Yola and Jimeta are the twin metros that form the state capital of northeastern Nigeria’s Adamawa State. They are tense places of high temperatures, military checkpoints and curfew.
It was late at night on June 4 when shoppers were milling around a small market opposite the Jimeta Modern Market. It was just after 7:30PM, and the walled, open-air market was closing for the day.  Suddenly, a fight broke out. When customers and traders drew nearer to take a look, two bombs went off killing 37 people. The fight was staged by a suicide bomber.
“There were body parts lying all over the stalls, and parts of the street,” says Shareef Al Hasan, a reporter with TV Gotel who arrived minutes after the blast.
For many of the survivors, the unthinkable had happened; Boko Haram had struck at the heart of the Adamawa State capital.
The area has been relatively peaceful for more than a year, and seen thousands of refugees from Mubi, Madagali, Michika swell homes and camps. Some families sheltered up to 100 relatives, friends and strangers in their homes. They were fed by the people of Yola and Jimeta. The total number of displaced in Yola alone is estimated at 15,000.
In 2011 and 2012, attacks by Boko Haram in the town were common with gunmen shooting civilians from the back of motorcycles. The state government has since banned the okada, a two-wheeled transport popular in Nigeria.
Scores of people came to gawk at the scene, others fled. By 8PM, news of the bomb blast spread and panic gripped the city.
By the next morning, the area was cordoned off. I arrived at around 8:30AM to see for myself the destruction of the night before. The bodies were gone and the survivors taken to hospitals where they filled the wards. The dismembered head of the suicide bomber lay on the asphalt in a cardboard box.
The traditional leader, Barkindo Aliyu Mustapha, was among the first on the scene. He looked distressed, telling people to keep praying for peace and to be security conscious. The next to arrive was the commissioner of police in Adamawa State, Gabriel Adaji, with a call for information.
“Even if your suspicions are later proved baseless, we will thoroughly investigate every complaint,” he says.
The newly-elected governor, Jibrilla Bindo, announced a security cluster meeting with state security chiefs.
The incident comes at a time when pressure is mounting on President Muhammadu Buhari to fulfill a campaign promise of ridding Nigeria of insurgency. He announced the relocation of Nigeria’s military command center to Maiduguri, the capital of Borno State.
The move to bring troops closerwas applauded by Nigerians. For the residents of Yola and Jimeta, it cannot come soon enough.

The Bloody Market  Of Fear

The new controversial South African visa requirements have been labeled an economy killer and sparked widespread jitters in the tourism business.
Foreigners who want to visit South Africa must apply for visas in person at South African embassies to have their biometric data captured. Residents of countries who require a short-stay visa for South Africa and do not have a South African embassy in their country or city, will have to travel. Parents and guardians traveling with children, must be in possession of an unabridged birth certificate.
<div id="attachment_3789" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-3789" class="size-medium wp-image-3789" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/0000223010-300x196.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="196" />CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA &#8211; APRIL 28: Deputy Minister of Home Affairs, Fatima Chohan meets to discuss the recent xenophobic violence on April 28, 2015 in Cape Town, South Africa. The Portfolio Committee on Home Affairs hosted a meeting with Ministers of Home Affairs, Small Business Development as well as Police on the challenges of xenophobic violence and looting of foreign owned shops. (Photo by Gallo Images / Die Burger / Deon Raath)</div>
While the tourism industry cries foul, Deputy Minister of Home Affairs, Fatima Chohan, defended the new regulations. She argues that the migration laws have not been changed for 15 years and that the regulations are in line with international rules against child trafficking. An estimated 30,000 children are trafficked through South Africa each year, according to government.
“Research suggests that it will cost the South African economy 21,000 jobs and around R10 billion ($809 million). By the end of 2014‚ the number of visitors from China and Brazil had dropped 70% and 62% from the year before‚” says Beverley Schäfer‚ the spokesperson on Economic Opportunities‚ Tourism &amp; Agriculture from the opposition party, the Democratic Alliance.
South Africa began implementing new immigration regulations in May 2014. From May to December, South Africa lost 66,000 foreign tourists due to changes in the immigration regulations.
The Association of Southern African Travel Agents (ASATA) has estimated the new rules will hit 15% of tourists.
“In 2014, South Africa received 9.55 million foreign overnight tourists, an increase of 7,5 percent over that recorded in 2013. Demand from all overseas markets steadily dissipated throughout the year, coming off highs of 8,6 percent in the first four months of the year to a decline of 1,2 percent in the last four months. Assuming a 20 percent drop in demand from the family market will result in a direct, indirect and induced loss to the South African economy of at least R10 billion ($809 million) per annum and potential job losses of around 24,000,” says ASATA.
The damage to the South African economy so far is R2.6 billion ($210 million) and a threat to more than 5,800 jobs, it says. In the future, ASATA warns of the loss of 100,000 tourists with R1.4 billion ($113 million). This translates to a net loss to the GDP of around R4.1 billion ($331 million) and 9,300 jobs.
Despite South Africa’s economy facing another hit, the hospitality sector is poised for further growth in the next five years in the wake of a number of inbound travelers into the African continent, according to a report issued by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) in June. The hotel industry in 2014 benefited from an increase in foreign visitors and rising room rates. The new visa regulations, could scupper this.
“Many in the industry fear that international tourists will not consider South Africa as a destination, which already has a number of issues and concerns despite being a cheap destination. International visitors especially those from India or China or those traveling with families may chose a destination where entry requirements are less onerous,” says Nikki Forster, a director and partner at PwC.
South Africa’s Minister of Tourism, Derek Hanekom, admits tourism has been hit. At the World Economic Forum on Africa he hinted that there would be a review.
“The current requirements [are] up for discussion right now as we speak, so it is not engraved in stone… We are in very intense discussions on this and I think we will find each other and find the right balance between legitimate defending, legitimate interests of the state and defending your national security interests and not putting unnecessary requirements on people wanting to travel to South Africa,” he said.
The Department of Tourism has since stated there will not be a review, but that talks about implementation will continue. The ministerial cabinet has resolved to set up a team of ministers to discuss and engage with any concerns to address the unintended consequences of the regulations.
With reports that Air China has cancelled the launch of direct flights to South Africa over the regulations, many of the continent’s finest resorts fear the threat of too much room at the inn.

