Today, #Africa has a Human Development Index (HDI) mean of 0.536 that is significantly lower than that for each of the other continents in the world (Asia 0.714, Europe 0.845, North America 0.733, South America 0.738, and Oceania 0.693), and the global average of 0.697 (Kpolovie, 2017).
The ideal of the #Africa we want in 2063 is a continent that will have a HDI mean which is above the global average. My essay will be mainly focused on the pragmatic solution of “how we can build the #Africa we want and what will be the contributions of the african youth” ?
According to #Buddha, “All that we are is the result of what we thought. The mind is everything. What we think we become.” Again, the former president of #Uganda, #Milton OBOTE also said that “He, who loses money, loses much; He who loses a friend, loses more; he who loses faith, loses all.”
These quotations tempted me to think that we need the philosophy of “The African Dream” as a challenging philosophy that can release us from our colonialist’s philosophy that we are a failing and disable continent. The African dream philosophy might boost our thinking and faith in order to stand up as African for the improvement of our quality of life, as what did and is still doing the “#American dream”.
As we have the #Agenda 2063 that sounds as a dream, the main question is therefore, what to be done, practically? African solutions to Africa’s problems should not remain rhetoric of the 21st century but it requires a high level of commitment that is achievable through an ideology or philosophy capable to generate hope, faith and courage in the society.
Pragmatic solutions
According to #Bill Gates, “Our modern lifestyle is not a political creation. Before 1700, everybody was poor as hell. Life was short and brutish. But then we started inventing-electricity, steam engines, microprocessors, understanding genetics and medicine and things like that. Yes, stability and education are important but innovation is the real driver of progress.”
I share this long quotation in order to highlight that if western countries have succeeded to a certain extent, we African people can do so and better, considering the natural resources we possess. Although the African Dream needs political stability, it needs also a spirit of innovation and production from its people.
“An investment in knowledge pays the best interest”, said #Benjamin Franklin. Again, according to #Nelson Mandela, “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world”. These citations remind us that we shall never ignore the relevance of education, but we should have an emphasis on education related to new technology.
In my conclusion, the Africa we want in 2063 is possible through African youth commitment around the African dream, innovations and new technologies.
As #Albert Einstein said, “Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning”.