I never thought that I would be able to put the dreadful word COVID-19 and the amazing word Blessing in the same sentence, but this may just be the case and I ask that you hear me out.
For those of us who lived in Ghana in the late 80s and early 90s, we have the unique experience of seeing and knowing major advancements in our country and continent’s development. I remember at the age of 7 when my family moved back to Ghana, we did not have a television, that was a rare commodity at the time, and we used to revel the opportunity of going to my aunt’s house to watch their black and white television – Yes! BLACK AND WHITE!… Then fast forward to getting a coloured television – that was heaven! But wait – television closed down, yes, closed down at 11:59pm and there was only one station – Ghana Broadcasting Corporation; they would shut down with Reflections and the national patriotic song – Y3n Ara Asaase Ni (This is our Land)… Then sssshhhhhhh… TV was over… so at this time, even if you weren’t sleepy, it was done, go to bed!… this was in the early ‘90s… not so long ago!
Also, in the early 90s, when my oldest sister went to University in the UK, we could only call her twice a year – birthday and Christmas… And it gets better – to make those calls, my mum had to go to P&T (Ghana post office) to buy a phonecard, which we would use at the phone booth up the street… so on her birthday, we would all walk up the street, already planned our words, and insert the phone card and talk very quickly as it runs out so fast … I am sure she always cried when we put the phone down because she knew it would be another 6 months before she would hear from us again. A couple of years later, Communications Centers cropped up and then we could go call her that way, but that was super pricey, so the situation changed from say, twice a year to 4 times…
Fast forward to late 90s/ early 2000s when my brother and I went to College in the US, we had a completely different experience. There was something called the internet. Thanks to the internet, we were in touch with home a lot more via email, then mobile phones, then Facebook, WhatsApp and Facetime! Mine and my brother’s experience away from home were quite different than that of my sisters… We were away, but not really…
The above are stories that I am sure many of my Ghanaian friends can relate to and the moral of this real-life story is that in the early 90s, we never dreamt of the possibility of being able to have a video call with our parents and family; It just wasn’t a possible thought… Today, we cannot imagine living without our phones and other gadgets, and even better, my 6-year-old nephew knows more about such gadgets than I do at almost 40!
The beauty of our experience is the fact that the story I have told above would be very foreign to someone my age in the United States because advancement occurred for them faster than it did for us… These changes and more, happened in our lifetime, these are not stories we were told, but stories we have lived… so here lies an opportunity… hang tight, I’ll make the connection shortly…
Its 2020 March and COVID-19 sprung its ugly head in Ghana (and other parts of the world prior) and has completely changed the world as we know it! I am sure you are tired of hearing “we are not living in normal times”, but this is the sad truth… However, this situation which has turned the world upside down has truly given us, particularly in Ghana and Africa, an opportunity to think differently, to leverage this crisis and the changes it has brought up to speed up our development. Keep in mind that the changes we have made now, for the most part, are not completely new, just that we did not do them because we didn’t have to. E.g. working from home… Let me elaborate a bit.
We remember the assertions by Melinda Gates that we did not like to hear… she wasn’t the only one, I read other articles that gave similar very damming estimations of how COVID-19 will crumble the African continent. On Melinda Gates’ assertions, I had two thoughts: (i) as a development worker, I honestly do not see anything wrong with what she was saying – her analysis was based on past realities, on the assessment of the African way of life (communal living – and there’s nothing wrong with this), and her knowledge about how our leaders tend to make decisions – usually very slow… but (ii) of course, as an Africanist, I was very upset, as there is a different story to tell about Africa. And this time we proved the world wrong (for the most part)!
Here is what the world didn’t see coming:
- Our leaders watched and listened; they invited the local experts and asked for advice (I wish I could have been a fly on the wall in the ‘war rooms’ of African Presidents when they were elaborating on the way forward), and for the most part acted fast. Today, we can boast of South Africa and Ghana’s response being effective, intense, and seeing relatively good (still cautiously optimistic) results. Yes, we may have struggles in terms of our populaces’ response to social distancing, but I think everyone can attest to our leaders’ swift decision-making being much better than what has happened in the West.
- Today, we are leveraging technology and have drones flying test samples to Research Centers to speed up the provision of results of COVID-19 infections.
