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The first workshop of the 2018 Archbishop Tutu Leadership Programme was held at the Mont Fleur Conference Centre from the 21st to the 28th of April. The 27 Fellowship candidates came from some 300 nominees of outstanding excellence from over 30 African countries, and represented nine African countries - Nigeria, Uganda, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Sudan, Rwanda, South Africa, Sierra Leone and Egypt.  

The Associates convened in Stellenbosch, Cape Town, where the beautiful and serene mountainous landscape served as the perfect backdrop to inspire deep, uninterrupted reflections.

South Africa's Public Enterprises Minister has appointed a new interim board to the country's state-owned defence company, Denel. On the new board is 2015 Tutu Fellow, Nonzukiso Siyotula.  No members of the previous board were retained. The cleanout of Denel’s board is the second major shake up at a state-owned enterprise in South Africa in recent months. The new President, Cyril Ramaphosa, has said that cleaning up state-owned enterprises with a track record of mismanagement and ethical lapses was a priority of his to get the economy back on track. 

2012 Tutu Fellow Dr Amy Jadesimi has been named Africa's Young CEO of the Year.  Amy is the Managing Director and CEO of LADOL, short for a half billion USD port development infrastructure project at Lagos, Nigeria.  The acronym stands for Lagos Deep Offshore Logistics Base and is an industrial free zone with a logistics base in the shipyard.  Amy's plans go beyond just infrastructure development, however.  She is working towards transforming the area into more than just an industrial area, rather, she wants it to be an economic zone that sustainably creates jobs and business opportunities in the area.

In 2017, at the close of the Tutu Leadership Programme, the Class of 2017 felt inspired by the life-changing programme and decided they wanted to collect a group donation to further the work being done by the African Leadership Institute. They asked that the cash collected from the personal resources of the 2017 Fellows be used for the sustainability of the programme in future. Because of the impact the programme had had on them, they felt it was important that somebody who might have the potential to become a Fellow shouldn't lose that opportunity because of a lack of resources. So they asked for the money to be used towards covering the expenses of a deserving candidate who otherwise may not be able to participate due to financial constraints.

The African Leadership Institute, once again, has a very strong cohort of emerging African leaders for the prestigious Tutu Leadership Fellowship for 2018.  Amongst nearly 300 nominees of outstanding quality from over 30 African countries, 18 of Africa’s highest potential young leaders were selected to take part in the programme. Including the candidates nominated by our sponsoring organisations, the candidates represent ten different African countries and various industries, and range from 30 to 39 years of age. The selected candidates demonstrate the incredible wealth and breadth of leadership talent that exists in Africa’s youth.  The biographies of the 2018 candidates follow:

2007 Tutu Fellow and AFLI board member, Terence Sibiya, has been appointed Nedbank’s Managing Executive for the Rest of Africa & Subsidiaries. He is responsible for leading and managing the Bank’s Rest of Africa and subsidiary businesses to ensure that they grow and achieve the key strategic objectives of the company.  These include building scale, increasing their share of contribution to the Group’s earnings, and generating returns in excess of the cost of equity.  Prior to this, Terence was the Managing Executive for Client Coverage Nedbank Corporate & Investment Banking and was with Standard Bank, before that.

In March 2018, Mutsa Chironga, a 2016 Tutu Fellow, was appointed Divisional Executive, Consumer Banking at Nedbank, one of South Africa's "Big Four" banks.  Of Zimbabwean origin, Mutsa has a deep passion for Africa. He was previously a Partner at McKinsey and Company, Johannesburg, where he led the McKinsey African financial services practice, focusing on strategy,
sales transformation, and digital and analytics.

This essay was originally written and submitted as part of my course requirements for the 2017 Tutu Leadership programme.  It looks at three elements of leadership that are timeless and universal, but also especially relevant to Africa today if we are to see the successful transformation of our continent. The first element – servant leadership - explores what a leader must ‘be’ and the attitude and approach they should have. The second – shared vision – looks at what a leader should ‘do’ and highlights a common fundamental that is core to all great leaders, but somehow lacking in too many of our countries and companies. The final element – succession planning – looks beyond the leader, and helps us think about what comes next.

An agriculture education program started by the global agricultural equipment manufacturer AGCO in partnership with Strathmore University in Kenya, have enrolled their first students.  The program was initiated by two Fellows, AGCO's Nuradin Osman - a 2013 Fellow - and Martin Mbaya, a 2015 Fellow, who is a lecturer at the business school.  The agriculture program seeks to create capacity and skills in the African agriculture sector at a time when people are being asked to do more with less.

The theme of this year’s International Women’s Day is #PressforProgress. According to the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report, it will take the world two hundred years to reach gender parity. We are being urged not to sit back. I am the first female leader of the Bar Association in Zambia pre- and post- Zambia’s independence in 1964. At the last count, I was one of only two female leaders of a national Bar Association in Africa. This is a very sad state of affairs.

The African Leadership Institute has hired Bridgette Mdangayi to lead the Ford Foundation grant-funded leadership initiative.  AFLI was awarded the $800 000 grant in 2017. The grant is to network young leaders from across Africa in order to obtain critical mass for young leaders and enable them to have an impact on the direction of the continent.

Bridgette came on board on 1 March 2018.  She's an independent management consultant and experienced Project and Programme management professional with 10 years’ professional experience in both the NGO and Corporate Sectors.

In her TEDx Talk that was recorded at TEDGlobal 2017, 2008 Tutu Fellow Bibi Bakare-Yusuf says stories carry great significance in a culture. Bakare founded the indie press Cassava Republic because of her conviction of the importance of reading to culture.  Narratives in books give shape to the people they represent, and as a writer and publisher she believes it is important to be able to find voices like your own in your country’s literature. This quest to broaden Africa’s story archive is what motivated her to become a publisher.  Since then, she has obtained considerable success, picking up several awards and her disruptive approach has seen her sell books in cafe's, hair salons, and supermarkets.

View her unedited talk below.