My Beauty Best Teacher

Continuing our coverage of foundations we now take a look at the Mo Ibrahim Foundation which has announced a $5million prize that:

Recognises former executive Heads of State or Government in sub-Saharan Africa who have dedicated their constitutional tenure of office to surmounting the development challenges of their country, improving the welfare of their people and consolidating the foundations for sustainable development.

G. Pascal Zachary writes:

"Saving" Africans is all the rage among celebrities. Hollywood is releasing a string of African morality tales, from "The Last King of Scotland," about Idi Amin's capricious rule, to "Blood Diamonds," the story of a white smuggler in West Africa who has pangs of regret over his misdeeds....By reducing Africans to the status of props in an American morality play, Africans are themselves robbed of some measure of their dignity, which is why a number of Malawians are upset by Madonna's fast-track adoption.

StockMarketNigeria writes about the benefits of Railway Transportation:

The first phase of the Lagos-Kano railway line project is to cost $8.3 billion, of which $2 billion of the amount has already been obtained as a soft loan from the Chinese government. The numerous benefits of the project as announced by the president includes:

· Utilization of local raw materials as much as possible,

·Increase in traffic of goods and passengers around Nigeria,

· Retaining the top rating of important commercial cities like Lagos, Aba and Kano as key commodity-trading points in West Africa,

· And, reduction of road accidents in Nigeria

Allan Brian Ssenyonga writes

The African immigration phenomenon has had different outcomes but one of the most significant yet overlooked is the aspect of remittances. This refers to the money sent back home by the immigrants. For sometime now, remittances have become an important aspect as far as the development of Africa and other poorer nations is concerned. Many Africans living and working in Europe and USA are working hard to maintain their families back home. On receiving their pay cheque, many send almost 60 % of their earnings back home to help foot medical bills of aging parents, pay school dues for school going siblings and relatives as well as establishing income generating projects...although Africa is losing so much in terms of skilled labour, it is also gaining a lot from the huge sums of money sent back home that are directly pumped into the local economy and therefore lead to economic development.

Ashraf Ghani on TEDTalks presents a case for Mobilising Capital to enable State Building:

Full disclosure, Emeka Okafor publisher of Timbuktu Chronicles and Africa Unchained is the co-producer for the TED Global Arusha event.

PSD Blog reports on the WSJ's coverage of Africa's Bull markets:

The continent's so-called frontier markets, such as Nigeria, Kenya, Ghana, Mauritius and Botswana, are up an average of 26% so far this year in dollar terms, according to Liquid Africa. By comparison, the MSCI Emerging Market Index, which includes just three African countries -- South Africa, Egypt and Morocco -- has risen 9.5% during the same period.

If you haven't heard this story, it's because the numbers are still small. The London Stock Exchange is five times as big as all African stock markets combined. And South Africa's exchange is 2/3 of the African total.

Reviews of Roel van der Veen's incisive "What Went Wrong with Africa" state that :

"This work is commendable on several counts. First, it is arguably one of the most ambitious syntheses of contemporary African history and politics to date, combining the study of internal and external factors, usually treated separately in the literature under the rubrics of African politics and African international relations. Furthermore, van der Veen adops a unique multi-disciplinary perspective, as well as a long-term historical perspective, rightly arguing that 'in order to understand Africa's present-day situation, we must look not only at outside influences but also at long-term, indigenous African elements'"--African Studies Review
"[a]ny personal, professional, or academic library reference collection strong in African social issues and history won't want to miss Roeel Van Der Veen's powerful What Went Wrong with Africa, charting the unprecedented changes in people's standards of living in Africa over the years. Africa is the only large contiguous region left out of the worldwide rise in prosperity: What Went Wrong with Africa seeks to explain why."--Library Bookwatch