Mo Ibrahim

The mobile industry changed Africa.

Mexico established a unique three-part governing system shared by the government, the information commission and civil society organisations.

Challenging vested interests requires a government's full commitment.

Mobile phones could not work in Africa without prepaid because it's a cash society.

Mobile phones play a really wonderful role in enabling civil society. As well as empowering people economically and socially, they are a wonderful political tool.

Billions of dollars are thrown at African countries.

It is very difficult for any dictator or any incumbent to falsify the results of an election and just get away with it.

Make as much money as you can, but can you please pay your taxes, because this is a major problem.

Transfer pricing is causing huge problems in Africa.

Before any investor goes into any country, he is looking for the exit door.

The U.S. has been a great friend all these years, but as soon as Africa found itself starting to move up, the U.S. is really disengaging.

Africa is progressing but maybe not in the way you think it is. Even if the overall picture looks good, we must all remain vigilant and not get complacent.

Now is the time for Afro-realism: for sound policies based on honest data, aimed at delivering results.

Compared to developed countries, or even to some major emerging countries, burdened by aging populations, financial crises, widening budget deficits, faltering faith in politics and growing social demands, Africa has become the world's last 'New Frontier:' a kind of 'it-continent.'

In a world of growing food demand, Africa is home to two-thirds of the world's unexploited arable land.

While the Marshall Plan was important for Europe's recovery, Europe's prosperity was really built on economic integration and policy coherence.

Mobile communications had been around for a long time, but always as a limited market, constrained by the radio spectrum.

What do you do if you're an executive who resigns? You declare yourself a consultant.

Tony Blair is paid $500,000 for one speech, and no one asks how he is going to spend it.

What we need in Africa is balanced development. Economic success cannot be a replacement for human rights or participation or democracy... it doesn't work.

Literacy in Tunisia is almost 100%. It's amazing - no country in the region or even in Asia can match Tunisia in education.

The Ibrahim Index is a tool to hold governments to account and frame the debate about how we are governed.

Everywhere in Africa, you see Indian, Chinese, Brazilian businesses. Other than Coca Cola and the oil companies, it is very rare to see American businesses.

If we are to build grassroots respect for the institutions and processes that constitute democracy, the state must treat its citizens as real citizens rather than as subjects.

We cannot expect loyalty to an unjust regime.

The state and its elites must be subject, in theory and in practice, to the same laws that its poorest citizens are.

I don't subscribe to the narrative that Africa is backward because of colonialism.

Not any amount of aid is going to move Africa forward.

Societies are not sustainable without institutions.

If you are African, the more educated you are, the less chances you have of getting a job.

Women in Africa are really the pillar of the society, are the most productive segment of society, actually. They do agriculture.

Women do kids. Women do cooking. Women doing everything. And yet, their position in society is totally unacceptable.

If we cannot accurately measure poverty, we surely cannot accurately measure our efforts to tackle it.

Business is global. Countries need to react to that; taxes need to be paid where profit arises.

Multinationals don't pay taxes in Africa - we all know that.

To be frank, I don't think President Obama gives much thought to Africa - or gives much to Africa.

Nobody can come and develop Africa on behalf of Africans.

The Zimbabwean people, like everyone else, have a right to live in freedom and prosperity and to select their leaders through fair and democratic elections.

Rwanda really did take very strong steps towards development. I mean, this place is unrecognizable. There's a very good management of economy and resources - it's a success story, and that's great.

The brain drain from Africa has been reversed.

Many Africans are used to a life where they get up in the morning and don't know what they're going to do that day.

When I was young, there was only one TV channel, sponsored by the government, and it only broadcast things like what the leader had for breakfast. There was no real media.

Computers are very expensive and they need power, and that can be a problem in Africa.

What is a government supposed to do for its people? To improve the standard of living, to help them get jobs, get kids to schools, and have access to medicine and hospitals. Government may not directly provide these public goods and services, but government must be accountable for whether or not they are delivered to citizens.

When Captain Moussa Dadis Camara came to power, too many thought he would hold to his promise to stand down, introduce democratic elections and restore the rule of law.

After the sale of Celtel, I really wanted to give the money back, and I had a number of choices - to go and buy masses of blankets and baby milk or to go into Darfur or Congo. That would have been very nice actually, but it's just like an aspirin: it doesn't deal with the problem.

Celtel established a mobile phone network in Africa at a time when investors told me that there was no market for mobile phones there.

Governance has been at the heart of the work of the Oxford Martin Commission for Future Generations and is a clear focus in its report, 'Now for the Long Term.'

I'm an engineer. I'm a techie, really.

I come from a typical family.