Vusumuzi Dube
Sunday News Reporter
AFRICANS have been urged to take a pro-active role in developing the continent using the abundant natural resources and the human capital at their disposal and not to sit back and wait for others to develop it.
This was said by Dr Tinashe Manzungu in his presentation titled “Unlocking Africa’s prosperity through investment in real estate and construction” at the fourth edition of the Jamie Pajoel International (JPI) Annual Leadership in Rwanda which ran under the theme “Build to last.”
He said Africa’s massive growing population of 2,5 billion made it a strong market in all sectors of the economy.
He called on local businesspeople to support their governments through private-public partnerships to grow their countries and continent at large.
“There is a need for businesspeople on this continent to support their governments in infrastructure development, which is an economic development enabler so that Africans have a prosperous continent they want.
“Statistics show that one in five people in Africa has electricity, 66 percent have access to water, four percent of African land is under irrigation and these statistics are a clear indication of a gap that exists in terms of infrastructure development into all these sectors like agriculture. More than 60 percent lack basic infrastructure and according to data, Africa has only 25 percent of roads that are tarred and the rest are dusty unserviced roads. There is need to maintain and manage the existing old and current infrastructure such as roads, dams and plants which assist in economic development.”
He said some countries on the continent were colonised and when their erstwhile colonisers were leaving some poured concrete in mining shafts, and some vandalised plants and equipment.
Dr Manzungu said they have seen companies failing to get spare parts for plants and equipment which has led to some million-dollar plants left idle.
“They are white elephants but we need to change that and start looking inside to solve our challenges and develop our continent. Another disadvantage is the cost of doing business in Africa which is expensive when compared to trading with outside African countries all because of the poor road network or poor rail network and or high costs charged at harbours.”
He said it was actually affordable to trade with a country outside Africa in terms of logistics compared to a fellow African country.
Dr Manzungu said Africa was in need of US$72 billion yearly consecutively to achieve its 2030 infrastructural development obligation and called on the business community to intervene as funding was a barrier to African development.
Dr Manzungu is a board member of the Africa Business Council and a director of the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa Business Council. He is also the co-founder of Zimbuild, a real estate business that has diversified to TM Group, an investment portfolio with interest in insurance and financial services.
He is also the senior vice-president of the Zimbabwe Building Contractors Association and has scooped the African Achievers Award under the Excellence in Leadership and Global Corporate Enterprise in the United Kingdom.
JPI is an organisation under the Governments of Nigeria and Canada that serves as a platform for human capital development, while it provides competency-based leadership trainings to individuals and organisations across diverse fields of endeavours.
It also provides knowledge-sharing and global experiences that help develop leadership competencies, improve performance, and drive strategies to promote organisational growth and profitability.
Online Reporter