New African Magazine November

8132019 New African Magazine November

httpslidepdfcomreaderfullnew-african-magazine-november 13



drive following the African Development Bankrsquos (AfDB) an-nouncement last month to float Africarsquos first infrastructure bondsto member nations to raise up to 983076983090983090 billion for investment in Africarsquos much-needed i nfrastructu re projects in a reas such asports railways roads and energy It is a move that has filledBoateng with confident exuberance

ldquoTis announcement is just music to my earsrdquo he gushes

and suddenly his stern-seeming posture relaxes and he radiatesoptimism ldquoTis is key to unlocking Africarsquos potential Lack ofinfrastructure is one of the major obstacles that has been hold-ing us back

ldquoI believe everything about Africa today is about momentum Whereas historically there hasnrsquot been big interest in terms of in-vestment and even interest in culture fashion and the arts todaythere is vast momentum in Africarsquos favour One of the key thingsabout the Made In Africa has been to change perceptions about

Africa and we welcome and support infrastructu ral developmentrdquoIn 983090983088983089983089 Boateng Nigerian businessman Kola Aluko in

collaboration with the Nigerian oil and gas company AtlanticEnergy set up the Made in Africa Foundation (MIAF) with avery ambitious plan But a mbitious is a word which doesnrsquot augur well with Boateng He seems to take it that it connotes ldquofailurerdquo

ldquoWhy do plans become ambitious when itrsquos about Africa Whyis it that itrsquos never an ambitious plan when the Chinese or theRussians are building high-speed rail links across their countriesrdquo

Te ldquoambitiousrdquo plan we are talking about is the seemingly

giddiness-inducing 983076983092983088983088m MIAF fundraising mission for master-plans feasibility studies and other projects to help prepare worksfor successful infrastructure schemes across Africa

ldquoTe bottom line is that these are not ambitious but necessaryplans and in the ca se of Africa itrsquos even more important we needto stop talking and just get on and do what is vitally necessaryInfrastructure development is beyond an ambitionrdquo he insistsadding a laudable explanation

ldquoItrsquos a well-known statistic that 983076983092983088983088m of funding for feasi-bility studies and masterplans across sub-Saharan Africa woulddevelop over 983076983089983088983088bn of infrastructure projects which in turn would create a trillion dollars of value across A frica Te firststep is often the hardest and we have created this Foundation with Atlantic Energy to make that step easierrdquo

But this is not the first time Boateng is courting the infra-structure development dream In January 983090983088983089983088 his putative Madein Africa organisation proposed an infrastructure project to thethen ldquogovernmentrdquo of slain Libyan leader Muammar al Gathafia copy of which New African has obtained

Te proposal ndash titled ldquoTe Great Green Sahara Initiativerdquo acomponent of a larger scheme dubbed the ldquoipping Point Ini-tiativerdquo sought funding for what can be said to be one of thegrandest rail projects ever considered in post-independent Africa

Boatengrsquos Sahara Initiative (also known as the A frica CrossrailLink) is on paper an extremely laudable project and if executed will be worth every dolla r spent on it

According to this proposal the project (which Boateng says

is still in the offing) a ims to link the port of ripoli in Libya tothe port of akoradi in his homeland of Ghana via a high-speedrailway with state-of-the-art sustainable cities built at all stopsalong the way

Of the many advantages Boateng and co envisage the railwayinfrastructure which would eventually be self-financing wouldbring supply and demand systems together more effectively andconnect agricultural industrial and energy-producing heartlandsof western and northern Africa to global trade routes

Te proposed route would pass through Libya Niger Nigeria

Benin ogo and Ghana Te railway would not only enhancetrade cooperation between the nations it went through by open-ing up vast swat hes of land to industry and development Boatengbelieves it would improve economic conditions due to decreasedtransportation times and administration costs

With the turn of events in Libya la st yea r where doe s theproject stand ldquoWersquore still doing itrdquo he says ldquobut financing fea-sibility studies to do such an exercise costs millions of dollars