The $809-Million  Question

It was the dual meaning of a few words that tripped off the tongue of the Somaliland foreign minister as he talked about the economic future of Africa that turned my blood cold.
“Africa shouldn’t miss the boat,” says Mohamed B Yonis.
The stark image that stabbed into my mind was that of Africans risking their lives on leaky boats crossing the Mediterranean in the desperate hope of a new life in Europe – a journey that has taken 2,000 lives this year. A new life? The odds are against it; even the survivors are likely to end up as sweated labour at best; trafficked labor at worst.
I was even more upset to see a magazine at the conference with a survey suggesting a large number of Africans say they would risk the tricky crossing of the Mediterranean even if it cost them their lives; a sad statistic close to the weeping heart of Africa.
A sobering thought amid the gathering of the rich and powerful in Cape Town where there were many signs of light and growth in Africa. Among the 1,200 delegates were investment fund managers from across the world.
“We like what we see and are here to invest,” says one partner of a $68-billion New York investment fund.
Infrastructure is likely to be the big business of the future; in the past, the World Bank estimated Africa needs at least $93 billion a year spent in infrastructure. Those in the know in Cape Town say this is barely enough to touch the sides of the infrastructure gap.
Former head of South African intelligence, Moe Shaik, has been doing his bit with the pan-African investment operation he is running for the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA). Shaik says he gathered $404 million (R5 billion) in investments into everything from roads to oil and gas pipelines in the last year. Shaik also says the DBSA contributed $150 million in raising $750 million for a sovereign wealth fund in Angola that will be used to build roads and infrastructure as well as making plans for a new coal fired power station at Mamba, near the Zambezi River, in southern Zambia. He believes state coffers can no longer afford infrastructure.
“Government needs to create an environment where capital can come in and build. But African governments also need to set up mechanisms where they can supervise infrastructure projects in their country so they can be done properly,” he says.
Patrice Motsepe, Africa’s 14th richest man, worth an estimated $2.3 billion according to FORBES, agrees.
“I have always emphasized that we need to bring the private sector in and that the partnership be a partnership between the government, the investment communities, both local and international, and that always gives me comfort that these projects make sense, that they are sustainable,” he says. “The environment has been put in place and we are making progress in Africa in comparison with various other investment countries.”
The head of state in the host country, South Africa, believes the continent is well on the way.
“There is the issue of infrastructure, all types of infrastructure that is actually changing the face and the landscape of the continent. This is what we are attracting. Those huge sums of money; we were therefore discussing the financing of these projects, how ready the projects are; some of the projects have been presented and are now ready to be financed and there is an interest of all financing institutions both locally and internationally,” says President Jacob Zuma.
With the optimism in Cape Town came caution. There are still doubts about political stability and corruption. Now, I have heard corruption compared to many things down the years, but never to crocodiles in the Kenyan bush.
“You know, when wildebeest migrate north to greener pastures in the Masai Mara game reserve, the crocodiles lie in wait for them in the rivers. So the wildebeest have to know where to cross otherwise they are going to lose a leg. The crocodiles are corruption,” says Bharat Thakrar, the head of East African advertising giant, Scangroup.
“It used to be limited to the police and small government offices, but now corruption is creeping into private business in Africa.”
