Africa

In 2023, Eswatini Electricity Company (EEC) marks sixty years of existence. At the time of its foundation in 1963, Swaziland - as Eswatini was then known - had electricity, but not much to speak of. Even by the year 2000, a full fifty years after the first electric generators were installed in Mbabane, only about 20% of the population of slightly over one million people had access to electricity.

Despite its 4,000-year-old history, Egypt’s capital Cairo is a city that refuses to spend too long looking in the rearview mirror. With its greater metropolitan now home to 20 million people - making Cairo one of the world’s megacities - the city and its people continue to look to the future. A good example of this is the city’s metro system, Africa’s first urban railway, the first of three full-fledged metro systems built in Africa, as well as the first in the Arab world.

Blaise Diagne International Airport (AIBD) is located near the city of Ndiass, a town in the African country of Senegal. The airport was named after the Senegalese politician who in 1914 became the first black African deputy in the French National Assembly. It serves as the new airport for Dakar, the country’s capital, since the old Léopold Sédar Senghor International Airport became too small for the number of current operations.

It has been over a decade since Business Excellence (BE) first ran a feature on Namibia Power (NamPower). At that time, the company was focused on delivering the Caprivi Link Interconnector (now known as the Zambezi Link Interconnector), a N$3.2 billion project which would connect Namibia’s electricity network with its northern neighbours, enabling it to trade directly with them. Delivered in 2012, the company has now set its sights on more ambitious targets.

In 2022, the Barrick Gold Corporation marks a quarter of a century operating at the Loulo-Gounkoto Mine in western Mali. At Barrick, which previously operated in the country under the name Randgold Resources, the goal is to stay in the country for another twenty-five years. That sentiment alone tells us a lot about the relationship between the country and the company marketing its silver anniversary year. Business Excellence made the decision to visit the project in order to learn the keys to a successful mining partnership.

In November 2015, Lesedi La Rona, the world’s second-largest gem-quality diamond ever found, was mined at the Karowe Mine in Botswana. The mining team behind the discovery was Lucara Diamonds (formerly called Boteti Mining), a diamond exploration and mining company founded in 2009. In less than six years, the Canadian-registered firm had made a discovery that placed it firmly in the spotlight of industry analysts.

In June 2019, the government of Rwanda put forth the National Electrification Plan, which aims to see 100% of Rwandan households with access to electricity, both on-grid and off-grid, by 2024.

The remarkable progress made by Rwanda’s electricity sector since the turn of the millennium provides a true case study for other developing countries to learn from. World Bank figures show that just 6.2% of the Rwandan population had access to electricity in 2000, and now, according to Rwandan government data, that figure has surpassed 65%. The government’s vision is for 100% of the population to have access by 2024.

Rwanda’s Transport Development Authority (RTDA) faces a stern challenge to deliver on its mandate. Firstly, there are the budgetary restrictions that come with being a low-income country. Next, there is the country’s population density: At 416 people per square kilometre, Africa’s highest. Finally, Rwanda is known as the ‘land of a thousand hills’ - outlining, in the plainest of terms, what might be the biggest challenge of all.