What Is Wrong With Us: A continent cannot be built forever in the future tense

Source: MyJoyOnline · 2026-10-28T09:10:11.000Z · Business

Africa's more than 1.5 billion people have heard every promise a podium can produce. They have been promised industrialisation, jobs, affordable housing, reliable electricity, good schools and modern hospitals at election rallies, inaugurations, investment forums and continental summits. Some of those promises were kept, and others produced real if incomplete progress, but far too many remain suspended somewhere between an eloquent speech and a disappointing site visit. Meanwhile, the mother still walks for water, the graduate still searches for work, the entrepreneur still borrows at punishing rates, and the farmer still watches harvests rot for want of storage and roads. And then, another conference is announced, another declaration is drafted, another photograph is taken, and another round of applause fills the hall. NyansaKasa (Words of Wisdom) offers a gentle rebuke: "A promise may inspire hope, but only action improves lives, for no hungry child has ever been fed by a beautifully written development agenda." The problem is not that Africa plans too much, since planning is essential, but that announcing intentions has quietly become more rewarding, politically and commercially, than delivering outcomes.

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