It is on the peaceful shores of the Ebrié lagoon in Abidjan that Dr Monique Nsanzabaganwa granted us an exclusive interview on the occasion of the publication of her book Seed. A meeting that reflects her work: clear-sighted, dense, and inhabited by a quiet conviction. In this essay with biographical accents, the former Vice President of the African Union Commission, who has also served as a minister in Rwanda several times and as the former Deputy Governor of its central bank, reflects on the major challenges facing the African continent while outlining the contours of a possible future.
The title, Seed, alone sums up the author’s project: to sow today the seeds of an autonomous, supportive, and prosperous African future. Nourished by her personal and institutional journey, the book oscillates between intimate narrative and strategic analysis. While she humbly denies it, Monique Nsanzabaganwa has undoubtedly been a key figure in the reconstruction of post-genocide Rwanda, a country she describes as “rising from its ashes” thanks to a culture of ownership, accountability, and inclusion. A triptych that she wishes to see on a continental scale.
An Africa that belongs to itself
In our interview, conducted on the sidelines of the African Development Bank (AfDB) Assemblies, she calmly asserts: “African integration is not an option, it is a survival condition that must absolutely go through industrial development based on value chains and regional supply chains oriented towards strategic economic poles.” Through her experience at the AU Commission, she understands how the continent’s ambitions – notably Agenda 2063 – are still hindered by implementation obstacles, institutional inconsistencies, and bureaucratic silos. Her plea is clear: Africa must take control of its destiny, stop relying on external aid, and organize convergence among its multiple economic, political, and social actors to build win-win strategic partnerships in relevant segments of value chains.
She notably revisits the AfCFTA, this vast continental project that remains underutilized despite its structuring potential. While the protocols are in place, concrete progress is lagging, even as we enter the flagship decade of acceleration. For Dr Monique Nsanzabaganwa, regional integration involves very practical mechanisms: free movement, customs interconnection, modern logistics, and coherent industrial policy. “A product does not circulate simply because a treaty has been signed. It circulates because there is a truck, a road, a scanner, a cross-border payment system, and common standards,” she summarizes.
A voice for endogenous finance
The Rwandan economist also pushes for a deep reflection on the continent’s financial resources. She discusses, with supporting figures, the $3 trillion in assets of African pension funds, capital flight, inadequate taxation, and the inefficiency of intermediation between local savings and investment needs, notably through a still fragmented capital market. “The role of finance is to bring together supply and demand. But there must be bankable projects, reliable data, and clear governance,” she says.
It is precisely through an analysis of value chains that the missing links will be highlighted, thus constituting derisked investment opportunities, developed into bankable projects – public or private – and corrective policy interventions at the ecosystem level. In this way, African financial institutions can collaborate in providing tailored financial and technical solutions, close to businesses of all sizes, including mostly informal small and medium entities.
Through concrete examples – such as unprocessed cotton or raw exported bananas – she denounces the African paradox of an abundance of raw materials and a lack of local value addition. For her, everything needs to be transformed, in every sense of the term. And this implies a coordinated effort: from central banks and financial institutions to private investors, through technical ministries.
Coherent institutional framework
In this interview, the author of Seed also emphasizes the need for an aligned African institutional ecosystem: the AU and its agencies such as AUDA-NEPAD, the AfCFTA Secretariat, the APRM, Africa CDC, AMA, and others; regional economic communities; as well as pan-African multilateral institutions such as the AfDB, Afreximbank, TDB, Africa Re, and other members of the Africa Club; commercial banks and the insurance industry; guarantee institutions and entrepreneurial development services; and, of course, the private sector. For Dr Nsanzabaganwa, these actors should not compete but act complementarily, each in their role, in service of a common vision. “We have plans, frameworks, strategies. What is lacking is coherence in their execution,” she reminds.
It is this same concern that, almost on the eve of the end of her mandate at the AU, motivated her to commission a study by an African expert, Dr Papa Demba Thiam, to propose a methodology for such a paradigm shift. The methodology covers the strategic correction of delivery approaches by integrating AU operations on the ground, reconfiguring relevant institutional structures to highlight synergy opportunities and complementarities, with profitable programs likely to attract the channeling and use of development financing, including multilateral development banks, as well as other international financial institutions and development cooperation.
An Africa in constant construction
If the book takes root in the pains of the past – notably the genocide of the Tutsis, which she evokes with poignant restraint – it is resolutely turned towards the future. It is the perspective of a woman of the field, attached to an Africa rebuilding itself, believing in regional value chains, in industrialization based on local resources, in a youth connected to the world and rooted in its territories.
Ultimately, Seed is neither an ideological manifesto nor a heroic narrative. It is a lesson in commitment, delivered without fanfare, but with rare intellectual rigor. An appeal to move beyond rhetoric, to structure actions, and to build an Africa that no longer asks for permission to exist. Through this book, Monique Nsanzabaganwa is not seeking to convince, but to awaken. An essential work for those who believe that the continent does not need to be saved, but simply organized.
