The Inaugural Harambean Global Summit: The "Anti-Davos"
Friday, February 28th, 2020. Franschhoek, South Africa.
I’ve met many inspiring leaders in my life, but none quite like Mr. Okendo Lewis-Gayle. Tall as a tree and as warm as the sun, he has a gravitational pull that lifts everyone around him up toward new heights from which a shared vision can be seen.
In 2008, spurred by some personal advice from then Senator Obama, Okendo founded the Harambe Entrepreneur Alliance to cultivate the entrepreneurial spirit on the African continent. Piloted by the Swahili message, “Let’s all put together,” the alliance has become the largest and most powerful network of African ventures, collectively valued at over $1 billion, with over $400 million in investment and support from Y Combinator, Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, CISCO, and others. Notable success stories include Andela, which secured $100 million in funds from Generation Investment management to train 100,000 tech leaders across Africa by 2025, and Flutterwave, which has processed $2.5 billion payments and 100 million transactions processed for its 50 bank partners in Africa attracting major global investment players like Uber and Flywire.
More inspiring than the numbers is the Harambe Declaration itself.
We publish and declare our intention to work together as one to unleash the potential of our people… We refuse to lose our knowledge that man’s proper estate is an upright posture, an intransigent mind and a step that travels unlimited roads… We will check our road and the nature of our battle. Yet in the end, the Africa our generation desires can be won. It exists, it is real, it is possible. It is ours.
After 12 years of grassroots effort, Harambe has secured a compelling track record and support from several of the world’s most powerful foundations. On February 28th, to mark a new era for the alliance, Harambeans, advisors, and supporters gathered in the Franschhoek wine country of South Africa for the inaugural Harambeans Global Summit.
As an advisor to the alliance, I had the undeserved honor of delivering a keynote to kick off the weekend. Below are my remarks.
Keynote for the Harambean Global Summit
I think Okendo is expecting me to speak on AI, but it feels like too small of a topic. So if you’ll indulge me, I’m going to share a reflection that’s been on my heart in preparing for this summit.
Allow me begin with some words from my friend Magatte Wade, who’s a Senegalese entrepreneur I met in my former life as a documentary filmmaker.
[Note: the following is a paraphrased quotation]
I am sick and tired of people putting the poor African chicken farmer on the cover of TIME Magazine. I am sick and tired of people putting the poor African chicken farmer on the cover of TIME Magazine. I do not see you putting a poor, smiling American farmer on that cover. No. You feature Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk. Visionaries who have changed the world. Well there are visionary Africans who are changing the world. But you don’t want to tell that story, do you?
Magatte is not demeaning poor farmers. She’s asserting that subsistence entrepreneurship is far too low of a bar for this continent. This is the soft bigotry of low expectations. (Gerson)
Okendo has a vision for this summit to one day garner the same level of influence as the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. I believe it could. But I told Okendo, I don’t want this to be the new Davos. I want it to be the anti-Davos. Because Davos belongs to the colonial super-elite, who from their atmospheric heights of wealth and power, benevolently give Africa a seat at their table, while their PR teams work tirelessly to make sure no good deed goes unnoticed.
But this place, this summit, it belongs to you.
Here, in South Africa, we stand in the long shadows of colonialism and apartheid, a mere microcosm of the racial holocaust spanning 600 years from here to Europe and across the Atlantic. We live in a fallen world. We’ve done terrible violence to one another.
But it seems appropriate that we gather here in a place of such natural majesty, a garden of Eden in which our hearts can be revived by a shared vision of what could be for this rich and wonderful continent. It seems appropriate that we are tipping the globe on its head, standing on top of the world from this southernmost place.
Like resetting an hour glass. This is a new beginning.
I must say, I admire so much what you ladies and gentlemen do. Especially you women, because as hard as entrepreneurship is, we all know you have to work twice as hard. I’m sorry that’s the case. I know I speak on behalf of the men in this room when I pledge my support to you.
I used to call myself an entrepreneur, but later I realized I was just self employed. Sure I started a couple of LLC’s and did contract work for some non-profits. But the reason I now work in AI research sitting between academia and industry, is because true entrepreneurs are very rare. And I’m not one, at least not at this stage in my life. Nevertheless in playing entrepreneur for a few years and meeting many, many true entrepreneurs, I came to a deeper appreciation for what it really means.
We talk about goods and services, generally in econometric terms. But as entrepreneurs I hope you think more deeply about the true meaning of these words.
I hope you will not just make goods, but offer goodness to someone. I hope you will not just sell services but truly serve others. These are the core values of entrepreneurship. And they require relentless, focused, commitment and active listening over time. And the company you keep in this endeavor, THIS is your company. Persons, not just workers. Brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, not just customers and suppliers and investors. Business is a fundamentally social activity. And business is the normative way in which people rise of out poverty all over the world.
So in your appropriate pursuit of profit, don’t lose sight of what profit really is: It’s a feedback mechanism for the service and the good you are trying to provide to others. Entrepreneurship is hard and you will need every fiber of your minds and hearts to succeed. But make no mistake. You are here because you do have what it takes. In sports, there’s a term “bulletin board material.” In locker rooms, athletes will post articles and headlines by all their detractors, to make themselves hungry to prove those doubters wrong.
So let me give you some bulletin board material. A few months ago, I was Christmas shopping in a very hip, progressive shopping center in Boston. And in successive stores I visited, the song “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” was playing. Let me read you the lyrics:
Pray for the “other ones”
At Christmastime it’s hard, but when you’re having fun
There’s a world outside your window
And it’s a world of dread and fear
Where the only water flowing
Is the bitter sting of tears
And the Christmas bells that ring there are the
clanging chimes of doom
Well tonight thank God it’s them instead of you
And there won’t be snow in Africa this Christmastime
The greatest gift they’ll get this year is life
Where nothing ever grows
No rain nor rivers flow
Do they know it’s Christmastime at all?
For over 30 years, this has been one of the most played Christmas songs in America. And despite people like myself criticizing it in well-known films like Poverty, Inc. and asking shopkeepers one at a time to remove it from their playlists, the song continues playing. And in the subconscious of our culture, so too does the sentiment.
The truth is, the truth Magatte Wade was striking at, is that for all the talk about entrepreneurship, empowerment and development, we haven’t believed in you. For too long, deep down, we have believed you to be lesser. And for too long, you have believed it too. As a friend of mine said to me yesterday, this continent has a giant case of imposter syndrome.
But here, in this place, in this community, I think we can all see that changing. And you know what. It doesn’t matter what you those doubters think. You have everything you need right here. On this continent. In your land. In your culture. In your people. In your capital. In your poetry and in your industry. In most of all the pan-African spirit that has proven to be the most resilient in the world.
Yes, there are many problems here. But what is business about if not about solving problems?
So it might seem crazy to think that one day this summit will have influence on par with the World Economic Forum in Davos. But I have learned to never underestimate my friend Okendo Lewis-Gayle and the company he keeps, nor indeed to never underestimate the African spirit.
I’m here representing IBM Research and the MIT-IBM Watson AI Lab. We do fundamental research, publishing in the top scientific conferences and working with some of the biggest companies in the world. Before this I did an MBA in finance at MIT and did blockchain technology research at the MIT Media Lab.
[Here I went off script and discussed the importance of African involvement in the development of artificial intelligence.]
Please come find me if you’d like to chat more about AI, business strategy, or anything else you like. I’m here to learn from you and I’m here to be supportive of you however I can be.
I feel truly honored to be among so many bright young leaders and true entrepreneurs.
Thank you.