Africa needs new financing models to bridge development gaps-Osinbajo
 

 

ACTING President Yemi Osinbajo, has advocated a new paradigm in financing infrastructure projects in Africa in order to close the huge infrastructure gap in the continent.
He stated this at a forum to mark Africa Finance Corporation’s 10th anniversary in Abuja.
According to him, the idea of a public- private development finance institution, wholly African from scratch, not born of the will and wishes of the other international multilateral Development Financing Institutions (DFIs) but of the will of African nations, African leaders and institutions, surely seemed a little far-fetched barely a decade ago.
He said, the story of AFC is the story of a core of solid African professionals whose courage and faith in leaving the safety and certainty of institutions where they had established firm reputations for the unknown world of the start-up multilateral DFI has formed an ethos that today defines the corporation. An ethos that has quickly built up such trust and confidence that has in these few years initiated, led participated in, and offered project finance and management services to some of the most significant infrastructure projects in Africa, he stated.
“Today the owners of the largest taxi fleet in the world own no cars and have no permanent drivers, the largest real estate agency in the world actually also owns no real estate of note and their clients both landlords and tenants sign up to their company. So technology, its accelerative power, and the capacity to disrupt established business, thought and even creative value chains will clearly stretch all our theories and assumptions on financing and management. But if we begin with the known even in this unknown it might help.”
Investments in broadband infrastructure, for example, is crucial. Broadband infrastructure has now won its place as the new utility alongside electricity, transportation, telecoms, and water supply. And it is bound to affect and indeed is already defining how every one of these other utilities work and will work in the coming years.”
He noted that AFC’s support for the MAIN ONE cable project is one of those farsighted initiatives that these times will require.
“It is important to mention also how in the past most nations, especially African countries were able to pay up for infrastructure projects in one way or the other. But that sovereign risk environment is changing quickly. Governments had always in the past been the largest contributor to infrastructure even when payments were always never really smooth, but they were able to offer sovereign guarantees or cash support.”
He however commended AFC for the excellent work they have done in the past ten years and especially the leadership of Andrew Alli, Olusegun Akin-Olugbade and all of the great professionals who have come together to make that institution what it is today.