- African Finance Ministers are calling the Multilateral Organizations to the table! What? They are not only sitting at the table, but they are calling them to the table… and the effects are freezing of loans and provision of major stimulus packages to the Continent… more is needed, yes, but I dare say that this kind of swift, effective decision making has not been seen in a long time, if ever… and it is largely as a result of changing the ‘Yes Sah’ mentality, and knowing our worth, our position in the global system, and being able to articulate our needs for positive results.
- Our telcos have provided free data for downloading educational material, which means that our children who have access are able to proceed with online schooling while school is closed.
With these examples and more, we have demonstrated how we can realize positive results if we take our destiny into our own hands, and from the angle, I started our story, if we can believe that similar to the changes we have experienced in our lifetime, we can believe that major positive changes can be made if we dream big and act even bigger! It is time for us to leverage the change that is being ‘imposed’ on us to push the envelope even further… this is definitely our time, and if we adopt, innovate, persist, our new normal post-COVID will be one where Africa is no longer rising, but Africa HAS risen.
I end with 5 open-ended thoughts and ideas… Ask yourself, is there is a place for you, where you can impact your world from any of the ideas below…
- COVID-19 will devastate our economies, no doubt (Ghana’s thriving GDP with projections of almost 7% will go down to about 1.5%, for instance), but how about we push harder on the digitization agenda already begun. Let us invest in getting National ID cards for all citizens, definitely do it in a safe way, but let’s have IDs for every one of the 30 million Ghanaians; so many benefits will result from doing this – one immediate one would be to provide more targeted, systematic assistance to small and medium businesses.
- Data! Data! Data! Let’s continue to collect data on the most vulnerable, identifying households, but also migrant populations that need consistent support, and expand our cash transfer programs so that the poorest can withstand this shock. We have 2.9 million extremely poor persons in Ghana, would it not be a great story to drastically reduce this number in the next 5 years? It is possible, even with COVID-19, if we target them properly and can use our limited resources to provide cash and support sustainable livelihood generation of the poorest.
- In the words of Mandela, “EDUCATION is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”… why don’t we move away from the ‘locked-up’ computer labs, after all, schools are closed, and this experience may just be telling us something… whatever happened to mobile and how it has changed our lives? Can we ride on this wave and instead provide tablets to children? With the very cheap pricing in tablets on the market these days, and the possibility to have locally built ones, can we invest, with the help of our partners, to provide a laptop to all our 9.2 million children who are currently out of school? (We do know there is a good percentage of this number where parents can afford this purchase, so my point about data comes in handy here). While at it, open up the internet… expand access to data (the telcos have already shown the way). Maybe this is the opportunity for us to allow our children to explore, learn in a different way than how our current education system is set up – have access to more pictures, videos, diagrams, machines, etc. through the online learning system that has been shoved upon us.
- Let us redefine the role of the PRIVATE SECTOR! Government is overburdened and simply cannot handle everything expected of them. The private sector has a major role in propelling our recovery – let’s allow the markets to do their thing; can we make the much talked about African-Free Trade a reality – as in real reality? Border closures have shown us something – we will not always be able to run away to the West! So Regional Integration is key for development… Can we allow our businesses – technological minds, researchers, investment bankers, philanthropists, engineers – to join the decision-making table properly? Allow them to lead, explore, fail and rise over and again?
- LEADERSHIP! This is the time for leadership that doesn’t budge, the type that has the evidence and acts without fear or favour. Let’s be real – who would have thought churches and mosques can be closed in Ghana? Well, it has happened, and guess what, the nation still stands strong, and God is still on our side… my point here is that we need both public and private sector leadership – that includes you and I to push for change and innovation, to bring about bold decisions, the ones that are scary, and that’s really the only way that we can realize the positive change that we so need. Doing business, as usual, is just not going to cut it anymore.
They say ‘adversity is the mother of invention’, they also say ‘if not now, when?’… all cliché, Yes! But absolute truths. For those of us born in the late 70s and 80s like me, who lived some or all of our childhoods in Ghana, we have seen change, we have tasted it, we have lived it… so let’s end the rhetoric of Africa rising, and RISE indeed! Truth is that some of us had major plans for 2020, we declared it the best year yet… and COVID-19 hit, ruined many, many plans, but now I sit back and I can see how this, just maybe, can truly be the best year (and decade) yet – if only we will change our mindsets and grab this opportunity to turn our current challenges into major blessings. Dream big and Act even bigger! In the words of a great man of our time, we all love – YES WE CAN.
Written by Christabel E. Dadzie, Social Protection Specialist, World Bank Group & Founder of Ahaspora Professionals Network (www.ahaspora.com)