A former Minister of Education, Mrs Obiageli ‘Oby’ Ezekwesili, has called for a new set of African leaders with big ideas to be trained to catch up and compete with their counterparts around the globe.
Ezekwesili stated this at an event organised by the School of Politics, Policy, and Governance (SPPG) in conjunction with Big Ideas Platform themed ‘Information Technology and Behavioural Change’ which was held at the Shehu Musa Yar’Adua Centre, Abuja during the weekend.
She said since technology is very key to transforming, changing things, and unlocking society, big ideas with behavioural change driven by women and young people will be the game changers for Africa continent.
Ezekwesili, who is the founder of the SPPG, said it is high time those at the helm of affairs in Africa understood the importance of governance backed by technology to transform the continent as well as advance its progress in the world. She said that SPPG is set up to train different sets of leaders with character competence and capacity with behaviour as the key component.
“It is the rate of the dearth of ideas that distinguishes one country from the other, one continent from the other. It is the fact that we are not persistent in nurturing ideas to fruition. We (SPPG) are determined not to allow this big idea to die. We are on the journey to ensure that the big idea will give resultant transformation in our continent, especially on a day that we celebrate Africa Day.
“There is an Agenda Africa 2060 in place which will not amount to anything if we don’t generate big ideas. That is why it gives me so much joy that our topic this year is focused on one of the key things that I consistently say will determine whether our continent claims the 21st Century. There are three things. I often say it is the women, the young people, and technology. These are the drivers, these are the game changers for our continent. And this year, we are focused on technology and behavioural change.
“One thing about technology is its very incredible exponential capacity to transform, to change things. The dynamism of the efficiency that technology unlocks for society is only possible for the people who are ready to behaviourally change and this is the greatest difficulty that we have. The failure of governance on our continent is the death knell of ideas which is why what we have seen among the children has shown that we are not a continent destined for failure.
“The failure of governance is actually in the realm of behavioural change, it is the challenges that we failed to tackle that have kept us stuck in a low equilibrium performance whereas other continents understand how to quickly use knowledge and ideas to advance their progress. We stay stuck in the low-intensity realm of what is possible.
“We are not a forum for talk we are a forum for talk and do. This (SPPG) is where unconventional people are trained to become a different set of leaders with character, competence, and capacity because, after all in the world of Artificial Intelligence (AI), the most important thing ultimately is your behaviour,” she stated.
The CEO SPPG, Alero Ayida-Otobo, said it is time for Africa to raise new political class that will tackle ‘wicked problems’ headlong and put the continent on the same pedestal as other continents around the world which she said the School is already doing.
“SPPG is an unconventional school designed to attract, train, and support a new genre of ethical and effective leaders for our country and continent who will disrupt the endemic problem of poor governance and effectively govern 21st Century Nigeria and Africa more broadly.
“The empirical rationale for the establishment of the SPPG is to build a new model and pipeline of public leadership that can reverse Africa’s acute governance failure. SPPG produces leaders who not only possess the right values but also have the knowledge and skills required to solve complex public problems,” she said.
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