In an era filled with so many plans and visions, which are often never followed through with any form of concrete action, this title was the theme which the Oxford Africa Society decided to give to its 2018 conference. The Oxford Africa Conference is an annual student-run gathering, with an audience of about 350 people from across Africa and its diaspora held at Oxford University, England.

This year marked its 8th year running, and the organising committee deliberately chose this theme to ensure that keynote speakers, panellists and delegates to the conference sought to identify solution-driven approaches to deal with the contemporary challenges and opportunities within the African continent. The theme of this year conference could best be described by the famous mantra of Karl Marx when he said that the greatest ‘philosophes have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the point, however, is to change it’.

The conference itself is renowned for bringing a range of people from different sectors that have a strong belief in African partnerships to resolve African problems and create new prosperous paths. By no means is this just another student-run event, with the conference in its recent history having been able to attract prolific continental leaders to be keynote speakers, including among others Mrs Graça Machel, an international advocate for women’s and children’s rights; Michel Elsie Kanza, the African regional head of the World Economic Forum; and entrepreneurs like Jason Njoku, Founder of Iroko TV.

The keynote speakers for the 2018 conference were led by none other than the President of Ghana, His Excellency Nana Akufo-Addo, Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations, Mrs Amaina J. Mohammed, the President and CEO of the U.S. African Development Foundation (USADF), Mr C.D. Glin and the First Lady of the Republic of Namibia, Mrs Monica Geingos. The conference then draws from young people from across Africa in various fields to participate as panelists and share their experience with delegates.

One can therefore imagine the levels of excitement when on the 22nd of February 2018, I received a letter from Ms Noxolo Ntaka, one of the co-chairs of the conference, requesting I speak on the youth political panel that would deal with the topic ‘Too young to lead? A generation of leaders in party politics and elected public office’.  Upon making an enquiry on how I had been selected, I was informed that some of the South African students who were members of the Oxford African Society had been tracing my work since my days as an SRC President at Wits University, as well as serving as the National Deputy President of South African SRC task team, Higher education task teams, my participation as an ANC member and the work we were doing as the Gauteng Provincial Government.

I will be the first to admit that as humbling as the invite was, for most youth activist who belong to the mass democratic movement, we are conditioned to critique the context, format and nature of such international gatherings. It’s almost always ideologically frowned upon to be seen participating in such forums, particularly as a graduate of the South African Student Congress (SASCO), when such a conference is held in a ‘western country’, particularly those which have a strong history of colonialism and apartheid apologism.

Here are two inherent concerns that I knew I had to first deal with before accepting such an invite. The first critique is that I knew I would have to ask and equally be in a position to answer the question ‘why is a conference discussing challenges faced by Africans in Africa not being held in Africa?’ This was best answered by Dr Vuyani Mhlomi, a medical doctor from South Africa who had been based in Oxford for the last four to five years. Having completed his PhD and now studying towards his MBA degree at the University, Dr Mhlomi answered this question so profoundly by unpacking how they, as African students based in Oxford, had the responsibility through the Oxford Africa Society, to deliberately open up the doors of opportunity, empowerment and resource which for years had been an impossibility for so many people of colour, who by their very nature of being underprivileged would never set foot in a university of such stature. More important was the fact that in building a post-colonial society, hosting a conference of such magnitude for African students across the continent and its diasporas in Oxford, was in itself an act for those based as students at the university.

With the first concern having been resolved, the secondary question which was halting my participation was ‘to what extent is this not another talk shop that does little to resolve the material condition faced by our people on the ground?’ This was a far easier question to resolve than the first one. The nature of the conference is that delegates  are screened and selected to attend on the basis that there is  a portfolio of trailblazing work in the country, be it in the private sector, NGO, government, creative arts, medicine, etc. To top it off, the theme of this year was specifically crafted such that the recommendations of conference would be consolidated so that they could be sent as submissions to the African Union and the regional groups such as SADC and ECOWAS.

When these two questions had been answered, it was clear that by all means necessary I had to work at ensuring attendance at this festival of ideas for the benefit of enriching the work that one was doing back at home here in South Africa, and so on the 16th of May I took my first ever international flight to go participate in the Oxford Africa Conference.

The conference was truly all I had expected it to be and in fact more. Very few conferences have the ability to have so many cross cutting themes, and still manage to ensure that the discussions are focused, deal with tangible solutions that are targeted, measurable and achievable. The panels of the conference had nine focal areas which included:

1. Curbing Unconstitutional Changes of Government through Constitutionalism & Citizen Movements
2. Shaping an Inclusive Business Landscape:  Foreign Direct Investment for Social Progress & Innovation
3. “____” is (un)African. Lifting the Rug on LGBTIAQ+ Identity
4. Addressing Mental Health – Africa’s Invisible Epidemic
5. African Art & Media – Its role in Entertainment and Public Expressions on Social and Cultural Issues
6. Adapting to Climate Change in Africa – Tackling Financing, Collaboration, Energy Production & Job Creation for Resilient Development
7. Not too Young to Lead – A New Generation of Leaders in Party Politics and Elected Public Office
8. Shaping an Inclusive Business Landscape:  Foreign Direct Investment for Social Progress & Innovation
9. A Disruptive Digital Revolution – Utilizing Emerging Alternative  Technologies to Tackle Africa’s Challenges

