The African Dream

The dream that the 21st century will be the African Century is powerful and intoxicating. It is also becoming reality.

As African officials gather in Washington, DC, from Monday to today for the first US-Africa Leaders Summit, it is worth considering the basis — and limits — of the continent’s progress.

While conflict and poverty remain serious problems in many African regions, the continent is not only more stable than before, but also experiencing some of the highest economic growth rates anywhere on the planet. Over the past decade, tens of millions of people across Africa have joined the middle class, its cities are expanding rapidly and its population is the most youthful in the world.

However, Africans must not take it for granted that their time has come. Words are cheap and despite the continent’s positive momentum, we know history is littered with squandered dreams — and nowhere more so than in Africa.

INTEGRATING EAST AFRICA

So, there is much that we in Africa must do to seize our opportunity. Building bigger, more integrated sub-regional markets that are deeply embedded in the global economy is one of the most urgent tasks that we are facing.

After all, from the European Union to the Association of South-east Asian Nations to the North American Free Trade Agreement, we see how geographic regions can create conditions for shared growth and prosperity by removing barriers to commerce, harmonising regulatory norms, opening labour markets and developing common infrastructure.

This is precisely the vision that we are working to realise in our own part of Africa, under the banner of the Northern Corridor Integration Projects.

In the past 18 months, Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda, joined by South Sudan and, more recently, Ethiopia, have launched 14 joint projects that will integrate East Africa more closely and make our region a better, easier place to do business.

There have been concrete results. We have put in place a single tourist visa valid in all three countries. We have established a single customs territory, slashing red tape and removing non-tariff trade barriers. A standard-gauge railway from Mombasa to Kigali and Juba via Kampala is being designed, and financing for the first segment has been secured from Chinese partners.

Taking these steps has required going against decades of entrenched practice. Unfortunately, across Africa, national borders have tended to be choke points rather than enablers of intra-continental cooperation on trade, security, labour and environmental issues. Too often, Africa’s economies exchange goods and coordinate policies among themselves less than they do with countries outside of the continent.

We are determined to change this. Under the Northern Corridor initiative, for example, each of our governments has accepted responsibility for shepherding key projects.

Uganda is securing investors for a new oil refinery and spearheading the development of regional infrastructure for information and communications technology, which will lead to the elimination of cellular roaming charges among our countries.

Kenya is tasked with developing a regional commodity exchange, improving human resources through education and consultancy services and building crude and refined oil pipelines. It is also exploring ways to expand regionally focused power generation and transmission.

Rwanda is charged with aligning immigration laws and promoting freedom of movement for citizens and visitors. Other coordination duties include regional security (through the East African Standby Force), coordinated airspace management as well as joint tourism marketing.

POLITICAL WILL NEEDED TO FULFIL DREAM

We know what success will look like for the citizens of our region. And we know what needs to be done. Progress will be achieved not by building monuments for politicians or holding summits, but by lowering the costs of doing business and raising the incomes of our people.

Bureaucracies move slowly, sometimes because they are institutionally programmed to subvert change. The framework of the Northern Corridor Integration Projects is designed to generate and sustain the political will necessary to get the project done.

The United States has always been an important partner for our countries, but the path to solving our problems is not through handouts from American taxpayers. Only we, together with our business sector, can do the job.

As we do so, we look forward to a deeper and more “normal” relationship with the US, focused on what we can do together, rather than what Americans can do for us.

Africa has always had what it takes to rise. Together, we can make it happen. PROJECT SYNDICATE

ABOUT THE AUTHORS:

Paul Kagame is President of the Republic of Rwanda. Uhuru Kenyatta is President of the Republic of Kenya. Yoweri Museveni is President of the Republic of Uganda.