Written by Michael Thervil
One of the biggest panel topics that caught our eye here on day 4 of CERAWeek was the panel entitled “POWERING AFRICA”. Currently, this is a pivotal time for Africa as a continent. With the military leaders and Juntas of the Sahel Region of Africa not only kicking out the French and their military presence in their respective countries, but making a pivot towards the east: specifically, towards China and Russia in particular; Africa is without a shadow of a doubt is the next melting pot in terms of infrastructure and technology. But the question that’s being asked is: “what's the cost, who's going to pay for it, and why?”
This morning's empowering Africa panel consisted of Thomas Hardy, Acting Director of the U.S. Trade and Development Agency, Dele Kuti who is the Global Head of Energy and Infrastructure Group – Standard Bank Group, Silvia Macri, Moderator and Associate Director of S&P Global, and lastly, Akinwole Omoboriowo Chairman, Board of Directors – Genesis Energy Holdings. The one thing that all the panelists agreed on was how difficult it is to find investors that are willing to invest the desired amount of money that’s required to scale their energy businesses in Africa.
Even though Africa has nearly an abundant source of fossil fuels and other commodities that are ready to be capitalized on, the thing that Africa is lacking is a continent-wide integrated energy infrastructure that can provide both reliable and affordable electricity to all Africans regardless of the country that they reside in. When you look at Africa as a continent, there are many barriers that hinder this desired goal of not only African energy companies but all Africans as a whole. Those barriers are corruption, western influence and interference, and many African countries inability to choose the best strategic partners in the long run.
The barriers that we’ve highlighted here were not brought up during the discussion and it is our position that these obstacles were intentionally avoided to avoid having to address some of the common roots of Africa's problems when it comes to the continent-wide construction and distribution of energy across Africa. On both the surface and the core, finding investors that are willing to invest exceptionally heavy into Africa’s energy infrastructure is difficult to find. But that seems to be because investors know and understand the inherent instability of many of the governments that make up the African continent.
If it's not terrorist executing acts of terrorism, it’s the lack of intergovernmental communication between neighboring countries and collaboration, tribal infighting, and the purposely induced governmental fragmentation created by their past colonizers. In short, Africa as a continent is in utter disarray and has been so for many decades but is expected to get better over time. To date it was reported during the panel that over 600 million Africans don’t have access to electricity and its population is still growing.
Sitting in and listening to this panel, we were able to conclude that energy sustainability and the implementation of renewable energy is simply out of the question at this time for Africa as a whole. And the reason for that is because there is just way too much socio-economic devastation that has been done to and allowed to happen by Africans to Africa. This is not to write Africa off when it comes to the possibility of obtaining energy sustainability and the implementation of renewable energy in the long run. What we are saying is that Africa will have to do several things, and those things are as follows:
Stop relying on western powers to help them and turn towards China (for infrastructure) and Russia (for security)
Stop allowing foreign countries to exploit the continent and Africans for its/their natural resources
Understand and leverage their natural resources for strategic gains within the international community
Boost their levels of trade and manufacturing capabilities
Utilizing nuclear energy
Of course, there are more things that can be done but turning to any country in the Collective West without expecting to be exploited and left with the shitty end of the stick at some point is nothing short of being naive and stupid. These are some of the brutal truths that both African energy and governmental leaders are going to have to face if they wish to have stable and reliable energy and security for the African continent.
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