Blair Glencorse, is fighting corruption with his NGO Accountability Lab in Liberia and was at WEF Africa.
“Where there needs to be enforcement, the key issue is to make sure it is part of a larger strategy to build transparency, open up information and build channels of exchange between citizens and governments – so it is not politicized. There are countries of Africa which are making some progress along these lines like Botswana and Ghana,” he says.
Hope and crocodiles collide; Africa has its work cut out before WEF Africa in Rwanda next year.
<h4>The Fresh Face of $2 Billion</h4>
Africa is changing fast and has a fresh face. Ten years ago, it would have been unthinkable; 20 years ago, unimaginable in an often patriarchal Africa. One of the freshest, not to mention powerful, faces at the World Economic Forum (WEF) on Africa in Cape Town runs $2 billion in investment at the age of 38.
Ngugi Kiuna grew up in Nakuru in western Kenya, the son of a managing director of a company selling tractors and a mother who sold animal feed. He went to boarding school in England and studied chemical engineering at Imperial College, London, before earning a PhD in composite structures of aerospace applications.
In August 2013, Kiuna became the head of investment banking for Africa at Rand Merchant Bank. He runs $2 billion in assets in Nigeria, Kenya, Namibia, Ghana, Lesotho, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia Angola and Botswana.
“Most of the countries we deal with are single B rated by the risk people. We also do a lot of work with private entities. The sovereign element is there and if you have it there is less of a risk. The sweet spot for us is three- to five-year investments. Off our own balance sheet, we can do longer, with the support of development finance, up to 10 years,” he says.
It means Kiuna oversees the financing of aircraft for Air Namibia, the building of roads in Angola and investment in locomotives in Mozambique. It is investing in Cenpower – a new 300MW gas power plant – in Ghana. In Kenya, it has helped tie up a deal, this year, to plough $350 million into a new 450-kilometer oil pipeline between Mombasa and Nairobi. It will take over from the old pipeline that’s been pumping oil since the 1960s.
Most of the people Kiuna meets, in his extensive travels across the continent, are old enough to be his father.
“I was with the minister of finance in Gabon, we were talking about the government infrastructure plan and strategy about borrowing, you could see all along there was something in his mind he wasn’t comfortable with. I said ‘minister, I know I look too young…’ He burst out laughing. I said I am not as young as I look, it broke the ice. After that, the nature of the conversation changed,” he says.
“I think people are generally embracing but obviously some are surprised by how young I am, but people are much more open minded to the younger generation. I think it is also a function of the technology age, you have younger people becoming billionaires these days.”
At WEF in Cape Town, Kiuna rubbed shoulders with many others with billions to invest.
“We saw there is continued buzz and interest in Africa; a lot of new people, new faces and new companies ready to invest. There is also a lot more intra-Africa dialogue; people talking about projects, people collaborating on projects. The amount of trade in Africa is nowhere near what it should be. Thirdly, power in Africa, we need to get that right and let’s hope we can. There have been power projects too big and too complicated to execute. So, we need to scale down projects to a size where it’s easier to be financed and done.”
His greatest fear for Africa?
“Political stability and transparency; these are all matters we have to get right… The biggest fear is around transparency around elections cycles in Africa. The recent elections in Nigeria, Kenya, Zambia and Namibia show we are getting there.”
“Wherever I travel on the continent, I am always inspired by the number of people who have started their own business. I dedicate what I do to them.”
Words wise beyond their years.
&nbsp;

