Africa-Press – Namibia. VISITING Zimbabwean public speaker, author and musician Joshua Maponga is set to speak on his book ‘Find Your Truth’ in Winhoek this week, in which he challenges African governments to prioritise locals in creating business opportunities.
Maponga, who is currently visiting Namibia to participate at the One Africa narrative through a one-night event at the National Theatre of Namibia on Friday, yesterday spoke to Desert Radio 95.3FM. His visit in Namibia will end with a men’s conference at Katima Mulilo.
Maponga is also taking part in a three-country tour of the Southern African Development Community in partneship with Poiyah Media. He said land remains a vital empowerment tool in changing the lives of previously disadvantaged communities, and calls for countries in Africa to shun borders.
“If Africans can come together with 2,8 billion people, we can come up with the concept of one financial system, one stock exchange, for example, one military base, and we may even get a seat on the United Nations Security Council,” he said.
He said the failure of Africans to unite has resulted in the continent failing to secure a security council seat.
According to Maponga, the African renaissance movement needs to extend financial, cultural, military, academic, linguistic and entertainment conversations.
“I’m actually interested to see how the government will respond, and in this basic concept of building new cities and attracting the diaspora environment to come and invest money in that space, and I’m passionate about that project,” he said.
He said there is a need for African countries, including Namibia, to start prioritising the use of their natural resources for the betterment of local lives.
“I want us to look at the bigger picture that I think is absolutely 100% African and is filled with natural resources.
“We have many resources that can improve our day-to-day operations as Africans, but a lot of African countries have been struggling to do that over the past few years,” he said.
“The southern African region, including Zimbabwe, Botswana, South Africa and Namibia, needs to understand that we are one.
“I wonder why we build cities in the desert in the middle of nowhere, where there are no resources, there’s nothing, whereas here the beautiful paradise with a dam with water, the Chobe and Zambezi meeting Botswana, Namibia, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Angola just a few kilometres away . . . how about we begin to talk about building new, ecologically friendly cities?”
He said continued disunity on the African continent has resulted in Africa failing to confront challenges on a global scale.
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