Lee Kuan Yew
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This man is absolutely brilliant. If you want to know what Africa needs to do to pull itself out of the glut of poverty, you’ve got to listen to Lee Kuan Yew. Why? Kenya and Singapore were at the same level economically at independence, but Singapore left us behind because they had Yew at the helm.
If you haven’t already, read his book (“From Third world to First”) — He outlines exactly how Singapore did it. He also mentions Africa in the video below (and in the book) and he says that traveling through Africa (& other countries) showed him what didn’t work! ouch!
There’s a man that’s doing the same thing in Africa – albeit rather quietly – president Paul Kagame in Rwanda. He’s gotten the country wired up on broadband, appointed cabinet members with relevant private sector experience into his government, speaks his mind, is action oriented and most importantly always ready to learn. He parallels Lee Kwan Yew in that in both cases, the people were asked to sacrifice their democratic rights for the expediency of a benevolent dictatorship…funny fact about Singapore – you cannot buy or chew gum in the country – Lee passed an act outlawing chewing gum after it was discovered that it increased the cost of cleaning the streets.
Surambaya
That is an interesting point you make. I believe Singapore has now relaxed it’s non-chewing gum laws and is also in the process of relaxing other draconian laws (the population is becoming more urban and more sophisticated and the laws are changing accordingly)
It’ll be interesting to see where Rwanda ends up 30 years from now. I don’t think they’ll be at kenya’s level, but that all depends on who succeeds Kibaki in 2012. 2012 will be the big transforming election for Kenya.
Kagame is aggressively tiding up the mess and putting in order what needs to be done so as to elevate Rwanda to the next level in development. With very limited natural resources and the history of genocide in their backyard the country deserves accolade for their efforts. Kagame is a man of action and not just thought.
I know that Rwanda’s literacy rate is quite low (I believe 80% of the population is illiterate)
So, how much can kagame do with a population that is not literate? even with the best intentions, doesn’t that limit his options?
or is he going to rely on more highly trained expatriates from countries like Kenya?
Somehow I feel that 80% illiteracy rate is grossly inflated. I thought the entire raison d’etre for the genocide was the fact that Tutsis were so urbane in the educational and economic spheres compared to their counterparts. The Belgiums spent a lot of time and money ‘civilizing’ them. I know they’re a minority, but even by the law of ratios, 20% cannot be the educated core of the population.
Anyway, all that seems to be irrelevant when you take in to account developments such as these:
http://www.africa-interactive......ageID=3992
I doubt corporations such as Cisco Systems would be making these kind of investments just for the ‘feel good factor.’ Similar to Google’s strategy on the continent. These guys see what’s happening with 3G technology on the continent and they’re trying to get ahead of the curve.
Sijui
The question is how much money cisco is investing in Rwanda. I’m sure it’s a pittance compared to what they’re investing in India.
There is a movement by technology companies to help Africa – I like to call them “pity investments” – I guess it’s better than nothing and I guess technology can help to bridge the gap of widespread poverty, but without a literate populace, the real investment money will not flow.
The Rwandese have a large expatriate community that had been leaving the country for years, prior to the genocide – they’d mainly been going to french speaking former colonies like France and Belgium. I assume some are now moving back and the literacy rate may change, but not by much. The vast majority of Rwandese IN Rwanda just don’t have the skill set.
Is Kagame really doing the same thing? And what is this silly obsession with benevolent dictatorships? It is about morals and intelligence.
Hitler was a pretty successful benevolent dictator until he started killing people.
The problem with Kenya is that we keep electing people who have an interest in keeping things as they are. Why would Kibaki, Raila, Musalia, Uhuru want things to change? How did they get so rich in the first place?
We lack a national conscience. No one cares about anyone else. This spirit is what has animated every single country that has transformed itself, Ireland, the Baltic republics, China, India. Meanwhile the Anglo-Saxon animals believe in poverty, America has existed throughout its history by stepping on others, both at home and abroad.
KE,
I find that argument defeatist and myopic. Of course Cisco will not invest the same kind of $$$ in Rwanda that it is investing in India, assuming they are working on a purely ROI perspective, India guarantees the higher returns right now, but there is also no opportunity cost lost in investing a pittance in Rwanda where this is potential especially if facts on the ground support a viable market.
In terms of ‘pity investments’, I doubt the Ciscos of this world are thumbing their noses at the fastest growing wireless telecommunications market in the world. What is happening in Rwanda is a perfect example, Kagame has every intention of connecting every part of Rwanda, they have already made tangible investments in terms of infrastructure rollout with every last penny they can get from their coffers, the Chinese, aid, their Diaspora and what have you. For Cisco, the business opportunities inherent in providing the networking platform, support services etc are inescapable and if Cisco doesn’t get their business, the Chinese or the Indians or the Malysians will. So whether their ‘pity investment’ is $ 1million compared to $ 100 billion in India is irrelevant, the point is they’re exploiting a business opportunity that can be immensely profitable and if the Rwandans remain serious, this pity investment can be a catalyst for billion dollar investments in 15 or 20 years. Cisco is learning fast from the Chinese example, build the infrastructure for a song and couch it as ‘development assistance’ and then control the commercial aspects of the infrastructure use. Now you tell me, what is more profitable?
