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OPINION - As the world tries to deal with the worst economic crisis in living memory, the role and efficiency of the market system as an allocator of resources is being questioned as is the capitalist business model in an unprecedented manner at a time when Africa’s own post colonial model premised on the state playing a role as shareholder, market corrector and regulator has not delivered the promise.

What should be the role of business in post-colonial Africa? Who should drive the engine of growth in Africa? Politicians in the developed nations are increasing assuming the role of super businesspersons and yet the process of selecting politicians has anything to do with intelligence or business acumen.

Can you trust state actors to be the face of business you can believe in? It is common cause that the difference between business people and politicians is that the former’s success is determined by a system that respects the exchange of value i.e. there must be a seller and buyer for contract to be consummated while in the political market the principle is different because people surrender their power to politicians and in return they get promises that may not be delivered during the tenure of the politician and yet citizens have no mechanism to recall such a politician as they have for a defective product, for example.

Part of the injury caused by colonialism was that access to business opportunities was denied to the majority to the extent that capitalism in the minds of many politicians in post-colonial Africa is and has been inextricably linked to the creation and crystallization of an unjust business environment. Strategies and tactics of black economic empowerment have to be seen in the context of the national liberation theology.

With an Obama Presidency, the talk about a new global financial architecture has intensified not only because of Obama’s ideals of democracy, liberty, opportunity and unyielding hope but because the world urgently requires new institutions to support a new business model that balances private and public interest. Prime Minister Gordon Brown in the post-Bush era is also calling for the world to come together to create a global society to confront the challenges of our time. Which leads me to ask whether in our lifetime it is possible to create an African society united by a shared vision, values and ethics.

Is it conceivable for Africans to agree on what kind of Africa they want to see and how it should be governed? At a time when the world is seized with the challenge of responding to the global financial crisis, the majority of African leaders are preoccupied with the demons of colonialism and less with what is required to reposition the African brand. How should Africa respond to the reconfiguration of capitalism in the West? Should Africa follow the example of nationalization and what would be the implications on growth and development?

Can African leaders be trusted with controlling and managing economic assets? If Africa has yet to develop checks and balances in the political market, can we trust politicians to control our purses? We must accept that African citizens are less organized to monitor and hold their governments accountable than participating in elections.

The last 53 years of uhuru has exposed how fragile and vulnerable Africa’s post-colonial administrations to manipulation and abuse by power hungry and insensitive political actors. If we learn from our colonial experience of turning unity of purpose into unity of action, there is no doubt that African citizens can seize this unique moment of profound change in the world, to usher a new age of progressive activism that will create the kind of leadership required to build a stronger, secure, and more equitable continent.

We in Africa have not only a shared history but a shared belief in the great principles of freedom, after all we produced a Mandela and other great African statesmen, and the rights of man which continue to be undermined even in the post-colonial era. As the world’s greatest power, America, stands at its dawn of hope, we at Africa Heritage Society believe that it is important that such hope be fulfilled through a new social contract where African citizens can take the lead and shape the current century as the first century of a genuinely African society. Africa has had its share of revolutionary politicians and very few revolutionary capitalists of the ilk of the Randlords.

The face of African capitalism continues to be largely the same as the inherited face. Among Africa’s colonial capitalists, the late Tiny Rowland build his reputation on what he termed “revolutionary capitalism”. He was close to many of Africa’s freedom fighters and was intimately involved with the anti-colonial struggles. However, he was one of the misunderstood men of his time.

It is no different to some of us who have chosen business as the theatre to contribute towards Africa’s development. It was no strange coincidence that former British Prime Minister Edward Heath described Rowland as “the unpleasant and unacceptable face of capitalism”. As the world tries to find meaning on the causes of the current financial crisis, it is not uncharacteristic for businesspersons to be described as “greedy” and “unpleasant”. The actions of most governments are largely motivated by a genuine desire to protect the vulnerable from the so-called “villains” who often take the form of businesspersons.

An invisible face that is often domiciled out of the forum countries controls Africa’s major business enterprises and as a result the face of African business is never understood in its proper context and content.

Ultimately it is left to the few of us to defend the virtues of capitalism even when we know that we are not the major beneficiaries from Africa’s resources. Even in the developed nations, capitalists are under attack and if they fail to defend the model, it is inevitable that the standards of living will be compromised and it will be a question of time before it is discovered that an alternative to a market system will not produce the intended benefits. Often in the quietness of my time, I question whether the decision to get into business was a wise one given that the majority of the opinion in Africa thinks that business people are crooks and criminals.

What is often forgotten is that the real value of shareholding like parentage is not in the form of financial returns but in the inherent obligations imposed on the parent to make the business do what it is supposed to do i.e. serve the customers who are ultimately the key determinants of business success. I have often observed that the true owners of businesses are the customers without whom there is no purpose in business.

Equally, the true owners of political processes should be organized citizens whose obligations should go beyond casting votes at election time.

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