Emira Woods @ Women Ambassadors Conference @ Howard University

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Emira Woods, female parliamtentarians in Africa, gender parity in Africa, Howard University, IPS, pan-Africanism, Women Ambassadors Conference

Yesterday I ventured to Howard University to hear Emira Woods of the Institute for Policy Studies speak on Militarism in Africa, primarily through the recent examples of the Central African Republic and Mali.  The occasion for this talk was the 19th annual Women Ambassadors Conference.  The Conference continues today and tomorrow.  I understand that seven of the 23 female ambassadors resident in DC will be present tomorrow as well as the female Ambassador of the African Union to the US.

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Kah Walla – “It’s the politics, stupid.” (Guest Post)

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Africa Rising, Cameroon, emerging Africa, gender parity in Africa, Ghana, Kah Walla

By Angie Tyler, Graduate Student at SAIS at Johns Hopkins

Kah Walla, entrepreneur, activist and former presidential candidate from Cameroon gave a short presentation on Thursday at Georgetown MSFS titled, “Africa is Rising. Are Africans?” and then spent most of the time on Q&A. She said that she chose her theme based on her recent trip to Ghana where she found that despite impressive statistics on economic growth her conversations with Ghanaian citizens revealed a different reality.  Apart from a few exceptions, she argued, most African countries have not been able to translate their vast economic potential into health and wealth for their citizens, which led her to ask, “Why is there such a disparity between the potential and the reality?” In a word…GOVERNANCE. She says Africa is not poor, but poorly run and lacks visionary leaders and strong democratic institutions.