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Highlights of 3-day Pan-African summit

"Africa is the country of the future, each sector of activities has opportunities we must seize, so as to create more jobs, renewable energy, transportation, agriculture, education, digital industries which will promote growth in the continent."

The audience during the 'my role in the society session' moderated by Chude Jideonwo (Managing Partner, Red Media Africa, Nigeria)

The Pan African forum which was held in Libreville,Gabon from August 28-30, 2015 can be referred to the most powerful African summit this year, as it brought together on one platform political and business leaders from around the world as well as journalists in order to discuss pragmatic solutions to our the continent's economy.

The pre-forum which focused on the importance of the participation of youth’s in the progress of the continent, had paradigm changers from various parts of the world as panelists.

The event was declared opened by the President of Gabon His Excellency‘ Ali Bongo Ondimba.’

The president's speech was based on need to diversify as oil is falling, he emphasized on the need to take risks and seize opportunities.

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In his words “Africa is the country of the future, each sector of activities has opportunities we must seize, so as to create more jobs, renewable energy, transportation, agriculture, education, digital industries which will promote growth in the continent.”

The quote which was a take home for the audience was that of ‘Professor George Njenga’ which emphasized on the need for Africans to unite, being that he has noticed the segregation between the anglophone and the francophone Africans.

Same as it’s first day, the second day staged world leaders, it kicked off with a ‘ministers’ session’ where Transforming Gabon was discussed.

It was focused on the energy of Africa’s opportunities

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During this session, the Gabon mining MD, Nze-Nekale called for transparency in attracting investors to the Gabon mining sector.

In his words, ‘We need to attract mining investors in Gabon and we need to make their exploratory projects easy through transparency.’

Speaking on Africa’s opportunities was not complete till encouraging and acknowledging the need for developing female leaders for the future.

During the ‘Women in leadership’ session, it was summarized that  Africa’s untapped potential was in girls and women. Beyonce’s song ‘who runs the world’ was appreciated.

On education, ‘Deputy director general UNESCO, Mr Getachew Engida’ gave an educative speech on how girls and women should be empowered in to realise their full potentials.

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“We have to insist on their civic participation, in order to realise the full potentials of this women” he said

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On day three, business moguls, ceo’s, political leaders, entrepreneurs, urged for more of the intellectual sessions, as it was the last day.

In conversation with Alan Kasujja on Africa's transformation at the New York Forum Africa, Dr Lopes revealed that Africa has enough to finance her own innovations.

In his words, 'One of the reasons why Africa's trade is not so valuable is that we don't master intellectual property. Africa has enough to finance her own innovations: she has more than $500bn in savings that should be leverage.'

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Without doubts, this further show that participants and panelists will build on previous years’ discussions to focus on the concrete measures that will be needed to drive Africa’s transformation in its next stage of development.

The New York Forum Africa  is an annual event which brings together political and business leaders from around the world as well as journalists in order to create a global meeting where economic issues and growth can be discussed with solutions proferred.

The NYFA is created by Richard Attias, former organizer of the World Economic Forum and co-founder of the Clinton Global Initiative.

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