In Case You Missed It: 5/2/16 – 5/8/16

The most impor­tant in this week’s head­lines out of and about Africa, for those who need help catch­ing up.

In this week’s news, the World Eco­nom­ic Forum on Africa holds in the Rwan­dan cap­i­tal, and African push for a Euro­pean-style inte­gra­tion of the continent.

Who Cares: World Eco­nom­ic Forum on Africa Holds In Rwanda 

The 26^th World Eco­nom­ic Forum on Africa, a part of the World Eco­nom­ic Forum, a not-for-prof­it plat­form which engages lead­ers and nations around the world for pub­lic-pri­vate part­ner­ships, is sched­uled to hold in the Rwan­dan cap­i­tal, Kigali from May 11 to 13.

The Rwan­da Eye reports that “The three day forum expect­ed to kick off on Wednes­day at Kigali Con­fer­ence and Exhi­bi­tion Vil­lage (Camp Kigali) is seen as a plat­form that is like­ly to ignite ideas and strate­gies that would help to leapfrog the continent’s economy.”

A bold agen­da has been laid out for the meet­ing this year and it includes dig­i­tal tech­nolo­gies and trends, African entre­pre­neur­ship, as well as a look at the continent’s tech industry.

“Con­ven­ing under the theme, Con­nect­ing Africa’s Resources through Dig­i­tal Trans­for­ma­tion, the dis­cus­sion in Kigali will take up where the Forum’s Annu­al Meet­ing in Davos-Klosters in Jan­u­ary left off: by seek­ing to iden­ti­fy pri­or­i­ties and actions for Africa’s lead­ers as they look to build economies resilient to today’s chal­lenges and able to flour­ish in the increas­ing­ly dig­i­tal, con­ver­gent mar­ket­places of tomor­row, “ accord­ing to eTur­bo News.

“Par­tic­i­pat­ing in the dis­cus­sions in Kigali will be over 1,200 lead­ers from gov­ern­ment, busi­ness, civ­il soci­ety, acad­e­mia, media and the arts.”

So—what’s the big deal? 

Rwan­da is the sec­ond East­ern African nation to host the meet­ing, after Tan­za­nia in 2010.

Kigali, Rwan­da, is wide­ly known as the epi­cen­ter of the 1994 geno­cide in which mil­lions of Rwan­da cit­i­zens were slaugh­tered by their fel­low citizens.

Writ­ing for Ven­tures Africa,  Fum­nanya Agbugah states:

“Regard­less, Rwan­da has dra­mat­i­cal­ly trans­formed its econ­o­my, emerg­ing as a region­al high-tech hub that boasts one of sub-Saha­ran Africa’s fastest GDP growth rates. It is one of the continent’s most com­pet­i­tive economies and a top reformer in improv­ing the busi­ness envi­ron­ment. In the past two years it has suc­cess­ful­ly host­ed sev­er­al notable con­fer­ences like the pan-African AfDB Annu­al Meet­ing in 2014, Trans­form Africa Sum­mit in 2013 and 2015, and the 84th Inter­pol Gen­er­al Assem­bly in 2015. Rwan­da is expect­ed to host the African Union Sum­mit in July and the Africa Hotel Invest­ment Forum in Octo­ber, this year.”

Push for a Euro­pean-Style African Union Gain­ing Steam 

For­mer Libyan leader, Muam­mar Qaddafi may be gone but his lega­cy lives on.

Qaddafi, over­thrown and killed in a Unit­ed States inspired coup, led by rebels, was known for chaos that result­ed in his lead­er­ship of Libya. But one of the pos­i­tive marks of his time in office was the con­tri­bu­tions he made towards the cre­ation of today’s African Union or AU.

Known for his Pan-African ideas, to unite dis­parate pieces of the African con­ti­nent under a sin­gle umbrel­la, Qaddafi  advo­cat­ed for a uni­fied African mil­i­tary to defend the entire con­ti­nent, as well as a sin­gle cur­ren­cy and pass­port for all of Africa, sim­i­lar to the Euro­pean Union (EU).

While the man is gone, pieces of his dream will sur­face in dis­cus­sions dur­ing the World Eco­nom­ic Forum on Africa in the Rwan­dan cap­i­tal, Kigali, from May 11 to 13. That’s accord­ing to this Newsweek mag­a­zine story.

The idea of uni­ty among African nations dates back to the 1960’s when many of them gained inde­pen­dence from their colo­nial mas­ters. But the for­mer Libyan leader is large­ly cred­it­ed for the piv­otal role he played in the uni­fi­ca­tion of the con­ti­nent and towards the cre­ation of the AU in 2000.

“There’s a grow­ing sense among many pro­po­nents of greater uni­ty between African nations that now is the time to push for a deal to form a sim­i­lar bloc. In its Agen­da 2063—a plat­form announced in 2013 out­lin­ing poli­cies nec­es­sary to trans­form the con­ti­nent over the fol­low­ing 50 years—the AU pro­posed estab­lish­ing a Con­ti­nen­tal Free Trade Area by 2017, abol­ish­ing visa require­ments for African cit­i­zens in African coun­tries by 2018 and even­tu­al­ly intro­duc­ing an African passport.”

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