George Ayittey & BonoI had a wonderful conversation with George Ayittey last friday about the recent TED conference in Arusha, Tanzania. I have profound respect for George because he is a old-school pragmatic thinker. Dr. Ayittey is trained as an Economist, but he doesn't talk like most Economists who talk about Africa such as Jeffrey Sachs or others.
During our 30 minute conversation about the TED conference, George asked, "so Nii how do we get you TED Cheetah's to contribute to African development"? I thought about it for a second and said, "I would be nice if TED sponsored fellows to their respective countries to use their professional work experience to help a business for a month or so. I heard a pause, and George said, "well that is nice, but what about a fund, called a Cheetah Fund that is sustainable was set-up to help TED fellows or other African Cheetahs with funding for their respective businesses".
Wow, I said to myself, how come I didn't think about this before. African chiefs have been using this system for centuries before colonialism, we just have to go back to some of our indigenous roots. George mentioned that the fund would be sustainable by having the Cheetah's repay the fund the amount giving to him or her, this way the fund would be sustainable.
In Africa, before there was European colonialism, African tribes taxed each other to fund small-scale businesses. If a business would fail that tribe would pull it's resources together to help that particular business. African countries had these types of systems in place years before any Wall Street Hedge Fund, or a Silicon Valley venture capitalist like, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB) were around.
We as Africans have to be progressive with our future and start addressing African opportunities. This Cheetah Fund is a good start to address African opportunities.
During our 30 minute conversation about the TED conference, George asked, "so Nii how do we get you TED Cheetah's to contribute to African development"? I thought about it for a second and said, "I would be nice if TED sponsored fellows to their respective countries to use their professional work experience to help a business for a month or so. I heard a pause, and George said, "well that is nice, but what about a fund, called a Cheetah Fund that is sustainable was set-up to help TED fellows or other African Cheetahs with funding for their respective businesses".
Wow, I said to myself, how come I didn't think about this before. African chiefs have been using this system for centuries before colonialism, we just have to go back to some of our indigenous roots. George mentioned that the fund would be sustainable by having the Cheetah's repay the fund the amount giving to him or her, this way the fund would be sustainable.
In Africa, before there was European colonialism, African tribes taxed each other to fund small-scale businesses. If a business would fail that tribe would pull it's resources together to help that particular business. African countries had these types of systems in place years before any Wall Street Hedge Fund, or a Silicon Valley venture capitalist like, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB) were around.
We as Africans have to be progressive with our future and start addressing African opportunities. This Cheetah Fund is a good start to address African opportunities.
George Ayittey is a hero who does not get enough attention in my opinion.
ReplyDeleteI was fortunate enough to meet him at the Cato Institute a few years back.
Thank you for mentioning him in this post.
I do think that many parts of the world should look to their own cultural pasts to solve many of their problems today. It is a better option than continuing to look to the European-style nation states imposed on them for salvation.