How do we build a renaissance in Africa? This is a question that thinkers like Patrick Awuah, the Ghanaian former IBM millionaire-turned-educationist, and Fred Swaniker, the founder and CEO of the African Leadership Academy, are trying to answer. It is one that I think about often too, especially in the context of sparking economic opportunities, specifically for our burgeoning …
When I was 18 years old, full of ambition, zeal and energy, I graduated from high school in Kampala, Uganda, with good grades and a great command of the English language. With my gap year at hand, I combed the streets of Uganda’s capital, looking for a job. After being turned down several times for …
This past April, a survey of 300 women commuters on the Paris metro system found that every one of them experienced some form of sexual harassment or assault while travelling on the massive transport system. The High Council on Equality, the government agency that conducted the study, urged the French government to address this alarming …
It was Pope Francis that called youth unemployment one of “…the most serious of the evils that afflicts the world these days…” Many believe that extremist groups such as Boko Haram, Al Shabab and IS take advantage of unemployed youths who feel marginalised from the mainstream economy. It is this sense of disenfranchisement that makes …
What separates developed from less developed countries is not a gap in resources but a gap in knowledge, according to Joseph Stiglitz, the ex-President of the World Bank. It therefore follows that in order to bridge the gap between Africa and the developed world, we must embrace knowledge. We must embrace it whether ever we …