Africa’s future must be shaped by a new generation of leaders who are willing to take ownership of the continent’s resources, build strong institutions and create enterprises capable of competing globally, Aliko Dangote and other prominent African leaders have said.
The call was made at the closing of the 2026 Aliko Dangote Foundation Africa Diaspora Leadership Programme Young Global Leaders Convening in Lagos.
Speakers at the four-day event urged Africans to move beyond a narrative centred on the continent’s challenges and natural resources, stressing the need to build globally competitive products, services and ideas.
The Lagos learning journey, held under the theme ‘Building Africa at Scale’, exposed participants to Nigeria’s industrial, financial, technological and creative sectors.
The Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations, Amina Mohammed, said Africa’s struggle for greater influence was increasingly a contest over power and institutions.
She urged Africans to move beyond simply seeking representation at international decision-making platforms and instead work towards gaining the power to influence decisions.
“We can no longer be the people that are profited from. You have to own what it is that is your power,” Mohammed said.
She also pointed to Artificial Intelligence as an emerging area where Africa must ensure it does not fall behind.
Former President and Chairman of the Board of Directors of Afreximbank, Prof Benedict Oramah, said the Dangote Petroleum Refinery had made an important contribution to changing how Africans perceive their industrial capacity.
“The greatest thing that the Dangote Refinery has done and will do for us is our ability to take back our minds,” Oramah said.
He said the refinery was helping to put behind Africa’s long-standing perception that the continent lacked the capacity to execute world-scale industrial projects.
Oramah stressed that Africa’s economic transformation would require the continent to significantly expand its manufacturing and production capacity.
“unless we manufacture, unless we produce, Africa would struggle to transform its position in the global economy.”
He also called on African commercial banks to adopt developmental commercial banking approaches that would support long-term investments in productive sectors.
The Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Taiwo Oyedele, said governments had a responsibility to create conditions that would enable more African entrepreneurs to build businesses and projects on the scale demonstrated by Dangote.
Describing Dangote as “a fighter”, Oyedele said working closely with the industrialist had changed his understanding of what it takes to execute major investments in Nigeria.
“Until I got close to him, I saw that he was stressed more than the rest of us. But he would never give up.”
Oyedele added: “What if we create the right conditions so that he will be less stressed, so that other people will be encouraged to do the same thing?”
He said government’s role was to establish a stable policy and regulatory environment that would allow private capital to support innovation, create jobs and deliver viable infrastructure.
The Minister of Art, Culture, Tourism and the Creative Economy, Hannatu Musawa, said changing Africa’s global narrative must go hand in hand with the development of its creative economy.
She described the creative sector as an important source of jobs, economic value and international influence, urging Africans to take ownership of their stories and recognise culture as both an economic asset and a tool for shaping global perceptions of the continent.
The Chief Executive Officer of the Rwanda Development Board, Jean Guy Afrika, said the Dangote Refinery demonstrated the impact that exceptional entrepreneurial leadership could have.
However, he warned that Africa could not depend on extraordinary individuals having to overcome dysfunctional systems to achieve major successes.
Afrika identified policy predictability, respect for contracts, institutional accountability and the preparation of investable assets as key conditions required for Africa to build projects and enterprises at scale.
The President and Chief Executive of Dangote Industries Limited, Aliko Dangote, challenged participants to turn the lessons from the Lagos programme into concrete action.
“What you have seen in Lagos is that Africa’s challenge is not a shortage of ideas or ambition. It is turning ambition into institutions, productive capacity and lasting value,” Dangote said.
He urged the Young Global Leaders to consider not only what Africa could become but also the role each of them could play in building what he described as the “New Africa”.
The Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of the Aliko Dangote Foundation, Zouera Youssoufou, said the Foundation had supported African members of the Forum of Young Global Leaders for the past 15 years as part of efforts to strengthen Africa’s representation and influence in global leadership networks.
She said the Foundation specifically funds African Young Global Leaders to participate fully in the programme and its learning journeys, providing promising leaders with access to global knowledge, networks and experiences that can strengthen their ability to make an impact across the continent.
Source: Aliko Dangote Foundation