Cover Story Interview Special

10 New African Magazine November 983090983088983089983090

Tat has been the major hurdle that we needed to overcome andthat is why we set up Made In Africa which is raising the moneyfor feasibility studies and also to support first-stage funding ofinfrastructure projects in Africa

ldquoAnd it has been hard to find anyone to actually put that firstdollar in but we are in the process of raising these financesrdquo

Te Foundationrsquos partner the Lagos-based Atlantic Energy were the fi rst donors a nd the compa ny is he avily involvedBoateng does not elaborate further on how much money hasbeen raised so far but he is quick to appreciate the opportunity

the AfDB bonds profferldquoEach day that goes by brings our vision closer And this is

why the AfDB infrastruct ure bonds floatation is such a welcomeventure It just reinforces what I have been saying all these yearsrdquo

His only reservation on the AfDB bonds floation is that it iscurrently only being offered to its member states

Potentially the 983076983090983090bn of bonds which take advantage of the AfDBrsquos ldquoAAArdquo rating would be a more secure investment than

those issued by European states making the offerinmore attractive opportunities in the global debt cap And if implemented properly it would have a posi Africarsquos GDP raising it by an estimated 983090983077

Te pragmatic consensus and Boateng also ag

the success of this AfDB undertaking would help out of poverty

All proponents believe its effect on Africa could the Marshall Plan which was a huge stimulus for grEuropean continent in the post-war period But thMarshall Plan involved a lot of money and the 983076983090983090cally a drop in the ocean for such a grand scheme

ldquoYesrdquo concurs Boateng ldquoit has been said that Asomething close to a trillion dollars in in frastructure planning alone But the fact is we need to get on ansomewhere and 983076983090983090bn would be a really good start

He believes however the AfDB can do even bettethe flotation to Africarsquos leading entrepreneurs and b well as those in its Diaspora

ldquoLet Africans have the chance to show their beown continentrdquo he emphasises adding

ldquoTe global A frican Diaspora is a trillion-dollalready investing 983076983091983088bn in remittances to the conyear and the AfDBrsquos lsquotriple Arsquo rating would provide

guarantee an excellent return for people How canthe offering I think it is great but it shouldnrsquot just b African countries it should be opened to the African well I think private enterprise should play a key role Africa will be a great facilitator in helping to make th

As a man who knows some deep -pocketed peplaces Boateng wants to put his good connections too asking rich entrepreneurs to come aboard the in

November 983090983088983089983090 New African Ma

ldquoWhy do plans becomelsquoambitiousrsquo when itrsquosabout Africa Why isit that itrsquos never an

ambitious plan whenthe Chinese or theRussians are buildinghigh-speed rail linksrdquo

Boateng with fellow diasporan guests speaks at the 2007Ghana AU Summit Below Aliko Dangote (l) and Patrice Motsepe(r) have been invited to join his initiative for philathropy giving

BOATENGrsquoS AFRICATRANSRAIL PROJECTItrsquos hard to argue against Boatengrsquos grand plan Hireads like something from Brunelrsquos brain

A self-financing high-speed rail network with staart sustainable cities as economic and regional hthe route

Use of green technologies and energy ndash both as sand as revenue to open up new economy streamsenable social development

The increase in the land price alongside the trackused as security and land value appreciation capleverage sustainable maintenance and security

Land along its periphery will be cultivated with nifixing oil-producing crops such as Pongamia for production or other agricultural biomassPower will come via solar farms along the railwayrich regions

Use of innovative financial instruments and altercapital flows to finance the initiative including texport credit systems carbon credits and milita





development bandwagon However hebelieves the spirit of philanthropy shouldbe their driving force But he is starting with Africarsquos own billionaires

And as a non-believer in foreign aid ndash which Africa ha s been on the receiving endof for the past 983093983088 years but which by andlarge has amounted to nothing in terms ofdevelopment ndash Ozwald says philanthropyby Africarsquos burgeoning private millionairescould go a long way in filling the aid gap

ldquoAid is not the answer Itrsquos very impor-tant that all of Africarsquos top entrepreneursare actively i nvolved in the development of Africa We have been talking to everyonein regards the importance of infrastruc-ture development We have approachedbig entrepreneurs such as Aliko Dangotein Nigeria and Patrice Motsepe in South Africardquo

