Chinelo Anohu-Amazu Quotes

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.

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

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.

I think there needs to be a paradigm shift from the way we look at collaboration.

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.

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.

We were very gratified to hear about the launch of the global gateway and the $300 billion initially earmarked for it.

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.

The homemaker aspect of a woman’s life teaches me one thing and that’s to joggle and manage different things at the same time.

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

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.

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.

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

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.

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