CEO Blog #21 – Nurturing the Next Generation of African Leadership

I always try to make time in my professional and personal life to engage with young people. I relish the opportunity not just to impart the benefit of my experiences, but more importantly, to learn from and encourage them. I am blessed at The Africa Centre to have our dynamic Young Africa Centre, which has recently expanded its membership and is in the process of instituting a new organisational substructure, which will be immensely impactful in its ambitions. Watch the space for more information on the great work that they are planning.

It is unfortunate that across Africa, despite having the largest number of young people in the world, positions of authority and national leadership continue to be held by geriatric bed-blockers. This despite the fact that many of the extant leaders assumed their first steps in leadership at what now seems to be ridiculously young ages. In the 1950s and 1960s, Africa’s independence movements were led by young visionaries:

  • Kwame Nkrumah was just 47 when he became Ghana’s first president.
  • Patrice Lumumba was only 35 when he led the Democratic Republic of Congo to independence.
  • Julius Nyerere was 39 when he became Tanzania’s first leader.
  • Yakubu Gowon was 32 when he became Nigeria’s Head of State and steered the country through the Civil War of 1967 – 70.

We should also remember that Martin Luther King Jr and Malcolm X died at the age of 39, Steve Biko died at 30, all having started their journeys in public service about a decade before their murders. These were not seasoned politicians, but young revolutionaries, thinkers and strategists who refused to accept colonial rule and instead built nations from the ground up.

It is humbling to note that several of these heroes of African liberation, had they been alive today, would have qualified by age to be members of our Young Africa Centre.

In 1960, the average age of African leaders was around 40. In 2025, the average age of African leaders is over 64 years old. Recently, we have heard several octogenarian African heads of state express their intention to run for office again, despite having already spent decades in power.

At a recent address to a group of postgraduate students, I reiterated how important it was for them to recognise the legacy of youth leadership activism that they are now custodians of, and run with the responsibility. I urged them to be agents of decolonisation so they can help to reshape some of the externally imposed and internally reinforced social, economic and political structures that hold Africa back.

While experience is valuable, Africa’s youthful population, where the median age is just 19 years old, needs leadership that reflects its energy, innovation and forward-thinking mindset. We also need young people with heightened values and a strong sense of African self-worth.

A key truth that our young people need to understand and own is that despite the challenges that we are all negotiating, no generation has ever been better equipped to lead than them. We now have a critical mass of young people who have knowledge, skillset and access to resources that were unfathomable to people one or two generations back. Unlike those previous generations, our young people are digitally fluent, globally connected and are armed with tools that accelerate progress like never before. They are able to mobilize movements in minutes and innovate beyond borders.

Through initiatives like the Young Africa Centre, we are nurturing a generation that will be equipped to write the future on their own terms. We should all be championing our youth as the superpower that will yet yield us the Africa we deserve: an Africa that will be a thriving, innovative, self-confident, dynamic, transforming and transformative continent.

Wakanda Forever!

 

Black History Month Warning

As October fast approaches, we have started to get the usual approaches from corporate bodies from all sectors requesting for assistance to help them ‘celebrate’ Black History Month. May I make a respectful request to any such organisations contemplating approaching not just The Africa Centre, but indeed any other Black-led organisation: if you have no budget for delivery, please don’t ask us to do it for free.

Almost all cultural agencies or community groups are charities, most of whom are struggling to make ends meet. The artists that you want to entertain you need to earn too. The historians that you want to deliver an inspirational message has a mortgage to pay and children to feed. And let’s be real – if your organisation cannot set aside a small budget for something that matters so much to a cross-section of its staff or clientele, you really should be asking the question of how seriously they are taking you.

 

Solidarity with African Activists

It is with sadness that we see so many artists being persecuted across the continent for using their craft to speak truth to power and seek a better life for their fellow citizens. In Togo, we see rapper Aamron. In Tanzania, gospel singers Sifa Bujune, Salome Mwampeta, and Hezekiel Millyashi, as well as Shadrack Chaula. In Kenya, Khaligraph Jones and Arrow Bwoy. In South Sudan, Manasseh Mathiang. We salute you all.

We know that there are hundreds of others, from filmmakers to musicians, who are in these positions of dread and continue to face significant threats to their wellbeing. Stay strong. Yet still, we rise.

 

My cultural highlights of the month:

·       ‘54-60’, the beautiful ode to Africa at Arcola Theatre, London, written and directed by Femi Elufowoju Jr.

·       Bien at The Africa Centre – Kenyan superstar Bien held a listening party for his new album. Bien appeared as part of our ongoing UK-Kenya Season.

Have a wonderful summer!

Peace, Love and Light!

Olu Alake

CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER

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