Ozwald is keen to discuss the impor-tance of philanthropy ldquoItrsquos all about phi-lanthropy Our role as top entrepreneursalso has to be charitable I personally feelvery strongly about the idea of key entre-preneurs and companies donating to thelsquoMarshall planningrsquo of Africa It should beour way of giving backrdquo

He also believes philanthropy makes commercial and economicsense as well ldquoFrom a commercial point of view the positive

realisation of these plans creates a value chain eventually Butthe initial steps have to be taken from the hearts of key Africanentrepreneurs What this also demonstrates is that Africans can work together And this coming tog ether of all of us as top busi-ness people is a cr ucial key to t he development of our continentrdquo

He has good reason to believe in the power of philanthropyldquoOpportunity in Africa is so vast that even the most successful

African is still only niggling a little bit on it If we worked togetherand turned the quantum around imagine what sort of structurecould come out of it I strongly believe that joint philanthropy isa very important start it can bring together the best of the bestof Africa and move the continent forward using our own

ldquoOur coming together is keyrdquo he emphasises ldquoWe need tohave a vehicle for development which we can call our own andone that will actually transform the current scenario and createa major masterplan that will change Africa for ever But we needto do this together ndash we c anrsquot do this as individualsrdquo

He concludes ldquoImagine what could be achieved if all top en-trepreneurs worked with 983089983088983088 other people like them Te gains

for this type of partnership are unimaginable for all of us andthis enormously rich continentrdquo

What does the role of good governance in A frica play in a llthis I ask ndash while his PA takes stealthy glances at her watch

ldquoMy advice is park the criticism and letrsquos get on with the jobof making it happen Yes there are going to be challenges yesthings will go wrong and the task is huge but we canrsquot continue with the same old stories of corruption in Africa and many other

negatives da da da da Tose stories havebeen running for over 983093983088 years now Teagenda now should be letrsquos get on withthe jobrdquo

ldquoTe Africa of todayrdquo he adds ldquodoesnot have the same issues as 983093983088 years ago We are all understanding more what thevalue of opportunity is We are begin-ning to believe more that if we controlmore than 983093983088983077 of the worldrsquos rich naturalresources we cannot be poor Because of

this one fact Africans can no longer af-ford not to believe in themselves and theircapabilities But the question is how do we unlock that beliefrdquo

But shouldnrsquot all this be accompaniedby good governance and political aptitude

ldquoI think the issue of governance hasbeen overusedrdquo he a rgues dismissivelyldquoTere seems to be always a big reason

why no one inve sts o r shou ld inve st in Africa or why Africans c annot do betterfor themselves Come on letrsquos just get overthis now If anyone believes corruption andbad governance arenrsquot issues around the world and are a just a preser ve for Africathen they donrsquot live on planet earth

ldquoAfricarsquos no different in experiencing these issues th an manyother places in the world Tatrsquos a fact but unfortunately theproblem of underdevelopment in Africa is more visible bec ause

of the continentrsquos lack of infrastructure Itrsquos a big drawbackrdquo heexplains

Is he turning a blind eye to bad governance and corr uptionldquoCritics will say what they want to say But personally I un-

derstand critics ndash unfortunately in the world of fashion we live with critics every day However on the scale of what we have toachieve for Africa its time we moved on to matters that makea huge impact on development and I believe the way forward isnot to keep on about the same old issues that have held us backand implement instead large-scale projects

ldquoIn fact what I am proposing should not be seen as reallylarge-scale because they are not Tis is what every other countrydoes Tis is what they have done in China they do it in Rus-sia and they do it in Europe But when Africa wants to do itthey suddenly become these lsquolarge-scale projectsrsquo Excuse me Inthe meantime everywhere else they are enjoying the benefits ofbuilding high-speed rail links between their borders and withintheir countries I mean what do we say to that Tese are neces-sary infrastructure developments and not lsquoundoablersquo large-scale

developmentsldquoTerefore the attitude again is letrsquos get these plans working

letrsquos engage the world with all its knowhow to build the infra-structure for Africa and make it one of the best not just in the983090983089st century but for all centuries to comerdquo

