100 Influential Africans – how is Ibrahima Cheikh Diong trying to shape Africa?

“Development is all about leadership. You can get all the resources in the world, you can get all the best human capital… but if the leadership is not there you can’t make the best of the resources you have and eventually move your country forward.”

Ibrahima Cheikh Diong is UN-Assistant Secretary General and Director General of the African Union specialized agency “the African Risk Capacity Group” or ARC, which works with governments to help them deal with climate related disasters.

But in a varied career, he’s also been a member of the Senegalese government and worked for the World Bank, as a senior banker and in management consultancy. And he even speaks Mandarin as well as French and English thanks to his student days in China.

But he says if he had to best describe himself he’d say he was ‘an African who cares about Africa and wants to make a difference in Africa’.

This is Alan’s second conversation with people included – like himself – in New African Magazine’s 100 Influential Africans list for this year.