Lawyers From Nigeria

"I have played my role but people can decide whether it is quiet or not"

"The health of the private sector in any economy is a fair measure of how prosperous and democratic that economy is."

"The more transport infrastructure we provide the more efficient the economy becomes, resulting in more business opportunities."

"For Nigeria to be better, for Nigeria to be able to get its place in the world, Nigeria must address the gender question. If we don’t, we’ll remain where we are."

"We will not achieve anything as a group of women if we don’t have a strong movement."

"One of the easiest ways to liberate women is also to come up with legal jurisprudence that can help in promoting the rights of women."

"I explained to African Business why in the current crisis, originating transactions is more important than ever."

"At the Africa Investment Forum, we distil the talk into projects."

"So we’re involved throughout the value chain, all year round, providing the tools and instruments and know-how to make a deal bankable and helping it see the light of day. Of course, each deal is different and our role will change depending on the needs."

"With the AIF, which is a flagship initiative of the African Development Bank along with seven other founding partners, we are preparing projects for bankability and helping projects progress through the different steps, the next one being raising capital and once that is done also working to unlock the bottlenecks that can cause some deals to not reach closure."

"So through the AIF platform we’re helping people join us as partners and shifting the discussion to one of investments. And I see that this approach does resonate in the American market and US investors."

"They say, this is what you need because you have not articulated your own needs in a manner that you can present it so that it will be addressed. The continent also has not understood its part in solving its own problems, nobody will do it for you. You’re going to have to rise and do it yourself."

"That brings me to your direct question about the perception of the Americans in business. You have to deal with people telling you what they think is good for you because you’re not able to speak for yourself."

"That’s what we’re doing now with the Africa Investment Forum. Again, building a platform that is multi-transactional, multi-disciplinary and very deal-oriented. We are trying to get away from the endless talk about what needs to be done in Africa to actually doing stuff and we’re doing it one transaction at a time. We distil the talk into projects. We are working with the creative industry, for example, and doing a lot of work and seeing how we can channel funds to where it is needed, not just where people think it is needed."

"And I suppose this is a continuation of a culture that goes back to my days at Pencon. There was a lot of talk on pension reform and many people were saying that it wasn’t possible. It took a few senior people and a very willing President Obasanjo to back us and we pushed through the pension reform and did it in such a way that it remains sustainable"

"We are constantly putting things on the table that weren’t there before and constantly refusing to take no for an answer when it comes to Africa."

"The Lagos to Abidjan corridor highway project has been well documented and it’s fully subscribed – the road, the rail connection. So, now we are working on the next step which is logistics, storage, warehousing along this corridor. That’s what the boardrooms will be focusing on during the AIF. Making transactions happen and getting real investor interest in critical projects that will help drive transformation and development."

"This is something we incredibly proud of and when we talk about women in business, we’re helping make it a reality. We’re helping create scale and impact. This year, mining especially what are termed green minerals. We have many technology projects and also projects around logistics."

"We are helping to channel monies to women-led and businesses with a gender lens. We have a dozen deals on our platform starting from $2m – a sheer butter business – to a multi-billion refinery business. Their stories are amazing when you look at the obstacles they’ve had to overcome, the challenges and sheer tenacity and not just the will but also the mental acumen to pursue the deals to where they are now."

"Before I talk about deals, I would like to talk about something that is paramount to me: women as investment champions. This is something I am most proud of, the launch of the Women as Investment Champions."

"We are helping structure this, and helping channel investments towards this. The same applies to the creatives, and making sure that we are monetising our creations."

"Around sports you have the merchandising, you have the whole ecosystem, the infrastructure and for those watching these sports, the hotels, the shops, the licensing. This is why people are paying billions for sports franchises."

"But we want to look at it more than just an athlete or a singer. We are looking to creating the framework so that we monetise the IP. Others are currently making money from our talent."

"Talent is not the issue on the continent. We have it in abundance. We are naturally blessed in sports and in the creatives."

"The same principles that we discussed earlier still need to be applied to these sectors. Thinking about scale, structuring projects properly, creating awareness around the impact and upside."