As I throw in a question on the fa shion business in Africa Iknow my time is up But there is a lot you can get out of half anhour with Mr Boateng

ldquoJoint philanthropy canbring together the bestof the best of Africaand move the continentforwardrdquo



drive following the African Development Bankrsquos (AfDB) an-nouncement last month to float Africarsquos first infrastructure bondsto member nations to raise up to 983076983090983090 billion for investment in Africarsquos much-needed i nfrastructu re projects in a reas such asports railways roads and energy It is a move that has filledBoateng with confident exuberance

ldquoTis announcement is just music to my earsrdquo he gushes

and suddenly his stern-seeming posture relaxes and he radiatesoptimism ldquoTis is key to unlocking Africarsquos potential Lack ofinfrastructure is one of the major obstacles that has been hold-ing us back

ldquoI believe everything about Africa today is about momentum Whereas historically there hasnrsquot been big interest in terms of in-vestment and even interest in culture fashion and the arts todaythere is vast momentum in Africarsquos favour One of the key thingsabout the Made In Africa has been to change perceptions about

Africa and we welcome and support infrastructu ral developmentrdquoIn 983090983088983089983089 Boateng Nigerian businessman Kola Aluko in

collaboration with the Nigerian oil and gas company AtlanticEnergy set up the Made in Africa Foundation (MIAF) with avery ambitious plan But a mbitious is a word which doesnrsquot augur well with Boateng He seems to take it that it connotes ldquofailurerdquo

ldquoWhy do plans become ambitious when itrsquos about Africa Whyis it that itrsquos never an ambitious plan when the Chinese or theRussians are building high-speed rail links across their countriesrdquo

Te ldquoambitiousrdquo plan we are talking about is the seemingly

giddiness-inducing 983076983092983088983088m MIAF fundraising mission for master-plans feasibility studies and other projects to help prepare worksfor successful infrastructure schemes across Africa

ldquoTe bottom line is that these are not ambitious but necessaryplans and in the ca se of Africa itrsquos even more important we needto stop talking and just get on and do what is vitally necessaryInfrastructure development is beyond an ambitionrdquo he insistsadding a laudable explanation

ldquoItrsquos a well-known statistic that 983076983092983088983088m of funding for feasi-bility studies and masterplans across sub-Saharan Africa woulddevelop over 983076983089983088983088bn of infrastructure projects which in turn would create a trillion dollars of value across A frica Te firststep is often the hardest and we have created this Foundation with Atlantic Energy to make that step easierrdquo

But this is not the first time Boateng is courting the infra-structure development dream In January 983090983088983089983088 his putative Madein Africa organisation proposed an infrastructure project to thethen ldquogovernmentrdquo of slain Libyan leader Muammar al Gathafia copy of which New African has obtained

Te proposal ndash titled ldquoTe Great Green Sahara Initiativerdquo acomponent of a larger scheme dubbed the ldquoipping Point Ini-tiativerdquo sought funding for what can be said to be one of thegrandest rail projects ever considered in post-independent Africa

Boatengrsquos Sahara Initiative (also known as the A frica CrossrailLink) is on paper an extremely laudable project and if executed will be worth every dolla r spent on it

According to this proposal the project (which Boateng says

is still in the offing) a ims to link the port of ripoli in Libya tothe port of akoradi in his homeland of Ghana via a high-speedrailway with state-of-the-art sustainable cities built at all stopsalong the way

Of the many advantages Boateng and co envisage the railwayinfrastructure which would eventually be self-financing wouldbring supply and demand systems together more effectively andconnect agricultural industrial and energy-producing heartlandsof western and northern Africa to global trade routes

