Do Not Give up On Africa: A Case for Frontier Markets. Andrea Balongo

“Class of 2015, I stand before you as a Pan-Africanist and an Afro-optimist. Do not give up on Africa.”

-Hon. Raila Odinga, Kenyan Prime Minister (2008-2013)

On August 22nd, 2015, the former Prime Minister of Kenya was the commencement speaker at our MBA graduation ceremony. The key aspects of coincidence are the lack of a causal relationship between events, making the outcome quite remarkable.

I took a gap year after completing High School and spent 1997 working at a Camp in Massachusetts and exploring the United States. In 1998 I began my undergraduate studies in Boston, before moving to Charleston, South Carolina for my last two years of school.

In 2002, I was a freshly minted idealistic university graduate now living and working in Washington D.C. In the Fall of 2002, one of the leading political figures in Africa hosted a dinner for Kenyan professionals living in Washington D.C.

Hon. Raila Odinga hosted this engagement with two objectives; share the dream of their newly formed political Alliance and convince those of us who consider making the United States our permanent home to reconsider.

The 1950’s and 1960’s brought a flurry of advocacy on matters racial injustice felt from Montgomery, Alabama to Accra, Ghana. The United Nations General Assembly Resolution 1514 passed a declaration affirming the independence of colonial countries and an end to racial discrimination on December 14th, 1960.

Hon. Odinga made a compelling argument that a similar cohort had studied abroad in the 1950’s and 1960’s and returned to help build their new independent nations; according to Hon. Odinga the air of promise in 2002 felt like the 1960’s.

A couple names of interest to have returned to Kenya after studying in the United States were Wangari Maathai, a future Nobel Laurette and Barack Obama Sr, a Harvard graduate and future Economic Advisor to the Kenya government.

The people of Kenya were the most optimistic on the planet in 2002; that optimism would make me forfeit the opportunity to permanently live and work in the United States, to the surprise of my family and friends.

I briefly questioned my life’s choices on February 1st, 2003, when I attempted to watch my favorite American football team (New England Patriots) play in the Super Bowl using a dial-up internet connection in Nairobi.

Theodore Partners was founded in 2011 with an ambitious dream to channel capital into high impact projects that would change lives and livelihoods. My MBA thesis asked questions of my business partners’ Founding dream; and the viability of that proposition. The focus on directing Private Equity to projects of social impact in Frontier Markets remains our North Star today.

The coincidence of listening to Hon. Odinga making the same pitch for Africa thirteen years apart in two Capital cities on two different continents was more an affirmation than a coincidence.

Excerpts from Hon. Odinga’s commencement speech on August 22nd, 2015, at USIU, Nairobi.

“In a week, world leaders will gather in New York City to declare an end to the Millennial Development Goals(MDGs) and unveil the Sustainable Development Goals(SDGs).”

“Issues of expansion, efficiency, equity and equality are best addressed based on research and data, critical in the realization of Africa’s vision 2063.”

“I trust this generation to see farther than my generation.”

Hon. Raila Odinga is a candidate for election for Chairperson of the African Union in February 2025.

Andrea Balongo