Same way, the Verizons of this world are belatedly waking up to the fact that those mobile telecommunications companies that set up shop in Africa in the late 90s and early 2000s have realized an almost 1000% ROI. Verizon is now bidding for Telkom Kenya. Bottom line, poverty is profit and it is extremely myopic to be unable to look past the challenges of underdevelopment especially when every day people continue to make a mint by harnessing its potential. Your recent post is dead on, our problem has always been wealth accumulation through kleptocracy rather than innovation and creativity………..BUT that tide is changing. Ask the Safaricoms of this world who are immensely rich because of using poverty to their advantage by offering a service that is ‘complementary’ to it.
Bottomline, Kudos to Kagame, KiKwete and other ‘basket case’ leaders who are milking the poverty is opportunity well dry, and the entrepreneurs riding on those coat tails all the way to the bank.
P.S. This issue of ‘literacy’ levels is also a chicken and egg analogy. Definitely you need a critical mass of an educated populace but you also need to walk and chew gum as the Indians, Chinese have proven. If there is one positive contribution the Chinese have brought to Africa, is this constant drumbeat of INFRASTRUCTURE, INFRASTRUCTURE, INFRASTRUCTURE. When you look at India and China now, at most 40% of their populations have tertiary literacy, yet their infrastructure investments are comparable to the developed world with perhaps twice the literacy levels. Definitely Rwanda must accelerate its literacy, but it must accelerate its infrastructure investment thrice as fast if it is to derive any benefit from an educated population.
Sijui:
I’ve been seeing a lot of news stories about technology companies in America doing all sorts of projects in Africa and 99% of the time, they talk about using technology to alleviate extreme poverty. Okay. I applaud their charity, but if the requisite investments from African governments don’t take place, that technology will only go so far. However, I guess something is better than nothing. Let them take pity on us. We need everything we can get.
I am not familiar with China’s educational stats, but India is interesting. Can I bore you with a discussion of India’s modern political history? Let me bore you.
At independence, India, under Nehru decided to become a non-aligned nation, which meant that it would not get support from either America or the USSR during the cold war.
This decision by Nehru (to remain non-aligned) meant that India was cut-off from foreign aid subsidies from America & from the USSR. Remember, this is the biggest mistake Africa made (we took sides and became dependent on those foreign aid subsidies)
This decision by Nehru meant that India had to become self-sufficient and learn how to fend for itself. So, Nehru set up all these ITT”s as a way to train Indians to make everything for themselves (cars, factory equipment, etc, etc).
Nehru also closed the economy and no imports were allowed into India until 1991 when they decided to open up the economy. Now, when the economy finally opened up, all these Indians, who had been trained at these ITT’s and who had learnt how to fend for themselves, were waiting there with all their intellectual talent. Naturally, western companies recognized this enormous, cheap, English speaking talent and started to move operations there.
Rwanda can set up all sorts of sophisticated infrastructure, but in the short-term, they are going to have to IMPORT talented workers from places like Kenya or encourage educated Rwandese expatriates to move back. I don’t see how else they can do it.
KE,
A few clarifications, definitely there are US technology firms doing stuff in Africa but in pales in comparison to what the Chinese, Arabs, Malays and Indians are doing. Part of that is because US companies do not understand the long tail market model as applied for the African marketplace hence they are flatfooted in this domain. Like I said earlier Cisco and Google are doing ‘charity works’ only to catch up on their market intelligence. That’s perfectly reasonable and definitely we should take charity of their kind in any way shape or form. But they are here because of market share considerations. Bill Gates confides now that he rues the day when he made the comment that ‘Microsoft sees no opportunity in Africa until they get a handle on the war, poverty disease et al’, he was proven wrong that technology cannot be adapted for a mass market in Africa and be extremely profitable. Now you see Microsoft cutting deals left and right especially under the guise of literacy programs for schools, same strategy.
Rwanda, again you’re making the mistake of statism. Kigali is developing what it hopes will be a worldclass ICT institute (fashioned after what the Indians did) that will attract the best and brightest brains in Africa, incubate talented Rwandans at home and attract their Diasporans. As it is now, Kigali is already becoming a magnet for investment in the region based on the correct perception of their relative competitiveness. Again, you’re assuming people like Kagame’s thinking is linear i.e. do step A then do step B and then try step C. Like I said, walk and chew gum.
http://www.ashdenawards.org/winners/kist05
Go figure! What a novel way to make good use of the genocide perpetrators……..like I said, folks are not sitting on their hands.