World Bank, IMF not created for Africa - Obasanjo

Obasanjo at 89: The farmer general who built one of Nigeria’s biggest agric businesses

…urges continent not to outsource its development

Olusegun Obasanjo, former Nigerian President and Chairman of the Intra-African Trade Fair (IATF), has asserted that the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) were not created for the benefit of Africa.

He stressed that the continent must stop outsourcing its development and begin to take full responsibility for shaping its own future.

Obasanjo made this bold statement during a fireside chat at the 4th Intra-African Trade Fair, currently taking place in Algiers, Algeria. The event is jointly organised by the Afreximbank, the African Union Commission, and the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) Secretariat, and is focused on fostering economic integration and intra-African trade.

Speaking on the sidelines of the fair, Obasanjo challenged African leaders and institutions to move beyond dependency on external actors and frameworks. “We need to understand the world in which we live. It is not a world we created for ourselves, it’s a world we found ourselves in,” he said.

“The World Bank, IMF, the United Nations, even the WHO, these institutions were established before most African countries gained independence. They were not designed for us”, he added.

He recounted a revealing moment during his time with the InterAction Council, a global forum of former heads of state. There, he questioned the fairness of the global economic system and was bluntly told, “We created capitalism for ourselves, not for you.” When he asked what role humanity plays in economic systems, he was told, “Humanity is not a factor in economics.”

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This, Obasanjo argued, encapsulates the structural imbalance of the global economic order, where African nations are systematically positioned as suppliers of raw materials and consumers of finished goods, rather than as equal participants in value creation.

“They buy our cocoa at N100, take it to Hamburg, turn it into chocolate, and sell it back to us at N1000. That’s not trade, that’s extraction”, he noted.

On globalisation, he added, “They say open your borders. But they keep theirs closed. They take from you and sell back to you. That’s not globalisation; that’s exploitation.”

Obasanjo called for a strategic shift in mindset and action. According to him, Africans must build their own institutions, drive intra-continental trade, and harness platforms like IATF and AfCFTA to transform how the continent does business. “We must engage the world as it is, not how we wish it to be,” he said. “We cannot continue to rely on institutions that were not built with us in mind.”

Citing the example of Uganda’s milk production, which exceeds 5.5 billion litres annually, he questioned why Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, was not a direct beneficiary. “Bulgaria benefits from that. Why not Nigeria?” he asked. “That is what IATF and AfCFTA aim to correct: sharing information, collaborating, and building African trade from within.”

Obasanjo reiterated that Africa’s path to development lies within its own borders. “We must prioritise African solutions, African partnerships, and African prosperity. We cannot outsource our development any longer”, he concluded.

Hope Moses-Ashike

Hope Moses-Ashike is an Associate Editor, Banking and Finance, with more than a decade of experience reporting on Nigeria’s financial system and broader economy. She closely tracks market movements, monetary policy decisions, company disclosures, regulatory actions, economic indicators, and global developments, and interprets what they mean for businesses, investors, policymakers, and households. Her reporting helps readers understand complex issues such as inflation trends, foreign exchange market dynamics, interest rate decisions, bank performance, and investment risks. She also covers major international events and periodically travels to Washington, D.C., to report on the World Bank/IMF Spring and Annual Meetings. Her dedication to financial journalism has earned her multiple recognitions and invitations to high-level professional development programmes. She is an alumna of the International Visitors Leadership Programme (IVLP) in the United States and holds an Advanced Financial Journalism Certificate from the Press Association Training in London, UK. Her other notable achievements include completing the Lagos Business School CMC Programme, the Bloomberg Media Africa Initiative Programme, and a Master Class in Journalism at Rhodes University in South Africa.