Te proposed route would pass through Libya Niger Nigeria

Benin ogo and Ghana Te railway would not only enhancetrade cooperation between the nations it went through by open-ing up vast swat hes of land to industry and development Boatengbelieves it would improve economic conditions due to decreasedtransportation times and administration costs

With the turn of events in Libya la st yea r where doe s theproject stand ldquoWersquore still doing itrdquo he says ldquobut financing fea-sibility studies to do such an exercise costs millions of dollars



Tat has been the major hurdle that we needed to overcome andthat is why we set up Made In Africa which is raising the moneyfor feasibility studies and also to support first-stage funding ofinfrastructure projects in Africa

ldquoAnd it has been hard to find anyone to actually put that firstdollar in but we are in the process of raising these financesrdquo

Te Foundationrsquos partner the Lagos-based Atlantic Energy were the fi rst donors a nd the compa ny is he avily involvedBoateng does not elaborate further on how much money hasbeen raised so far but he is quick to appreciate the opportunity

the AfDB bonds profferldquoEach day that goes by brings our vision closer And this is

why the AfDB infrastruct ure bonds floatation is such a welcomeventure It just reinforces what I have been saying all these yearsrdquo

His only reservation on the AfDB bonds floation is that it iscurrently only being offered to its member states

Potentially the 983076983090983090bn of bonds which take advantage of the AfDBrsquos ldquoAAArdquo rating would be a more secure investment than

those issued by European states making the offerinmore attractive opportunities in the global debt cap And if implemented properly it would have a posi Africarsquos GDP raising it by an estimated 983090983077

Te pragmatic consensus and Boateng also ag

the success of this AfDB undertaking would help out of poverty

All proponents believe its effect on Africa could the Marshall Plan which was a huge stimulus for grEuropean continent in the post-war period But thMarshall Plan involved a lot of money and the 983076983090983090cally a drop in the ocean for such a grand scheme

ldquoYesrdquo concurs Boateng ldquoit has been said that Asomething close to a trillion dollars in in frastructure planning alone But the fact is we need to get on ansomewhere and 983076983090983090bn would be a really good start

He believes however the AfDB can do even bettethe flotation to Africarsquos leading entrepreneurs and b well as those in its Diaspora

ldquoLet Africans have the chance to show their beown continentrdquo he emphasises adding

ldquoTe global A frican Diaspora is a trillion-dollalready investing 983076983091983088bn in remittances to the conyear and the AfDBrsquos lsquotriple Arsquo rating would provide

guarantee an excellent return for people How canthe offering I think it is great but it shouldnrsquot just b African countries it should be opened to the African well I think private enterprise should play a key role Africa will be a great facilitator in helping to make th

As a man who knows some deep -pocketed peplaces Boateng wants to put his good connections too asking rich entrepreneurs to come aboard the in

November 983090983088983089983090 New African Ma

ldquoWhy do plans becomelsquoambitiousrsquo when itrsquosabout Africa Why isit that itrsquos never an

ambitious plan whenthe Chinese or theRussians are buildinghigh-speed rail linksrdquo

Boateng with fellow diasporan guests speaks at the 2007Ghana AU Summit Below Aliko Dangote (l) and Patrice Motsepe(r) have been invited to join his initiative for philathropy giving

BOATENGrsquoS AFRICATRANSRAIL PROJECTItrsquos hard to argue against Boatengrsquos grand plan Hireads like something from Brunelrsquos brain

A self-financing high-speed rail network with staart sustainable cities as economic and regional hthe route

Use of green technologies and energy ndash both as sand as revenue to open up new economy streamsenable social development

The increase in the land price alongside the trackused as security and land value appreciation capleverage sustainable maintenance and security

Land along its periphery will be cultivated with nifixing oil-producing crops such as Pongamia for production or other agricultural biomassPower will come via solar farms along the railwayrich regions

Use of innovative financial instruments and altercapital flows to finance the initiative including texport credit systems carbon credits and milita

































































Documents

New African Magazine November