Africa needs transformational leadership

2 Feb 2017

Seychelles President Danny Faure has called on his African peers to embrace a new form of leadership, one that is suited to take the continent into the next phase of its development.

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The President was speaking at the Retreat of Heads of States and Government held on January 29, 2017, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The meeting preceded the 28th African Union (AU) Summit that opens today at the AU headquarters. It was convened to discuss the recommendations of the Report for Institutional Reforms of the African Union under the chairmanship of President Paul Kagame of Rwanda.

President Faure reminded the meeting that the findings of the study was a wakeup call that challenges our comfort zone to which we have for so long been accustomed to.

“We cannot continue to adopt resolutions that to date total more than 1,500 without having any indication as to how much we have actually implemented,” said the Seychelles President before going on to talk about the funding of the Union, whose budget remains, until 2016, heavily dependent on donor funding.

“The working methods, duplications of structures, payment of contributions, the need to focus on key priorities are all challenges raised in the report that as a body, we have to address with determination and purpose,” Faure remarked.

It was at this juncture that President Faure, who is at his first appearance at an AU meeting in his capacity as Head of State, pointed out the need for a new form of leadership.

“We need a transformational leadership as we cannot continue to dwell in the paradox of the past,” he said as he drew attention to the need to look at the sequencing of the Report as a way to usher Africa to the level where we can proudly call this continent the Africa we have wanted… the “legacy that we bequeath to our children and children’s children”.