Mo Ibrahim Quotes

United States has always been very close to Africa and it's very sad now to see that Africa has a lot more friends - a lot more engagements with the Chinese, with the Indians, with the Brazilians as the United States retreats. Actually, Africa is a wonderful place to do business and American business is missing a big opportunity by really overlooking Africa.

Far from being hopeless, Africa is full of hope and potential, maybe more so than any other continent. The challenge is to ensure that its potential is utilised.

There's no point in trying to hoard money after life, so better really to share with people.

If we cannot accurately measure poverty, we surely cannot accurately measure our efforts to tackle it.

The Security Council represents the situation from 1945 - you had the Allies who won the war who occupied that. The defeated guys - the Germans and Japan - were out. The occupied countries had no voice. That was fine in '45, but today, Germany rules Europe, frankly. They are driving Europe but have no voice.

Mobile phones could not work in Africa without prepaid because it's a cash society.

Mobile phones play a really wonderful role in enabling civil society. As well as empowering people economically and socially, they are a wonderful political tool.

Every man, woman and child knows about Mugabe, but people say, 'Mogae, who is that?'

Rule of law is the most important element in any civil society.

For citizens to become fully engaged in holding their leadership to account, accurate information is required to see where action is needed, to measure the results of policies and programmes, to build support for courageous decisions and to consolidate political legitimacy.

When Captain Moussa Dadis Camara came to power, too many thought he would hold to his promise to stand down, introduce democratic elections and restore the rule of law.

The Ibrahim Index is a tool to hold governments to account and frame the debate about how we are governed.

Africa was perceived - it still is to some extent - as a place which is very difficult to do business in. I don't share that view.

Educational opportunities have supported the rise of the African middle class, the professional cadre of young people who are now willing and able to contribute to Africa's future prosperity.

I really don't have heroes in business; I never looked up at business people.

The issue with international institutions is that there is a crisis of legitimacy. Trust in these institutions is a serious problem.

Women in Africa are really the pillar of the society, are the most productive segment of society, actually. They do agriculture.

The U.S. has been a great friend all these years, but as soon as Africa found itself starting to move up, the U.S. is really disengaging.

The mobile industry changed Africa.

There is a crisis of leadership and governance in Africa, and we must face it.

African leaders work really under severe limitations and constraints.

If Sudan starts to crumble, the shock waves will spread.

Botswana had three successive good presidents who served their legal terms, who did well for their countries - three, not one.

Roads are not practical in Africa.

Literacy in Tunisia is almost 100%. It's amazing - no country in the region or even in Asia can match Tunisia in education.

Transfer pricing is causing huge problems in Africa.

Modern slavery is a hidden crime and notoriously difficult to measure.

It's time Africa started listening to our young people instead of always telling them what to do.

The leakage of information means you're going to be able to read everybody's e-mail.

What we need in Africa is balanced development. Economic success cannot be a replacement for human rights or participation or democracy ... it doesn't work.

Many African people are smarter than me - kids who could have been better. I have no claim for genius.

You fly for hours and hours and hours over Africa to go from one place to another.

I come from a typical family.

I never set out really to build a financial empire or to be a wealthy man.

It is very difficult for any dictator or any incumbent to falsify the results of an election and just get away with it.

All we hear about Africa in the West is Darfur, Zimbabwe, Congo, Somalia, as if that is all there is.

While the Marshall Plan was important for Europe's recovery, Europe's prosperity was really built on economic integration and policy coherence.

Almost every country in Africa has now instituted multi-party democracy.

What is a government supposed to do for its people? To improve the standard of living, to help them get jobs, get kids to schools, and have access to medicine and hospitals. Government may not directly provide these public goods and services, but government must be accountable for whether or not they are delivered to citizens.

Behind every corrupt politician are 10-20 corrupt businessmen.

When I was young, there was only one TV channel, sponsored by the government, and it only broadcast things like what the leader had for breakfast. There was no real media.

Electoral turnout is falling among the young, and political apathy is on the rise.

In a world of growing food demand, Africa is home to two-thirds of the world's unexploited arable land.

Multinationals don't pay taxes in Africa - we all know that.

After the sale of Celtel, I really wanted to give the money back, and I had a number of choices - to go and buy masses of blankets and baby milk or to go into Darfur or Congo. That would have been very nice actually, but it's just like an aspirin: it doesn't deal with the problem.