Crocodiles,  Money And Hope

It is a cold Saturday morning in Soweto, a township in south west Johannesburg. A short drive from where the World Cup final was played at Soccer City, three boys kick a soccer ball on its last life on a netball court in what used to be a fan park for the football tournament in South Africa in 2010. When World Cup fever grasped the country, these lads and hundreds of soccer fans, dressed in layers of clothes, gathered in this park to watch the games on a big public screen. The boys were all 10 years old then; they remember the camaraderie and piercing noise of the vuvuzelas.
But last year the screen was removed, leaving a gaping hole. A painting of a soccer ball on a lamppost is the only sign that the World Cup was once here.
It is exactly five years after the tournament came to Africa for the first time. It was the event that brought hope to the country, with promises to develop the sport and give business to local hospitality spots. People renovated their homes and let them out to tourists. But few are still in business. The promise of sustainable post World Cup business seems to have gone to the dogs. Several world class stadiums were built and upgraded to the tune of $1.1 billion. But today the majority of those stadiums are white elephants.
There was controversy around the tender processes to build these stadiums. Whistle blowers were murdered and several people went on trial. One prominent figure that was tried was Bobby Motaung, a Kaizer Chiefs manager and son of the club’s founder Kaizer Motaung. He was implicated in a tender saga for building the Mbombela Stadium, in Nelspruit, Mpumalanga province. Due to a lack of evidence, the case against Motaung was dropped in 2013.
A few weeks before the 5th anniversary of the World Cup in South Africa, it emerged that the country had paid $10 million to secure votes to win the bid for the event. This was never declared in public until the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) indictment emerged alleging the money was a bribe to Jack Warner, the former Fifa vice president. It also identifies two South Africans as “co-conspirators” but their names are withheld. The South African government denies there was a bribe. According to a letter written on March 4, 2008, by Local Organising Committee president, Molefi Oliphant, the money paid was a donation to the Diaspora Legacy Programme in the Caribbean.
A few days ahead of the FIFA annual meeting in Zurich on May 28, Swiss police arrested Warner and six other officials in the five-star Baur au Lac hotel. By the end of May, 14 people involved with Fifa were indicted in connection with wire fraud, racketeering and money laundering.
“[The South African Football Association] requests that the Diaspora Legacy Programme be administered and implemented directly by the president of Concacaf who shall act as a fiduciary of the fund,” it reads.
Warner, who was the president of Concacaf, and his co-accused are implicated in Fifa bribes that include awarding the World Cups in France in 1998 and South Africa in 2010. Chuck Blazer, a former Fifa official from the United States (US), has admitted to his involvement in these bribes after being implicated in the FBI investigation.
“How Warner took a $10-million bribe from South Africa in exchange for his vote is laid bare in six pages of a 164-page indictment made public in the US following the arrest of Fifa executives ahead of the corruption trial of the century,” says Ray Hartley, Editor At Large at the Times Media Group.
The South African Portfolio Committee on Sport and Recreation has called for the Minister of Sports and Recreation, Fikile Mbalula, to summon the former members of the Local Organising Committee before parliament.
“The allegations contained in the indictment are yet to be proven in a court of law. But, the evidence is mounting that South Africa bribed its way to hosting the World Cup,”
says Hartley.
He also says the former organizing committee members are not accountable to parliament, but to the minister.
“It is a bit paranoid to block them from publicly speaking about the allegations,” he says.
Dominic Chimhavi, the South African Football Association director of communications, says the allegations that South Africa paid a bribe to Warner are unfounded.
“They are baseless and untested and we request proof from anyone who has evidence to the contrary to come forward. Our bid campaign was run, by among others, late president Nelson Mandela and former President Thabo Mbeki and several government ministers, who are men of integrity,” says Chimhavi.
So, it appears the 2010 World Cup has vanished from Soweto but it is likely to be in the headlines and the FBI investigation for years to come.

