“There is more to the continent than we realise – including optimism,” Dr Jonathan Lawley told last week’s Humanities seminar at Rhodes University.
The Rhodes alumnus was visiting his old university to discuss his recently published book, Beyond the Malachite Hills, A life of Colonial Service and Business in the New Africa.
“There is more to the continent than we realise – including optimism,” Dr Jonathan Lawley told last week’s Humanities seminar at Rhodes University.
The Rhodes alumnus was visiting his old university to discuss his recently published book, Beyond the Malachite Hills, A life of Colonial Service and Business in the New Africa.
Lawley is a management consultant with experience in developing indigenous African technical management. His book looks at the African continent, its recent history and its hopeful future.
“I wrote
this book mainly out of memory, from my head. I’m lucky I have a good memory,” he said. Beyond the Malachite Hills has two key aspects to it.
Firstly, Lawley tells the story of his years working in Zambia, Zimbabwe, the DRC, Morocco, Mauritius and Namibia. Secondly, he writes about wht he calls “the modern African nation”.
He takes a different approach to Africa’s colonial past by looking at our present and towards our future for hope.
In his book, he insists on the need for Africa to learn fast, embrace modernity and cultivate a confidence in the management of our continent.
The book talks of how aid and debt-wavering can be detrimental to Africa in the long run. “I believe in business, I don’t believe in aid.
Africa needs investment and trade from the West,” Lawley told the seminar. Those outside Africa need to end the patronising relationship they have with Africa, substituting it for a more positive one and working together as partners in the evolution of Africa.
His book highlights Africa’s key needs: the need to overcome a dependency mentality which has arisen from historical stereotyping and discrimination;
the need to recognise the futility and dangers of over promotion and window shopping; the need to recognise that real decision making should reflect local needs and local realities; and the need to develop and train the effective managers Africa requires.
One of the key solutions Lawley offers is that the West should “cut back on the aid and let the continent fend for itself ”, in the hope that this will break the dependency mentality and let the continent recognise that their future is in their own hands.
Lawley feels the continent needs to work as a whole with the West. It is not simply a matter of “come in out of the garden and have some tea”.
Rather, he feels there needs to be “less emphasis on race and more emphasis on training the new skilled black class”.
Beyond the Malachite Hills aims to provide insight into the inner workings of management within Africa, and displays a hope and passion for the future.
Prof Kenneth Ingham, vice-president of the Royal African Society, has said of the book that Lawley “is not writing about the end in Africa, but about Africa’s future.
This is an inspiring piece of writing because it not only expressed hope, but also offers practical advice on converting hope into reality.”