Governance has been at the heart of the work of the Oxford Martin Commission for Future Generations and is a clear focus in its report, 'Now for the Long Term.'

To be frank, I don't think President Obama gives much thought to Africa - or gives much to Africa.

Governance is everything. Without governance we have nothing

Most of the money I made has gone back to Africa or is going back to Africa.

We need to keep pressure on our own governments to force more and more transparency.

Nobody in Africa loves to be a beggar or a recipient of aid. Everywhere I go in Africa, people say, 'When are we going to stand up on our feet?'

Positive market incentives operating in the public interest are too few and far between, and are also up against a seemingly never-ending expansion of perverse incentives and lobbying.

Africa is rich, and why are we poor then if our continent is rich. It is not right.

Africa is progressing but maybe not in the way you think it is. Even if the overall picture looks good, we must all remain vigilant and not get complacent.

I left Sudan when I was 25 or 26 years old. If I had stayed, I would never have ended up being an entrepreneur. You can have the qualities, but if you don't have the environment, you just wither away. It's like a fish: take it out of water, it will not survive.

I ended up being a businessman unwittingly. I wanted to be an academic; I wanted to be like Einstein.

Young people, all too often, find their interests overlooked and their voices ignored.

The state and its elites must be subject, in theory and in practice, to the same laws that its poorest citizens are.

Intimidation, harassment and violence have no place in a democracy.

I need to be free, to speak the unspeakable. You can't do that in office.

Tony Blair is paid $500,000 for one speech, and no one asks how he is going to spend it.

People never confess to failure. They should.

Africa's success stories are delivering the whole range of the public goods and services that citizens have a right to expect and are forging a path that we hope more will follow.

I don't subscribe to the narrative that Africa is backward because of colonialism.

If economic progress is not translated into better quality of life and respect for citizens' rights, we will witness more Tahrir Squares in Africa.

Make as much money as you can, but can you please pay your taxes, because this is a major problem.

Increasing extremism - across Africa and the world - must be understood in the context of the failure of our leaders properly to manage diversity within their borders.

The brain drain from Africa has been reversed.

If we are to build grassroots respect for the institutions and processes that constitute democracy, the state must treat its citizens as real citizens rather than as subjects.

Compared to developed countries, or even to some major emerging countries, burdened by aging populations, financial crises, widening budget deficits, faltering faith in politics and growing social demands, Africa has become the world's last 'New Frontier:' a kind of 'it-continent.'

I made money. I wanted to give it back to Africa but I wanted to give it back in a meaningful way. So I really want to do something which deals with the root of the problem of hunger, of disease, of ills we have in our society.

Rwanda really did take very strong steps towards development. I mean, this place is unrecognizable. There's a very good management of economy and resources - it's a success story, and that's great.

More people smile at me now I'm richer.

The African Development Bank is one of the most aggressive advocates of regional integration.

I am not a politician. I am not in politics. I'm just a citizen.

Retail banking in Africa is very weak. You can't go to a village and get money from an ATM or visit a branch of the bank. So people have to use the Internet.

Not any amount of aid is going to move Africa forward.

Remarkably, governments are beginning to embrace the idea that nothing enhances democracy more than giving voice and information to everybody in the country. Why not open their books if they have nothing to hide?

Remember, 2000 was the year of the dot-com bust. The telecom industry lost about $2 trillion in market capital at that time.

If you are African, the more educated you are, the less chances you have of getting a job.

Cape Verde produces good people.

Africa should not again face isolation or stigmatisation based on ignorance and unrepresentative imagery.

Celtel established a mobile phone network in Africa at a time when investors told me that there was no market for mobile phones there.

Nobody messes with China, nobody messes with the United States, or with Europe, because these are really big entities with a lot of clout and a lot of economic power. They have a place at the table.

Of course, Nelson Mandela, everybody knows Nelson Mandela. I mean, he's a great gift not only for Africa but for the whole world, actually. But do not expect everybody to be a Nelson Mandela.

Many Africans are used to a life where they get up in the morning and don't know what they're going to do that day.

Business is global. Countries need to react to that; taxes need to be paid where profit arises.

I came to the conclusion that unless you are ruled properly, you cannot move forward. Everything else is second. Everything.

Mobile communications had been around for a long time, but always as a limited market, constrained by the radio spectrum.

We cannot expect loyalty to an unjust regime.