Africa: Foreign Investments or throwing Away of your Resources - By Gabriel Olatuja.
Connect with Gabriel Olatuja on LinkedIn.
No foreign investor invests in your country or startups/SMEs in your country to help you, they do so for their own interests and profitability.
Seeking foreign (direct) investment means seeking to dash out your nations resources and economy. Your foreign investors repatriate their profits back to their own countries to boost their economy and GDP, leaving your country with nothing.
The only way Africans can boost African economy is not by seeking foreign investments but by Africans investing in African businesses in form of angel investment, private equity funding and crowdfunding. This means national profit retention rather than repatriation that comes with foreign investments. This consequentially boost the nation's national GDP which will rob off on the nations sectors, economy, and citizens.
Rich Africans should invest in African SMEs, startups, innovations, inventions, research and development.
Individuals and youth should help raise funds through Crowdfunding for businesses, patronize the businesses and support to make them viable. Imagine a crowdfunding where 100,000 backers (0.0005%) of Nigerian population raise 1,000NGN for a startup. That is N100,000,000.
Imagine 1,000,000 (0.005% of Nigerian population) crowdfunding 1,000NGN for one or two businesses. That is N1,000,000,000 (1 billion Naira). This is a fund that so many startups find difficult to get from foreign investors. Even those who got it are being ripped off, lost ownership and control and the country is left with little or nothing from the profit.
Businesses that get local funding and support have high possibility to succeed and will boosting economy, create job opportunities aside the primary goal of problem solving.
Nigerians travelling out to other continents for studies are encouraged to return to their home countries as soon as they complete their education to help uplift their home countries and Africa at large. We must be responsible for our own lives. The countries many of us go to were built by their citizens, not foreigners. We need to reciprocate same in our countries.
The disadvantages of foreign investments far outweigh the benefits in startup funding which includes lost of ownership and control for the entrepreneurs.
It's high time Nigerians and all Africans rose up to defend and protect our economy.
Who says we can't build a non-partisan social media platform to accommodate the African community rather than depending solely on foreign platforms for everything.
In China, the combination of technological barriers, content control, data localization requirements, and regulatory measures has effectively limited the presence of international social media platforms in China, allowing domestic platforms to dominate the market and align with the government's objectives and policies in terms of economic development goals.
Enough of constantly going out to buy debt from those who are most indebted. It's time to desist from western dependencies and be productive in all aspects. These will alleviate poverty and debt.
Price of fuel is N850, a paint container of Gari is about N3,500, beans is N6,500, even in mile 12 market. Feeding is now difficult for everyone. No economic power to feed well, no food to buy. Individuals should come together and privately invest into agriculture. State governments should go all in to agriculture and work with local farmers to cultivate food and cash crops for local consumption and foreign exchange. From economic hardship, fuel scarcity to food scarcity, all the solutions lie on our hands.
No one will build your country for you. Building your country is your responsibility.
In as much as I'm not against foreign investment or international trade and not against positive western impacts on the continent of Africa, my voice is calling on Nigerians to build Nigeria and Africans to build Africa. No foreigner or foreign government will do it for us.
This is a clarion call to all citizens, let's be creative. Let's be innovative. Let's support innovations and inventions. Let's depend on each other for greatness.
Economic Community of West African States, ECOWAS should be joint-partners in building the economy of West African States through innovation in engineering, technology, business and development. Our goal of coming together as a cohort shouldn't be solely for political dominance.
ECOWAS should put resources together and implement sustainable projects in member States. Why can't ECOWAS build refineries and focus on other problems that face the member states?
Africa, Arise! We have all we need to make Africa strongly viable first-world nations. We have the resources from natural resources to human resources. It's time to loose ourselves from slavery and neocolonialism.
I, Gabriel Olatuja, I am committed to building Nigeria, defend the shores of Africa and her interests.
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