The origin of brain drain in Africa can be traced to the Portuguese contact with the ancient Bini Empire when the son of the Oba was sent to the court of Portugal, one of the most powerful empires at that time to learn their ways and transmit his knowledge to the development of his empire back home.
Many nationalists such as the Great Zik of Africa, Obafemi Awolowo, Hastings Kamuzu Banda, Kwame Nkrumah, Jomo Kenyatta amongst many others sought educational refuge abroad. It is arguable that the decolonization process may have been slower if not for the brain drain of some of the founding fathers.
Osagyefo Kwame Nkrumah opined that African nations should seek ye first the political kingdom and all other things shall be added unto them. How wrong was he when ruinous economic policies pushed the brightest and the best of African minds into economic exile in the west? Many African Nations subscribed to the disastrous policies of the International Monetary Fund by yanking off subsidies on critical sectors of the economy such as healthcare and education. The homegrown clone – Structural Adjustment Programme made many skilled Africans who had acquired training in the west and Asia flee the continent to escape poverty and repression. The loser is ultimately Africa as the skills of many of her compatriots is being used to develop already developed countries. The bargaining power of these African nations is very weak in the global market as a result of the dearth of skilled manpower. The world has since moved from the era of dependence on natural resources to that of human resources. The examples of the Asian tigers such as Singapore, Malaysia, Japan, China and South Korea are clear testimonies to this novel reality. Africa lags seriously behind since the bulk of its supposed skill force is in exile with no intentions of returning home soon.
How can this trend be urgently reversed? We can borrow from the India example. The Information Technology revolution saw India leapfrog into the latest destination for outsourcing of IT services from Europe and America to the once largely poverty stricken country. They positioned themselves in the late 1980’s and 1990’s with the aid of some of their successful professionals and home grown government policies that saw them as alternatives for cheaper provision of IT services to power and service the needs of the west. The local Silicon Valley in Bangalore is a billion dollar industry and the country is home to Infosys which is an IT giant in its own right. The telecommunications boom didn’t catch them napping as call centre operations were moved to the largely Hindu country as their services were far cheaper than what obtained in the west. The country is fast becoming a medical Mecca as the quality of their medical services is highly competitive and cheaper than what obtains in the west. Chile under the dictator, Augusto Pinochet who ruled with an iron fist from 1973 to 1990 was still able to attract the best of Chilean brains in the Economics Faculty of the University of California Berkeley back home. These brains popularly known as the Berkeley mafia fashioned out home grown economic policies that swiftly got the Latin American country out of the woods. Japan was battered after the Second World War with the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. By 1964, barely 19 years after the bombardment, they were hosting the world in the Olympic Games held in the capital, Tokyo. Their strategy was to develop smaller cars which made use of far less petrol or gas and give the westerners a run for their money in their own countries. Japan was able to achieve this economic miracle in less than two decades.
Some level of patriotism is required of successful Africans in the Diaspora. It may be foolhardy to migrate back completely but collaborations can be made with talented Africans back home through outsourcing of certain services. Who says that a Bangalore can’t be created in Africa? Despite the myriad of challenges of doing business in Nigeria, Innoson, an indigenous company was able to create the nation’s first motor car. A little aid in terms of favourable government economic policies by way of tax breaks amongst others is necessary for this car to be globally competitive. We are currently in the era of exportable human capital development and Africa needs to position itself to tap from this current global opportunity as the world has gone flat apologies to Thomas Friedman. Rather than running abroad and facing indignities in the process of getting visas, we can position ourselves to render cheaper services for the west and earn significant revenue in the process of doing so. We should move our thinking away from the rapidly dwindling natural resources and look inwards. The fall of the oil prices globally which hit Nigeria – ‘Giant of Africa’ so badly should serve as a gargantuan lesson and should make us put on our thinking cap – pain sharpens the brain apologies to Adolf Hitler.
The time to act is now!
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