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The Executive Vice Chairman, Ibadan School of Government and Public Policy (ISGPP), Dr Tunji Olaopa, stressed the need for African leaders and governments to “remodel the business of governance through institutional renewal and a cultural adjustment programme-inspired values reorientation.”
According to him, “this new wave will create shifts from short-term policy orientation to more longer-term concerns; from certificated illiteracy education outputs trends to skills orientation cum reflective practices and from profligacy and rabid consumerism to an investment orientation”.
Olaopa gave the advice in his keynote address at the 18th Africa Conference at the University of Texas, Austin United States (U.S) at the weekend.
Olaopa, in his keynote address entitled: “Transforming Africa’s Institutions: the Challenges of Politics, Development and Reform,” said that it is only the institutionalizing imperative that will unite African leadership and citizens into a comparative development of inclusive institutions.
He argued that deepening poverty which even the celebrated jobless growth of the yesteryears did not alleviate, reduces the chances of elections that are issues-based which in turn limits the potentials for emergence of transformation in most African countries.
The public administration expert explained that the chances of African countries breaking out of their logjam nonetheless demands dynamics that will, in time, create a new generation of detribalised and cosmopolitan leaders.
According to him, African leaders should be distinguished by their managerial sophistication and policy intelligence and, therefore, inspire by example and drive critical movements to rebuild institutions to create capable developmental states; distil compelling value propositions in African political economies that could shape new ideologies with regard to the role of the state relative to market as African alternative to Washington Consensus inspired neoliberalism
Olaopa stressed that African governments need to “reject foreign economic and development paradigms that are at odd with Africa’s interests and future; generate local economic frameworks that, for instance, encourage local consumption; scale up investment in education and the creation of a patriotic human capital invested with the will to transform Africa; facilitate a significant collaborative endeavors that transform Africa’s economic and technological future through research and development (R&D); and put in place several institutional reform strategies that lead to the emergence of world class public service around which the visions and programs of various African governments could be translated into veritable governance projects”
The theme of this year’s conference is “Leadership and Institutions in Africa.”
The conference, which is an annual gathering of intellectuals from across the world, discusses thematic issues that are germane to the understanding of Africa and African diaspora. It was convened by Prof. Toyin Falola, a professor of History, the Jacob and Frances Sanger Mossiker Chair Professor in the Humanities, and teaching professor at the University of Texas.