), an initiative of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation.

With 53 countries, Africa still has a long way to go in generating and taking ownership of its destiny. It will continue to be a football that can be kicked around for other people to score while the continent's icons play second fiddle or subsidiary roles on the defining issues of our time.

Who are the WEF? Who are AGRA? Why would Africans be comfortable having a Swiss-based organisation take ownership of its important conversation? When did Annan know that he was to be chairman of AGRA? What is its agenda? Why the African spokesman?

Africa has brilliant minds and yet the continent continues to act as if it has a paucity of the brain power to transform itself out of poverty.

A "comfort zone" denotes the limited set of behaviours that a person will engage without being anxious. It describes that set of behaviours that have become comfortable, without creating a sense of risk. A person's personality can be described by his or her comfort zone. A comfort zone is, therefore, a type of conditioning that causes a person to create mental boundaries. Such boundaries often create an unfounded sense of security. A person who has established a comfort zone in a particular axis of his life will tend to not step outside of it.

Could it be that Kofi Annan, like many of us, was so scared of what he would do after his tenure at the UN that he forgot to use his powerful position to empower his fellow Africans? Could he not have found sanctuary in uniquely African-conceived, structured and financed ideas instead of becoming a spokesman for ideas that may well be his, but are financed by Gates and Rockefeller money?

Annan is the first black African to have been UN Secretary General. Therefore more is expected of him than for him to end up with no "home" that is financed by Africans to use his experience, contacts and knowledge.

It is well known that he who pays the piper calls the tune. The truth is that AGRA is an initiative that will rely on funding from donors. One cannot fault the American foundations for identifying the green revolution in Africa as worthy of intervention and for which an African face in the name of Annan would be ideal. In as much as Africa recognises that its food and water management challenges need to be resolved, it is regrettable that Africans would not dare leave their comfort zone and create their own broad-based foundations, using their savings for the good of Africa.

When Gates chooses Annan to voice African issues, we cannot blame him because we have abdicated responsibility over our problems. On the other hand, it may be the case that Annan started his conversations with Gates while he was still at the UN and used his access to sell the idea of AGRA but could not find sponsors in the private or public sectors of Africa.

African governments sponsored Annan for the highest office at the UN and yet none of them were concerned about what he would do after his tenure. His voice may well have been purchased already and Africa's expensive investment has ended up being harvested by the very forces Africa seeks to reduce dependence on for defining its destiny. Annan, like many of his brothers in the diaspora, cannot escape the comfort zone of the classic brain drain, where Africa's best brains end up being the pretty faces representing other people's brands and ideas.

It is significant that Annan only announced his appointment at the WEF meeting, as if to confirm that Africa could not provide an appropriate forum for him to share his new role with the world. If Klaus Schwab, a Swiss business professor who is the founder and executive chairman of the WEF, had not thought of the idea in 1971, where would Annan have had an opportunity to break the news?

We have not been able to create our own forums for dialogue and debate about the major social and economic challenges facing Africa. The WEF has, therefore, provided an important address for Africans but the idea was conceived by non-Africans. Even Annan has not been challenged enough to get out of the comfort zone and be energised to create an African forum that Africa's big minds can use to ventilate their ideas on how best the continent can move forward.

I was not surprised to learn from a colleague who attended the Cape Town meeting that he could not help but notice that Africa's Who is Who are not black Africans. In fact blacks were Missing in Action (MIA). The WEF has, therefore, been transformed into a forum where the richest African and non-African businesses can easily negotiate deals with one another and lobby Africa's most powerful politicians in broad daylight for deals often at the expense of Africa!

It is an elitist get together and has perfected the skill of creating a power centre for those businessmen who are willing to pay the fees. Important decisions on Africa's future are made at these meetings with the beneficiaries often being non-Africans. Many of Africa's budding entrepreneurs re members of the Young Global Leaders and they are happy to pay the price, but often are not willing to belong to any of Africa's many initiatives to create a platform for debate and dialogue.

Why have Africans not been able to create their own exclusive and elitist clubs or associations, which their political decision makers will find value in using before outsourcing Africa's future to non-Africans?

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