Global Africa now an economic, cultural, practical reality – Dr. Elombi, incoming Afreximbank President
Dr. George Elombi, the Executive Vice-President – Corporate Governance and Legal Services, Africa Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank), has said that all hands must be on deck to continue to advance the Global Africa initiative, insisting that it has become a reality that must be sustained in the interest of the present and future.
Dr. Elombi, who is also the incoming President and Chairman of the Board of the foremost pan-African multilateral Bank, said this in his opening remarks to usher in the Presidential Panel that featured Prime Ministers of Caribbean nations at the 4th Annual AfricaCaribbean Trade and Investment Forum (ACTIF2025).
The theme of the Summit, which was held in St. George’s, the capital of Grenada, from Monday, July 28 to Wednesday, July 30, 2025 was “Resilience and Transformation: Enhancing Africa-Caribbean Economic Cooperation in an Era of Global Uncertainty.”
Speaking on the subject of the Panel discussion, “The New World Order as an Opportunity for Strengthening Africa-Caribbean Trade, Investment, and Cultural Relations,” Dr. Elombi insisted that the ongoing “deliberately orchestrated disruptions” to the world order are targeting payment systems, infrastructure and new trade patterns and routes of the last few decades.
Dr. Elombi, who holds a Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) degree in International Commercial Arbitration from the University of London, noted that the disruptions, which appear so deliberate and systemic, amount to weaponization of trade, finance and energy, and are aimed at bringing “us back to the old patterns that favoured some, but enslaved the rest of us.”
While commending the efforts of the forerunners, who have brought the Global Africa initiative to where it is presently, especially President Benedict Oramah “for providing the firepower, the actions that have made Global Africa a reality, an economic reality, a cultural reality,” he stressed that the disruptions must become opportunity to strengthen African-Caribbean Trade, Investment, and Cultural Relations.
Full text of Dr. Elombi’s remarks reads:
Opening Remarks of the Executive Vice-President, Dr. George Elombi, at the Africa-Caribbean Trade and Investment Forum (ACTIF 2025) 28 July 2025 | St. George’s, Grenada introducing the subject for discussion by the Presidential Panel on: The New World Order as an Opportunity for Strengthening Africa-Caribbean Trade, Investment, and Cultural Relations
The Honourable Dickon Mitchell,
With your permission, Honourable, I will adopt the protocol established by the MC at the start of these events as restated in your opening statement.
What brought us here is our sense of duty. A duty dictated by our unequivocal rejection of the state of world affairs over the last 500 or 600 years. That sense of duty is what explains the presence here of so many of our leaders and statesmen, of many sitting and former heads of states, heads of governments, Prime Ministers, Ministers, heads of institutions, and business leaders. Duty is what has brought us to this city of St. George’s, where the Atlantic converges with the Caribbean. It is not surprising, therefore, that convergence is at the centre of the themes and discussions of the coming two days. Duty is what brings us together to re-affirm the actions, not the thoughts, reflections, or wishes, but real steps and actions taken by Afreximbank over the last 5 years to make real the longstanding desire of Global Africa to re-connect:
So, thank you, Honourable Dickon Amiss Thomas Mitchell, for accepting your duty to bring us to St. George’s, to re-unite us around the 4th Africa-Caribbean Trade and Investment Forum. Thank you to the longstanding frontline combatants of the cause that has always united us. Thank you to the vigorous Baba of African politics, otherwise known as “former” President OBASANJO; and thank you to the Baba of Caribbean politics, P.J. Patterson for being here. As a demonstration of force, Hon. Mitchell, your brothers and sister, Prime Ministers from the Caribbean, are here to give meaning to these events. Thank you to Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit of Dominica, Gaston Brown of Antigua, Mia Mottley of Barbados, Terrence Drew of Saint Kitts & Nevis, Philip J. Pierre of St Lucia.
Since we will be discussing how to continue to convert our wishes into reality, we must also thank you, Mr. Christopher Edordu, the first President of Afreximbank, for converting what was a feasibility study and the silent words of the treaty establishing Afreximbank, into reality; into a living institution; not just an institution, but an institution with a soul.
To Professor Oramah, the “future former” President of Afreximbank, thank you for giving legs and wings to the soul. Thank you for providing the firepower, the actions that have made Global Africa a reality, an economic reality, a cultural reality; a practical reality; something we can see, sniff and touch, not in our minds, but in the streets, project sites, airports, and, soon, hospitals, etc. Thank you for the actions that have destroyed the psychological barriers that kept us so far and for so long apart.
It is for those actions and our wishes as a people that the organisers chose the theme of this session: “The New World Order as an Opportunity to Strengthen Afro-Caribbean Trade, Investments, and Cultural Relations”. You will be invited by the moderators, Hon. Prime Ministers, to reflect on why the current global disruptions appear so deliberate; why they appear so systemic; why they are aimed at important areas of trade – disruptions to payment systems, disruptions to the new trade patterns and routes of the last few decades; disruptions to the infrastructure that carries that trade (shipping lines, the insurance that goes with it). You will be asked whether this “weaponizing” of trade, this weaponizing of finance and energy, is not the sign of a much broader attempt to re-order what was becoming a new world order, in which the rest of the world begins to look elsewhere, away from the old patterns. You will be asked to reflect on whether the current disruptions are not the sign of a bold attempt to bring us back to the old patterns that favoured some, but enslaved the rest of us.
It seems that we will be invited to discuss whether we should not now re-imagine these developments to find ways to convert these deliberately orchestrated disruptions, which involve threats to our resources, threats to our minds, threats to our energies, into opportunities for our people, for Global Africa.
For, we must make no mistake again about it: the question is no longer whether the Caribbeans and Africa should work together. That question – which should never have been one at all – has long since been answered. It was answered by our political leaders of the end of the 19th century and throughout the 20th . It was answered by our essayists and poets; preached by the evangelists, and hailed by our athletes; composed by our musicians and acknowledged by us. Even the more important question as to how boldly and with what sense of immediacy we should act has also been answered! Answered recently by the bold actions of Professor Oramah and his team at Afreximbank; it has been answered by the bold actions of our sister, an extraordinary daughter of mother Africa, called Prime Minister Mia Mottley, who spread the need for the same action in the Caribbeans. The emergency of Covid-19 challenges created and heightened the sense of urgency, the need to act, not to speak. Prime Minister Mottley and the rest of the Caribbeans joined the African Union and Afreximbank to demonstrate that actions, actions, actions, would bring us closer. That, then, is precisely the purpose of this gathering of ACTIF.
You will therefore be invited today to frame your reflections along certain lines:
-global threats as a catalyst for determining our strategic alliances;
-re-structuring and strengthening the Africa-Caribbean nation;
-financial capital;
-cultural capital; and
-strategic sovereignty: i.e., taking ownership of the medium of our trade and cultural interaction; financial intermediation, such as payment systems and the currencies of our trade; compliance platforms; investment platforms; control of the trade infrastructure such as maritime & air links; control of our agriculture and food security; pharmaceutical manufacturing; mineral processing, digital infrastructure; and, finally,
-the form and quality of the education we impact on our children – the education that equips them technically, and also prepares them psychologically, the education that teaches them our longstanding values of family; the duty to family and community; the value of duty to our own, that duty that underlies why governments, grandparents, and business leaders must act to continue to make Global Africa a reality; that same sense of duty that brought us to St. George’s, Grenada, on this day.
Thank you Your Excellencies, thank you distinguished ladies and gentlemen.
