Mo Ibrahim
African leaders work really under severe limitations and constraints.
I never set out really to build a financial empire or to be a wealthy man.
The way forward for Africa is investment.
Young people are better educated. They grew up in a society which is well connected, well informed. They are able to communicate to one another, to know what is happening.
The African Development Bank is one of the most aggressive advocates of regional integration.
Nobody messes with China, nobody messes with the United States, or with Europe, because these are really big entities with a lot of clout and a lot of economic power. They have a place at the table.
The leakage of information means you're going to be able to read everybody's e-mail.
We need to keep pressure on our own governments to force more and more transparency.
We measure everything - why not governance?
Africa's success stories are delivering the whole range of the public goods and services that citizens have a right to expect and are forging a path that we hope more will follow.
Africa is underpopulated. We have 20% of the world's landmass and 13% of its population.
Africa is rich, and why are we poor then if our continent is rich. It is not right.
Every man, woman and child knows about Mugabe, but people say, 'Mogae, who is that?'
Modern slavery is a hidden crime and notoriously difficult to measure.
Positive market incentives operating in the public interest are too few and far between, and are also up against a seemingly never-ending expansion of perverse incentives and lobbying.
Africa offers the highest return on investment in the world.
The issue with international institutions is that there is a crisis of legitimacy. Trust in these institutions is a serious problem.
The Security Council represents the situation from 1945 - you had the Allies who won the war who occupied that. The defeated guys - the Germans and Japan - were out. The occupied countries had no voice. That was fine in '45, but today, Germany rules Europe, frankly. They are driving Europe but have no voice.
Look at the international bodies that came out of U.N. - international, publicly funded bodies that neither you or I know their names, because they are completely outdated and still publicly funded because there are no sunset clauses.
Young people, all too often, find their interests overlooked and their voices ignored.
Experience counts in government even more than in business.
It's time Africa started listening to our young people instead of always telling them what to do.
Remarkably, governments are beginning to embrace the idea that nothing enhances democracy more than giving voice and information to everybody in the country. Why not open their books if they have nothing to hide?
Mexico established a unique three-part governing system shared by the government, the information commission and civil society organisations.
Challenging vested interests requires a government's full commitment.
Mobile phones could not work in Africa without prepaid because it's a cash society.
Mobile phones play a really wonderful role in enabling civil society. As well as empowering people economically and socially, they are a wonderful political tool.
Billions of dollars are thrown at African countries.
It is very difficult for any dictator or any incumbent to falsify the results of an election and just get away with it.
Make as much money as you can, but can you please pay your taxes, because this is a major problem.
Transfer pricing is causing huge problems in Africa.
Before any investor goes into any country, he is looking for the exit door.
The U.S. has been a great friend all these years, but as soon as Africa found itself starting to move up, the U.S. is really disengaging.
Now is the time for Afro-realism: for sound policies based on honest data, aimed at delivering results.
Compared to developed countries, or even to some major emerging countries, burdened by aging populations, financial crises, widening budget deficits, faltering faith in politics and growing social demands, Africa has become the world's last 'New Frontier:' a kind of 'it-continent.'
In a world of growing food demand, Africa is home to two-thirds of the world's unexploited arable land.
All we hear about Africa in the West is Darfur, Zimbabwe, Congo, Somalia, as if that is all there is.
Mobile communications had been around for a long time, but always as a limited market, constrained by the radio spectrum.
Tony Blair is paid $500,000 for one speech, and no one asks how he is going to spend it.
What we need in Africa is balanced development. Economic success cannot be a replacement for human rights or participation or democracy... it doesn't work.
Literacy in Tunisia is almost 100%. It's amazing - no country in the region or even in Asia can match Tunisia in education.
The Ibrahim Index is a tool to hold governments to account and frame the debate about how we are governed.
Everywhere in Africa, you see Indian, Chinese, Brazilian businesses. Other than Coca Cola and the oil companies, it is very rare to see American businesses.
If we are to build grassroots respect for the institutions and processes that constitute democracy, the state must treat its citizens as real citizens rather than as subjects.
We cannot expect loyalty to an unjust regime.
The state and its elites must be subject, in theory and in practice, to the same laws that its poorest citizens are.
Not any amount of aid is going to move Africa forward.
Societies are not sustainable without institutions.
If you are African, the more educated you are, the less chances you have of getting a job.