Business hurt by terrorism in Africa

Terrorism ranked high among Africa’s business challenges, along with everyday regulatory and infrastructure shortcomings, a Cape Town summit on the continent’s economy heard this week.

Donald Kaberuka, a Rwandan economist and former head of the African Development Bank, told a gathering of investors and business and government leaders from across the world that fighting continental terrorism needed global support.

Referring to rebel groups and religious extremists, Kaberuka said “well-armed nonstate actors [are] destabilising African economies”.

“Africa is at war with nonstate actors who want to take the continent … it’s not Africa’s war. It’s a global problem. We need to work together,” he said.

At a business dinner on Tuesday, Kaberuka shared his views with delegates at the one-day Bloomberg Africa Business and Economic Summit at the Westin Hotel in Cape Town.

The summit took place yesterday and was organised to “foster meaningful discussion and debate about the opportunities and challenges for investment and growth in Africa, for both foreign investors and African companies”.

Kaberuka, who works with the African Union’s Peace Fund, switched between optimism and realism. He said that 25 years ago, businesses were concerned about nationalisation of the African economy, but now the business risks were multifold.

This included whether Africa’s independent regulators were “independent in law and fact” as well as trying to do business “where there’s no electricity or infrastructure”.

Kaberuka said China’s economic slowdown meant African countries needed to think how “we make our countries ready to attract investors from China”.

He also said it was a “misleading” story that China was a new colonial power in Africa which, in some quarters, seems to be a “standard narrative”. – ANA