When Raoul Rugamba, a Rwandan creative, met Rodrigue Fouafou, a Cameroonian angel investor based in Canada, the two quickly connected because they were speaking the same language: How can they build synergies that enable them to tell their own story? That was in mid-September last year at the Africa Startup Summit (Afric’Up) in the Tunisian capital, Tunis, where hundreds of startup entrepreneurs from across Africa had gathered to mobilise support for African startups. Rugamba and Fouafou shared a similar vision and spirit to tell the “African story” which both of them said had not been written correctly for a long time. “One of the things that we have been pushing here (in Africa) is to see how we can write our own story. We have to write our own story in our own way, in our own language,” Fouafou, the co-founder and CEO of HartNamtemah, a Canadian firm that invests in African start-ups, told The New Times. Fouafou says his company has invested in creative entrepreneurs back in his country, including videogame companies ‘Kiro’o Games’ and Nookemah, as well as Made in Africa Designs, a Canada-based fashion firm. Rugamba, who’s also the Managing Director of Hobe Agency, recounts when the two met they realized that they all had the same vision and passion and “since we were all in the creative industry it was just a quick process before we agreed to work on something.” The project That was the genesis of ‘Africa in Colors’ festival – a bigger dream to promote Africa’s creative industry. The event is expected to take place on March 26-28, at the Radisson Blu and Convention Centre. “We are trying to create partnerships with other creative entrepreneurs from across the continent. The first idea is to create bridges and collaborations between African creatives across the continent,” Rugamba noted. He believes it will definitely create more jobs and promote economies across the continent. It is estimated that creative industries generate $2.25 trillion in revenue and 29.5 million jobs globally. However, Africa gets less than 5 per cent of that share. The two entrepreneurs believe frontiers of creative industries in Africa can be expanded. “The solutions are there, the resources are there and the money is there. We only need to bring these things together and chart a way forward,” argued Fouafou. According to Rugamba, they have entered partnerships with pioneers of creative industries from Canada, Tunisia, Cote d’Ivoire, South Africa, and Morocco to bring about the success of the festival. For now, they say, they have decided to focus on performing arts, video games, fashion, and film industry. ‘Talent is there’ The brains behind the project say there are people who are passionate about the industry and they want to join it, now the next step should be helping them. “There are also people who are already in the industry but they don’t know how to break into the international markets. We are trying to begin the conversation on the table of how to facilitate them to scale,” the Rwandan entrepreneur said. “The festival is the first phase of the project. After that we shall have an incubation space for creative entrepreneurs, we shall have empowerment and education programmes to help players in the industry gain more skills and knowledge,” he adds. The Cameroonian native, on the other hand, thinks it is important to maximize visibility and exposure of existing talents beyond the African borders and promote their potential.
