ABOUT THE FORUM (statement by the team)
The Forum aims to provide operational follow-up to the Dakar Summit of 2015 from the specific context of African diaspora engagement. Cognizant of the challenges higher education across Africa has been subjected to since independence, including: low enrolment and access rates; the capacity to produce globally competitive graduates and research outputs consonant with the imperatives and dynamics of contemporary global knowledge; curricular stagnation; and the brain drain occasioned by the neoliberal onslaught of the 1980s, the African Union Commission (AU) developed a comprehensive ten-year Continental Education Strategy for Africa for the period 2016-2025 (CESA 16-25). This strategy is designed to create a new African citizen who will be an effective change agent for the continent's sustainable development as envisioned by the African Union and its Agenda 2063. Participants from relevant stakeholder groups, including the African Union Commission, AU member state focal agencies for the diaspora and education, government ministries and officials, African diaspora program administrators, academic leaders, strategic partners including the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA), the Pan-African Doctoral Academy (PADA), the Pan African University (PAU), the Association of African Universities (AAU), and funders are represented at the Forum.
Objectives and Outcomes of the Forum
Recognizing the enormous opportunities for synergy between investments in enhancing academic diaspora interventions in African higher education and the AU's manifold visions and frameworks for diaspora inclusion, as evidenced in the establishment of Citizens and Diaspora Directorate (CIDO), a department responsible for leading the AU's engagement with non-state actors through diasporas and civil society, the Continental Forum on the Role of the Diaspora in Higher Education, Research, and Innovation will consolidate the multiple goals set forth within the CESA 16-25 as they relate to the role of the diaspora in higher education, scientific research, and innovation. Objectives include the following:
1. Evaluate past and current African diaspora intervention models and frameworks in the higher education sector in Africa;
2. Identify member states with existing diaspora intervention institutions, policy frameworks, and mechanisms with a view to engaging them to develop a higher education component where absent;
3. Identify challenges and develop strategies to maximize the potential of African diasporas to contribute to higher education;
MY REFLECTIONS ON THE VARIOUS DISCUSSIONS DURING THE OPENING CEREMONY
Raw/unedited
TF
Education
Contemporary Africans should not act as though they are entirely rid of native education system from which they can, like their contemporaries in the world around, tap for the purpose of all-round development. The place of education in human development, beyond ordinary rhetoric, has been proven again and again. Whereas education is cardinal to human advancement, the challenging thing about it is that it could actually be the reason for a people's retrograde if not tactically handled and carefully administered. When Nelson Mandela posited that, "education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world," primary in his conception of the world is the basic human environment. If it is conceded that a people's development project their direction of education and knowledge valuation and it is equally the trajectory to their emancipation in every sense, it would therefore make no meaning that a people's education curriculum is dictated by external variables, which in plain language, takes the development of the second party as a secondary concern. The question, however swallowed by African intellectuals, which must not go unanswered is that, despite the long years after independence, is African continent a consumer or producer of ideologies, philosophies, technologies, political systems amidst other things? The understanding that these things are the basis and foundation of human position makes this question very urgent.
Our experience with the European world has punctuated our history for good, therefore running away from proffering solutions and following them in action is just a way of postponing collective molestation which will be harvested in multiple folds by innocent generations whose future is to be shaped by the current ones. Our situation is ironically unique. Unique because the experience with these invading civilizations has created an adjunct family for us in the transatlantic world, and the failure to map them into our solution finding expedition will mean that we are betraying the familial bond, the genetic ties that are unexplainable by scientific engagement. That blood that connects us makes it essential that we find ways by which we general solutions to problem of unproductivity, stagnancy and passive participation in global advancement. African countries however are beleaguered with leadership whose longest sight about the future spans a little inch above their noses. The fact that they are not seeing the urgency with which the African countries should show unprecedented determination to convert our knowledge economy for some global consumables, as only this can enhance that Africa takes its deserved position in the world.
Therefore, the mountainous challenge of producing graduates in courses that are considered irrelevant in the contemporary world would be faced by the concerted efforts of the academic community and the political leaders. This synergy is needed because the former will structure courses in line with the social expediency as highlighted by the political class who understand those areas where our capital can cover if indeed, we are serious about human advancement. Th Africans in Africa would act in the best interest of communal development when there are good researches that will address the challenges of the African people, the solutions which will help us surmount the hydra headed complications. As implied, the foundation for such paradigm shift is to be determined by the African political leaders, who usually are unserious with genuine and sustainable development. Committing the larger budgetary allocations of the continent security every time reveal that there are structural problems on the security architecture of the continent. If this can be solved, encouraging milestones will be achieved in ways that will factor in the Africa in the diaspora.
Media/Communication
Assertive in one of the challenges that Africans have to overcome is their inappropriate use of the media to promote their establishments. Using media is one of the strategies that has helped the Euro-American world to advance in unquantifiable measures in the twentieth and twenty-first century. And when we say media, we are not limiting our focus on the social media network that has populated the modern world, literatures, infrastructural stunts, cultural redefinition will go a long way in correcting the wrong notions about the African people and will create safety net for the African-Americans to identify with Africa in all ramifications. This therefore is definite not achievable through wishful thinking, the success of it is the reflection of the African academics and official's awareness about those initiatives that will exponentially improve the quality of research carried out to emancipate the African people. The bridge that will connect those Africa in the diaspora should be built with sturdy foundation so that their communication barriers can be convincingly laid to rest. When this is done, the road to African enlightenment, true independence and all-round development will be in the offing.
The Association of African Universities
The enthronement of such union as Association of African Universities (AAU) is premiered to serve the good interest of African knowledge production and establish its position among the community of continents in the world. Higher education in Africa should become the solution hub for the entanglement that has kept putting the continent's effort behind. The great number of African universities should not be for mere numerical strength, the diverse academic perspectives occasioned by their various research approaches should be harnessed for the development of the continent in question. Syncretism is usually a good strategy for advancement. When people' various ideas are joined, they have the force to bring about the desired change and improvement required in every society. Making intricate connections with the African-Americans will introduce another dimension to the African identity which will be difficult to submerge. Building the bond between the Africans in diaspora and those in the continent will create the atmosphere for making indigenous strategies that will topple the imposed hegemonic structures which have dominated the African intellectual space for a long time. The proliferation of external ideologies may actually provide palliative care to the grave challenges facing the continent, it does not however guarantee genuine solution. The reason behind this is that external influence does not take interest in the true emancipation of colonies, rather, it is concerned with continuous suppression of it.
So, when conferences of this nature are organized, it is usually considered to serve more than an avenue to exchange scholarly discoveries, instead it is considered as contemporary village square, as postulated by Chinua Achebe, where communal bonds are strengthened, historical legacies are shared and collective values propagated. Cross-disciplinary exchange will be attained because people would trade ideas dispersively. The synergy coming from the unity of African Universities will come with the potential to transform the African world.
Africans should be proactive because of the ominous signs of the contemporary world which signal that Africans are heading to doom if rescues are not properly put in place when they can. The fact that Africans are not in frontal position in technology, science and economics means that they are at the receiving end of the game. It is not quality education when we produce experts in different areas of study yet we cannot address our daily emerging challenges. Skills acquisition should be given primacy as well so that many younger ones would convert the energy in them to concrete valuables that can be rated and measured in great worth. This will unlock their potentials.
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