Economic integration vital for a better Africa - Manuel

"Economic integration - the idea that prosperity rests in part on institutions and markets that are shared across national borders - is far more than a technical economic construct," Minister Manuel said at the University of Namibia's gala dinner on Thursday, 20 September.

"It is not just about the industrial and trade ties that bind us together. It goes to the heart of what it means to be human, what it means to confront loneliness and despair, what it means to build a future that is better than the past."

It is up to Africa said the minister, to develop a response that addresses our needs and interests, as individual countries, as a region, and as Africans.

"We have to be able to connect the dots between our domestic agendas, the regional integration programme and events unfolding in China, Europe, the Americas and India," he said.

Minister Manuel told the academics and dignitaries that how well African states draws together their policy choices, the resources and "the form of our neighbourliness", would draw heavily on the continent's capacity to create, to transform, and to be greater than its suffering.

"We have a real chance to make a difference - this is not only due to the upswing in commodity prices, or because of better policy choices and improved governance, or because we recognise that greater integration of our economies hold long-term benefit.

"Sustainable outcomes that lead to the future we desire is dependent on all of the above, and many more."

Africans, said Minister Manuel, have been confronted with choices and challenges before.

"Globalisation has been around for a very long time - Jim Wolfensohn, former President of The World Bank said, 'Globalisation in the sense of the world becoming smaller has been going on, since Adam and Eve.' And so, too, there is a long history of African responses to external opportunities."

Manuel explained that the continent shares the enormous privilege of building better regional institutions in a context of comparatively favourable international opportunities.

Whether these opportunities turn out to be a blessing or a curse depends on us, he said, and highlighted specific areas such as: what priorities we set, how we work together, how we manage our budgets and spending programmes, how we encourage investment and job creation.

It took the European Union 50 years to achieve what they currently have, he explained, adding that this is a luxury Africa does not have.

"And so it is right that Ben Okri should remind us of our capacity to create, to overcome, to endure, to transform," said Minister Manuel.

"And if it helps sometimes to think in terms of a competition between nations, even as we search for better ways of working together, the recent passion displayed by the Namibian rugby team in a titanic battle with the Irish is surely a sign that astonishing things can come from the south."

Article published courtesy of BuaNews