The conference also had two additional aspects over and above the panel sessions and keynote address geared toward catalysing action among attendees. The first was workshop sessions which we held on the second day of conference to allow delegates to share experience of how their respective countries were dealing with the subject matter. These related mainly to areas on;

• Fast tracking Universal Health Coverage – Innovations for Delivery
• Rethinking Education –  Skills Development for Employment, Research and Innovation
• Equipping the Individual Actor: Unleashing Creative and Innovative Potential for Impact

The last component worth reflecting on was the conference innovation fair. The innovation fair brings together entrepreneurs and innovators tackling challenges in Africa. They participate in networking sessions and a pitch competition for a chance to win cash prizes to further their impact.

I was most challenged by a project named ECOACT, based in Tanzania. ECOACT is a project which has developed a chemical free, energy conserving plastic technology to recycle and transform plastic garbage and packaging materials into durable plastic timbers using unique technology. Plastic timbers are an affordable alternative to wood timbers. They reduce the need for building material manufactured from wood.

What really caught my eye however about this initiative is how they have been able to link recycling to increasing access to health care. In the areas in which ECOACT is based in Tanzania, there is a challenge of affordability of quality health care. The returns that community members receive from bringing litter and rubbish is that the project pays for your health care fees for up to a year.

The panel that I had been invited to speak on required us to interrogate the role of young people in public office and elected office. Fellow panel members included the Deputy Information Minister of Ghana, Ms Nana Ama Dokua and Advocate Fadzayi Mahere, an independent candidate running for office in the 2018 Zimbabwe general elections.

As a member of the ANC Youth League, this was bound to be a tricky topic to handle on the panel while maintaining some level of moral high ground. A league of a governing party has the difficulty of rallying young people of the country behind the banner, policies and program of its mother body, while at the same time ensuring that the mother body is responsive to the challenges of youth and resolves them. Since the disbandment of the 24th National Executive Committee of the ANC Youth League in 2013, its credibility as a vanguard of the youth of South Africa has been called into question. Too often it has allowed itself to be used as a mouthpiece and hired gun for the dominant faction within the ANC, without it being linked to any principle but rather some political patronage network beneficial for a few and not the youth in general. This has left the league, and invariably its members who toe the line, isolated from the majority of the youth in South Africa and unable to galvanise them behind anything.

In 2016, Stats SA recorded that an estimated 36.2% of the total population were young people between the age of 15-36. The panel discussion showed how there exist high levels of unemployment among youth across the continent, and that South Africa in the second quarter of 2017 showed sky rocketing figures of 67% from those younger than 25 years. The importance of how the fees must fall movement in South Africa was able to bring together youths from different political parties and walks of life, was highlighted to show that the youth is not apathetic, but rather requires a credible vehicle to push its cause.

Advocate Fadzayi took the panel through a detailed presentation on why she had decided that running as independent, in a country like Zimbabwe, was the best approach if she wanted to substantially change the political landscape in her country. Her hopes are geared at being one of Zimbabwe’s youngest members of parliament. To do this, she has taken a digitalised social media campaign aimed at first time voters. Within months of her campaign she already has a social media reach of over 107 600 followers, which is impressive when one considers the population size in Zimbabwe.

Deputy Minister Nana Ama Dokua, who although made it to parliament through partisan politics gave practical examples of how even though she was a member of the national executive, she was still subjected to gender bias which prescribed certain social norms and patterns for women which men were not obliged to follow. This was a constant reminder that intersectionality with our politics was needed and should never be abandoned.

In reflecting on the presentation of our panel, the ideological foundation was set, and agreed upon by all speakers, that in order for this generation to ensure concrete paths for our people there was a need to ensure we deal with the triple challenges of unemployment, poverty and equality, particularly in relation to its effect on African women.

In the immediate, some of the proposals were that respective governments must resolve the issues of access to quality higher education, including a diversified higher education that is not solely reliant on traditional methods of education like universities.

In dealing with the unemployment of the youth, demand-led learning had to be a priority, such that training and skills development are linked to verifiable market demand. The facilitation of young entrepreneurs and focusing on township and rural areas was important in narrowing the high levels of inequality that exist in Africa.

The final report of the conference is still to be put together by the organising committee, but one can safely rate the Oxford Africa conference a solid 8/10. It became a platform in which ‘a hundred flowers bloomed and a hundred school of thoughts contended’. It's upon each and every one of us as delegates to the conference to ensure that the partnerships and learning we all received from each other over the grilling three days in Oxford become concrete action for change for our people.

Written by Tebogo Thothela. He currently works for the Gauteng Department of Health in the office of the MEC as an Assistant Parliamentary Liaison Officer. He is continuing with his studies, currently pursuing a post graduate diploma in law with the intention of qualifying for conversion to masters’ study in June 2018, with the focal area being International Trade, Economics and Law.