African countries need political stability to attract investors, but elections like Mozambique’s, “where there was a bit of tension”, could derail investment, energy minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa told world leaders on Tuesday.
“We’ve seen that there's been a number of elections that have taken place on the continent, and there, by many accounts, …they tend to be free and fair, with the exception of Mozambique, where there was a bit of tension,” he said.
Ramokgopa participated as a panellist discussing the geo-economics of energy and materials at the WEF annual forum in Davos, Switzerland.
The session explored the rise in energy investments driven by growing energy demand and raised the question of where leaders should focus their attention in shaping geoeconomics amid an increasingly volatile geopolitical and technological landscape.
His comments coincided with Eskom celebrating a “milestone” of 300 consecutive days without load-shedding, coupled with ongoing complaints about power outages caused by ageing infrastructure and frequent hiccups in water supply due to water infrastructure issues, resulting in water-throttling in Johannesburg, SA’s economic hub.
Ramokgopa spoke about challenges and opportunities faced by African countries as a whole, stating that conversations with “major industrial powers” were necessary to encourage investment in countries’ just-transition programmes, especially in the extraction of mineral resources.
“First you need capital, because this is a capital-intensive industry, and we know that the balance sheet of these countries is not sufficient to self-finance. So, you need to create a dispensation where you are able to tap into the deep liquidity that is sitting in the private sector for those investments to happen.”
But for that to happen, there has to be political stability, he said.
“In many of these jurisdictions, unfortunately, we’ve seen unstable political environments that make it difficult for investors to come into those spaces and make the necessary investments.”
Commenting on SA’s G20 presidency, Ramokgopa explained that the government “sees the G20 presidency not just as an SA presidency, but as a presidency of the continent”.
“I think the G20 is a pristine platform for Africa to showcase the potential that it has. But for that to happen, we need to organise ourselves better and have a much more coherent articulation of what constitutes that transition.”
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