Featured, Politics
…calls for retelling of African narrative by Africans
By Anthony Isibor
KARIM El Ayanoui, Executive President, Policy Center for the New South Rabat, Morocco says that each country in Africa must review its own growth strategy in order to make the best out of the new world order.
Delivering the keynote address at the Realnews 12th Anniversary Lecture in Lagos, El Ayanoui noted that it’s time for introspections in terms of rethinking the worldview for every country and to rethink its relation with the rest of the world.
El Ayanoui, who is also the Vice President of Mohammed VI Polytechnic Universirt and the Dean of its Humanities, Economics and Social Science Cluster, also stated that although the United Nations, which was formed about 80 years ago has contributed greatly to world peace, but now we need a new institution for the coming 80 years. “And it has to be, I think, to take into account the needs of Africa. Same goes for the African Development Bank.” he said.
Speaking on the Theme, Africa in World Shifting Geopolitics: Matters Arising on Demography, Technology, Artificial Intelligence, Natural Resources, he called on African leaders to begin to ask pertinent questions on issues, some of which are at the level of countries and some at the level of continent.
Such questions as, what kind of multilateralism do we need, what are your partners, how do you want to interact with them, but at the continental level, it is what kind of world do we want for Africans, what do we have to say on multilateralism, does it make sense, can you make the best out of this new world? etc.
“But what we’re seeing is a paradoxical world where fragmentation is here in every dimension, in the multilateral system, but also in economic relations with an explosion of protectionism, with the reshuffling of value chains, and so on and so forth. But at the same time, countries, particularly in the New South, are in a state eager to cooperate. There’s an explosion, at the same time, of agreements. I will refrain from using the word alliance, but agreements, partnerships.
“It is a sort of, you know, willingness, excitement from countries to get into groupings. Some have coined the term Plurilateralism, unilateralism, and it’s quite, interesting to note this sort of double movement that can be seen as contradictory because it affects us. It’s impossible today to go to economic forums and not have political discussions, which was not the case a couple of years ago. We as economists were celebrating the happy days of globalization. So there was no question that politics could be an issue.
“Today, fragmentation stems mainly from the rivalry between the U.S. and China. And this rivalry has led to profound transformation. You mentioned the WTO before. It has led to a sort of completely stalled way, despite the great work that is done by my friend Ngozi, a former colleague at the bank. Despite all the efforts, we have to conclude that we’re not making a lot of progress.
“On the contrary, like I just mentioned, the explosion in the number of protectionist measures taken by countries, you could see the enormous subsidy programmes that are put in place by advanced economies have started inflation reduction. In the U.S. as protectionists for economists, subsidy or tariff is a protection.
Europe has responded of course, there’s also this fragmentation, the security dimension that has invited itself, and you’ve been following also, the tensions around proprietary technologies in advanced computing, in chips, etc., where they are first looking at two political lenses.
“We could go on and on on that, but this sort of rivalry is shaping also our position in what we do in Afghanistan of course and it has also an impact on multilateralism, cooperation at the global level, it has an impact on development finance, as we have not been able to scale up, for instance, the size of the World Bank, we have not been able to enhance cooperation on many areas. That includes climate, although on climate it’s less pronounced,” he added.
El Ayanoui also called for a change of narrative about Africa, one that will be told by Africans with the intention to improve its image.
Towards achieving this point, he called for an increased investment in education and create universities that can deal with the current challenges. “Not just, you know, the kind of university we have for the 20th century, and I am trying to think of what it means for the university to respond to the challenges here in Africa, here in the New South for us, and to equip our students with what I said earlier on, these two sides of things, intuition and reason, action and thinking, which I think will be essential for our continent
“It’s essential that the narrative about the continent is made by Africans on the continent.
“We’ve been trying at the Policy Center for the New South to do a modest contribution. We’re publishing three reports annually that are multi-author, multi-country authors. One on the geopolitics of Africa, one on the economies of Africa, and one on Atlantic Africa.
“For us, it’s a way to contribute to this narrative from the continent. This is essential as it shapes perceptions, and can shape as well the perceptions of investors about the continent. I think it’s about time that the narrative about this continent is made here, not somewhere else, in one of the largest capitals of the Atlantic community, we stand ready at the Policy Center to work with Nigerian think tanks, we do it with many others around the continent. I think you have a special role to play as Nigeria, an important country of the continent,” he added.
Tags: KARIM El Ayanoui Policy Center for the New South Rabat Realnews 12th Anniversary Lecture
