UN chief António Guterres said Africa continues to advance and demands investment at scale, justice in global systems, and partnerships grounded in respect, UN Secretary-General António Guterres said on Tuesday.
Guterres was speaking on Tuesday at the opening of the Africa Forward Summit, co-hosted in Kenyan capital Nairobi by President William Ruto and French President Emmanuel Macron.
Guterres highlighted how Africa is driving the debate around reforming global financial institutions that were “designed in 1945 for a world that no longer exists.”
He also credited the continent’s leading role in other areas, including getting the Pact of the Future approved, building new tools for debt negotiations, and challenging credit ratings systems.
African leadership also helped to secure the Sevilla Commitment on expanding lending by multilateral development banks, and alongside Small Island States, put the climate emergency “at the centre of the global agenda,” he added.
“This is not a continent waiting for solutions. This is a continent producing them,” he said. “But let us be honest about what stands in Africa’s way.”
The Secretary-General pointed out that the “global system was designed without Africa – and still largely operating without Africa and is perpetuating century-old injustices.”
Despite being home to more than 1.5 billion people, Africa has no permanent seats on the UN Security Council and assumes limited decision-making power within the international financial institutions that shape its economy.
“It is not Africa that loses. It is the world that loses by the fact that the voice of Africa is not conveniently taken into account,” he said, adding the official development assistance (ODA) to Africa is falling and aid budgets are being cut when needs are at their highest,representing “not only a financing crisis” but “a crisis of solidarity.”
According the UN Secretary General, he emphasized the continent is bearing the harshest consequences of climate change though it did not cause it.
“Africa must be at the centre of climate justice,” the Secretary-General said, noting that even though the continent holds 60 percent of the world’s best solar potential, it receives only two per cent of overall clean energy investment
“With the right finance, Africa could generate ten times more electricity than it needs by 2040 – entirely from renewable sources. Yet, 600 million Africans live without electricity,” he added.
He said Africa also holds vast reserves of the critical minerals needed for the global transition to “green” energy, but for too long its resources have been extracted.
MG/abj/APA