The FBI Tackles Fifa

We called it. Nigeria, the African Development Bank’s (AfDB), biggest shareholder, finally landed the bank’s presidency at its fourth attempt.
Final figures showed Akinwumi Adesina, the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development in the administration of former president, Goodluck Jonathan, was backed by 58.01% of all shareholders, to defeat Chad’s finance minister, Kordje Bedoumra (34.48%), and Cape Verde’s finance minister, Cristina Duarte (2.87%).
Africa’s largest country, which holds 9.3% of the AfDB, almost double the total of the next two biggest African shareholders, had failed on three previous attempts to capture the presidency of the bank since its inception in 1964, scuttled by an unwritten rule that Africa’s biggest economies shouldn’t vie for big continental positions and the discomfort of smaller nations wary of domination and stronger candidates than its own.
“Today, I have been given a great responsibility,” said Adesina after beating seven other candidates that had contested one of the most open election processes for a global development finance institution that mirrors the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the Asian Development Bank.
“I will be a president for all. I will not let you down.”
In six rounds of voting, in Abidjan, the capital of CÔte d’Ivoire, spanning just over four hours, Nigeria’s alliances proved the more resilient. In the first round, Adesina was second with 26% of the overall vote, trailing Duarte who led by 29.5%, with the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC)-backed Thomas Sakala of Zimbabwe third, with 13.5%. Sierra Leone’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Samura Kamara, whose country holds 0.25%, was eliminated after receiving 0.3%. No figures were available for the latter rounds at the time of going to press.
Adesina takes over Africa’s only triple-A rated development finance institution, which last year increased project funding by 15% to $7.6 billion, largely in infrastructure, adding to the $28 billion poured in the decade to 2014, versus $18 billion in the four decades between 1964 and 2004.
Aside from infrastructure, outgoing president, Donald Kaberuka of Rwanda, also focused on attracting private sector money to the bank, an effort that saw South Africa’s FirstRand and the bank partnering in creating a $200-million fund to boost African trade. The inclusion of women in economic development was also key, as well as continuing efforts to reduce conflict through the bank’s Fragile States initiative.
Both Adesina and Nigeria’s former Finance Minister, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, under whose watch Nigeria supported Adesina, emphasized inclusiveness in the bank’s decision-making process, seeking to allay the fears of marginalization raised by smaller African countries who have now seen the number one and number two economies take leadership of the continent’s foremost institutions after South Africa’s Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma was elected Chairperson of the African Union in 2012 in heavy lobbying African analysts say came at a heavy political price for President Jacob Zuma.
“We will be inclusive in our approach,” Okonjo-Iweala told FORBES AFRICA after Adesina’s victory. “It’s a great 50th anniversary gift from God to the country. We appreciate it and we take the responsibility very seriously. We will not abuse it.”
In his statement to the board of governors in support of his nomination, Adesina said he wanted to help build a competitive and more integrated Africa while ensuring that growth is more inclusive. To achieve this, his strategy combines five key themes including some from the AfDB’s 10-year strategy outlined at the 2014 meetings and the Africa Union’s Agenda 2063.
That seeks an integrated infrastructure program, growing the private sector, creating jobs for women and youth, reviving Africa’s rural economies and pursuing regional integration through transnational infrastructure and the expansion of regional markets.
“Given the bank’s strength and Africa’s needs, the next phase of the AfDB Group is to take development to the nooks and corners of Africa, through inclusive growth that transforms the lives of the urban and rural populations of Africa,” says Adesina.
It is a plan the board of governors of the bank appear to have bought and that will be tested over the next five years, as Africa’s growth shifts from being externally driven to leveraging off the increasing power of African consumers and economies that have made Africa, alongside India, as the only regional nodes of economic expansion in the world this year.