"First let me say that risks do exist. It would be naive and totally idealistic for anyone to say that political risk doesn’t exist. But it exists everywhere. The point is that it’s not going to go away. What we need are the tools to manage it so that it doesn’t become a problem. What we do on the AIF side is to ensure that we unlock these bottlenecks and sometimes it’s a political bottleneck, sometimes it’s a policy bottleneck. Sometimes it’s a data or business intelligence bottleneck because you can’t invest if you don’t understand your terrain, if you don’t have reliable numbers."

"They sit in the room with investors, they sit in the room with project sponsors and they hear first-hand how their intentions, their concerns, how policies affect the investments. And investors also get a better understanding of policy. It helps with decision making and we have seen leaders go back to work on policy to help drive greater investments and get deals over the line. That is the unique proposition of the AIF."

"One should understand that when the presidents come to the AIF they don’t come to AIF as the president of such and such a country, they come to AIF as CEOs of their countries."

"It is always incumbent on the project sponsors and the advisors to structure the deals in a manner that you accompany the interests of the country you operate in. That’s what differentiates success and frustration."

"We are uniquely placed to overcome all of these different items. We work with every government on the continent. So we can help smooth out issues around policy through discussions and sensitisation and through reforms. We also have proprietary data through the African Development Bank."

"I also think we need to be more ambitious. You see projects and they are too timid, too small. International investors and financiers want scale. So we also help see the bigger picture and help ensure that these projects are appealing and will meet the requirements and benchmarks that we know investors will request."

"One of the biggest challenges is project preparation. You can always find capital and it is available both domestically and globally."

"The issue we have found are the project themselves, the way they’re structured and the way they are prepared. We have noticed that you can have some fantastic projects but they are structure is wrong and they don’t have the basic corporate governance structures that make them investible from an investor’s perspective."

"On the domestic front, can I just say that the driver behind the pension reform we conducted was to ignite that domestic resource mobilisation. And across the continent, we haven’t even started to scratch the surface on that front. Just look at contributions as a percentage of GDP and it’s still small comparatively speaking. So there is capital."

"While we have come very far in the fight against these heinous acts, the road ahead remains long and arduous."

"People had been turning to witchcraft because of the mistaken belief that using their body parts in potions can bring good luck and wealth."

"Within a short period of time the reality of life would make people to understand that feminist solidarity is important, it’s key and it’s a solution to the global problem."

"Feminism should also allow people to make choices on areas they think they believe in while we try as much as possible to convince them on those other areas that we think are non-negotiable in conversations of feminism."

"The process of feminism is a process of learning, nobody was born a feminist, people grew up to learn feminism."

"Despite the challenges to women’s and girls’ empowerment, young women and girls must remain resilient and hopeful for the holistic change we are working to create."

"It’s a start, we’ll need a lot more, but this is something that is very exciting to us at the Africa Investment Forum, because it clearly charts a path where we can have a collaborative effort and ensure that deals on the continent have fruition."

"Project preparation and due diligence is very important."

"There is abundance of capital and projects in Africa."

"The Africa Investment Forum has been supporting the African Continental Free Trade Area through the Forum’s parent institution, the African Development Bank."

"A couple of years ago, it was Ebola ravaging the continent. Now it is COVID-19. There may be something else in the future. How do we then position Africa to very clearly respond to their own needs without a dependence on aid?"

"Therein lies a moral obligation to be our brother’s keeper, but whether we are doing that or not is playing out in this matter of vaccine equity. So, quite frankly, from this side in Africa, I’m not certain that it will happen. So, what you’re seeing now on the continent is a realisation that you have an option not to wait to be given, but to take your future into your own hands."

"Africa is increasingly getting tired of asking for aid when in all honesty we can trade. And that is what we’re now looking to provide at the Africa Investment Forum, a flagship initiative of the African Development Bank, where both domestic and international investors who are looking to invest for profit, while fulfilling a need, are mobilised to finance projects."

"Our call now to the rest of the world is to join us, not as aid givers, but as investment partners so that we can quite clearly chart the course for the future."

"So, rather than looking to be given vaccines developed in those labs outside Africa by people, some of whom are of African descent who did not have infrastructure to do it on the continent, we should be looking at setting up these vaccine plants on the continent."

"While it would be good for Africa to be given vaccines, the continent needs more of investments to become self-reliant."