African Leadership Council
PRESS STATEMENT
Mombasa
20 March 2004

Welcome to today’s Press Conference on African Leadership. I speak to you as the first chairman of the newly created African Leadership Council. A group of us, experienced former heads of state and heads of government, presidents and prime ministers, the current vice-president of Kenya, and a number of distinguished present and former cabinet ministers, have spent this past year developing a Code of African Leadership, forming the African Leadership Council, and developing a curriculum for a much needed capacity building program for younger elected leaders of Africa. We have also prepared a Mombasa Declaration on African Leadership which explains why we believe that African leadership should be strengthened and how we believe that we can help assist in the process of strengthening African leadership.

We met here this week at the invitation of the Vice President of Kenya, a member of our group from before he became Vice President. He was with us at the beginning of our sessions in Mombasa. Earlier we met in Gaborone, Botswana, and at the Kennedy School, Harvard University.

Having prepared and today issued the Mombasa Declaration and its supporting documents, such as the newly fashioned Code of African Leadership, our next step is to deliver the Declaration and the other documents to the African Union, to the New Partnership for Africa’s Development, and to heads of state in Africa. We want next to add to the membership of the African Leadership Council, particularly by recruiting senior women and senior leaders from Africa. We intend to be fully inclusive of Africa, and fully aware of Africa’s many positive advances as well as its critical leadership weaknesses. The African Leadership Council is now ready to assist leaders, governments, and international organizations in meeting the many challenges of leadership in Africa. Further, we want to sponsor capacity building seminars for leaders in Africa and at the Kennedy School.