The Man With Africa On His Shoulders

It was a golden path walked by the young Dare Okoudjou growing up in Benin. He came from a good family, a teacher father and nurse mother; he wanted for little and was able to study in Europe.
More than a decade ago, as a final year student for a Master’s in telecommunications engineering in Paris, Okoudjou had companies hounding him with lucrative job offers.
Engineering led him to New York and a job as an intern in the autumn of 1998. He was 22 years old.
“In those six months in New York, I realized I wanted to be part of a bigger plan, a bigger picture. There were a lot of offers from companies, such as Ericsson and Alcatel, but I didn’t like it there,” says Okoudjou.
The salaries in telecommunications were high and engineers were sought after, but the thought of working in the United States, far from Africa, terrified Okoudjou.
“Nineteen ninety nine was the boom of the dotcom. I was one of the first people who knew the stuff. At that time, a lot people had not heard about internet in Africa, I was an engineer of it,” says Okoudjou.
Instead, he accepted a job as a consultant in telecommunications and media at PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) in Paris in 1999 hoping it would lead home. He says the French were doing a lot of work in Africa. His first project was to launch a mobile network in Morocco. This was fortuitous. When Okoudjou finished school, at the top of the class in Benin, he went to an engineering scholarship in Morocco, for two years.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-3762" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Dare-Okoudjou-107-1024x681-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" />
“At PwC, I met great people from different backgrounds but which I related to. We knew we were fortunate to be there. They were sensitive to the world around them. We shared the sense of responsibility towards the larger community. Then there was a lady who created a link between PwC and the world of NGOs,” says Okoudjou.
In 2001, he quit and joined an NGO in the north of Tanzania. The NGO looked after 30,000 people in a refugee camp in the highly populated Nyanga district.
“That was the time I heard the call of Africa. I felt I needed to do something more helpful to the people than sending money now and then to my parents,” he says.
“African people were going there [Europe] out of desperation, I was not. I was in quest of greatness. I wanted to be the best. I really enjoyed my years in Paris.”
In Tanzania, Okoudjou realized the hidden side of what he calls the business of NGOs. He regrets that the camps turned out businesses that compete to serve people but with no intention to liberate them. Their business was to keep people in the camps as long as they could, he laments.
“No offence to the [NGO] people, some people had great hearts. They wanted to help somehow but that very personal need to help translated into a situation which will maintain thousands of people in the same situation for a long time. The refugees were not allowed to work, as a result they would sell what was donated to them to the working villagers,” says Okoudjou.
“Trade business is better, it provides the right incentives. There are no hidden agendas. The whole NGO business has hidden motives, so I left the NGOs after two months and went back to PwC and later enrolled for an MBA in 2005.”
In 2005, the former Minister of Finance in South Africa, Trevor Manuel, addressed Okoudjou’s MBA classmates in Paris about opportunities that his country had. The idea of setting up in Johannesburg was born.
The following year, Okoudjou joined MTN in Johannesburg and worked in the mobile financial services section, also known as mobile money. This position allowed Okoudjou to travel Africa.
“When I was in Paris in August 2005, there was a small article about MTN mobile money. I knew then that was what I was looking for because it had all the elements. It’s about technology and I love technology. I knew money transfer inside out. We were students in France and people in Benin sent us money. When I was in France I sent money to Benin, but there were always people trying to rip us off. That’s when I wrote to MTN and said I wanted to come and work for them. By the end of 2008, I realized I wanted my own thing and that was mobile money transfer,” says Okoudjou.
It took Okoudjou six months to raise $500,000 and start his own money transfer company, with three people, in Johannesburg. This was a similar business that he managed for three years at MTN. For the next three years Mobile Financial Services Africa won plump contracts with cellphone networks. They grew from one branch in South Africa to more than 10 on the continent. Then disaster struck. The $2 million, raised by the end of 2011, dried up overnight.
“In May last year, it was so hard, I struggled paying salaries, I couldn’t pay my home electricity bill, and they cut it off. I am from Benin, I took it on the chin. We cooked outside on an open fire. I turned it into something fun for my kids,” says Okoudjou.
By June, despite the increasing pressure to salvage the sinking business, Okoudjou says he turned away several offers to sell a portion of the business, or form partnerships. The deals didn’t feel right.
Okoudjou forged ahead trying to save his business. He opened more branches and tried soliciting credible shareholders.
On a hot Friday evening in November, it got worse. Okoudjou’s flight at Abidjan International Airport, back to South Africa, was delayed for six hours. He had flown in to open a branch in Côte d’Ivoire even though his business was bleeding back home. While at the airport, a security company called to tell Okoudjou his house in Johannesburg had been broken into.
“I could hear my children crying. My wife was not there with them. I couldn’t reach her on her phone and I was sitting in that Abidjan airport without money and helpless. I have been trying to do this business for five years, but I failed. I drove this [business] to the ground, there’s nothing I could do… And I remembered I read somewhere: ‘There’s always a way. There must be a way,’” he says.
Okoudjou says in that moment of despair at the airport he took out a piece of paper and wrote all the things he should try and people he should call in the next month to plead for a lifeline.
His father Pierre-Claver Okoudjou is a retired philosophy teacher and a prolific French essay writer in Benin. He says at that lonely moment in Abidjan he took inspiration from his father’s essays.
For a month, Okoudjou worked hard to find investors to save his business. Now, it is safe with 10 shareholders and 20 employees on the continent.
“We are not completely out of the woods, we still have a mountain to climb,” he says.
That is the philosophy that emerges from the scars of a worst day when you suffer the tears of your children from far away.

Tag: July 2015

FORBES AFRICA SOCIAL MEDIA

The Bloody Market Of Fear

The $809-Million Question

Crocodiles, Money And Hope

The FBI Tackles Fifa

The Man With Africa On His Shoulders

“I Could Hear My Children Crying”