Two ASU graduate students want to help the African people use their own resources to become independently sustainable.
Co-founders of The Africa Initiative Project Nubert Boubeka and Michael Ayodele hosted the First International Symposium on Africa at Manzanita Hall on the Tempe campus Friday to promote ttheir developmental initiatives.
“[The conference] is about bringing an African voice to the ASU community,” said Boubeka, a liberal studies graduate student. “There are no universities or colleges speaking about Africa the way we want it to be spoken.”
At the conference, scholars, graduate students and government officials explored environmental issues, discussed the disparities in health and delivery systems, promoted justice and social awareness and analyzed the extent of domestic political cooperation in Africa.
Boubeka said the public discourse helped identify positive actions that can be taken to address the issues of concern in Africa like malaria and the environment.
“Looking at issues where it matters is really helpful for getting people to engage in these initiatives,” Boubeka said. “You have a lot of initiative that goes on paper, but you have to go to the land, you have to go to save people.”
Boubeka said he hopes to go to Africa and teach people about the programs that have worked in other countries and show them how to use their resources to create similar programs that will stabilize their economy, government and society.
A year from now the Africa Initiative Project will host another conference to address the progress the project has made, the challenges it faced and how it can improve and expand its efforts, Boubeka said.
The conference featured keynote speaker Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of African Affairs and the former Ambassador to the Republic of Guinea Phillip Carter III.
Carter discussed U.S. foreign relations in Africa, democracy and human rights promotion political participation and what this means for Africa’s future.
University of Arizona law professor and guest speaker Leslye Obiora said the framework in Africa is not working properly. It is up to the African people to catalyze their own development, she said.
“The Africans need to do it for themselves,” Obiora said. “A lot of that capacity is already there lying latent. It’s just how we can harness that which is there and improve it and use it to the purposes that are much more talented and strategic.”
Obiora said a partnership among the world’s key players to support developmental projects in Africa will incite change on a fundamental level. Educating Africans is an invaluable gift, and is something financial aid alone cannot accomplish.
“It sounds far-fetched that the African Union would actually ever take a lead in Africa’s development,” Obiora said.
“But if you look at where it was a few years ago and where it is now, it’s really made incredible strides and gives grounds for hope that the best is yet to come for [Africa].”
Reach the reporter at lauren.gambino@asu.edu.
