CAPA Experience

The Commonwealth of Association and Polytechnics in Africa (CAPA) closed its June conference in Mombasa yesterday and the closing ceremony was addressed by Dr. Manu Chandria. One of East Africa’s leading entrepreneurs. Dr. Chandria is a polished well educated and highly entrepreneurial person. I hate to use the word wealth but indeed he is one of the wealthiest persons in the region and he features in the forbes list of wealthy people in Africa. I hate to use the word wealthy because it includes those who may have simply grabbed money from somewhere and put it onto their accounts. I want to make a distinction by referring to him as an industrialist. While being introduced among the things that were said about him was that he has been on the Nairobi University Council for a long time and he is also the Chancellor of a technical university of Kenya. He is the Chairman and CEO of the Comcraft group of companies. A company with a presence in over 40 countries. He has a Masters degree in engineering from the University of Oklahoma.

Dr. Chandria who was in the company of his wife talked off the cuff, he had no prepared speech. He addressed the issue of Africa’s development. He said, Africa had the responsibility for its development.no foreign inspired solution would solve Africa’s problems. Africa must work and not wait for donations. And he further said that one of the hindrances of Africa’s development was a vision of people based on religion, tribe and colour. Development was not based on religion or tribe and noted that this was one of the challenges Africa was experiencing and a hindrance to Africa’s economic growth. Having grown up in the East African region with one currency, he had noted with sadness the disintegration of the East African community which he said was a result of people’s egos. He urged the audience to out their egos in their pockets if they want to see development in their countries. Dr. Chandria who owns a vocational institution said Africa will not develop unless it also put emphasis on the development of vocational institutions. 

CAPA brings together technical and vocational universities and institutions in Africa sadly Uganda has no strong presence. It is only MUBS that participates taking to the group the entrepreneurship otherwise it is a crowd with mostly technical and vocational institutions. Uganda aspires to industrialize but does not have the key human resource. This is because joining a TVET is a punishment or a reward for failure. It is only those who fail to make in the academic mainstream that go to TVETs. So TVETs admit dropouts as a result very few people want to go there. Secondly the admission requirement into these institutions are similar to those of the universities so why do you go to TVET when you can go to a university. People end up there either because they are government sponsored or because they do not have the money to pay for a university degree. The consequence of this is low the registrations in the TVETs. It is also true to a greater extent that the conversion of Uganda Polytechnic into part of Kyambogo University killed TVETs in the country. Britain converted its TVETs into universities in the 1980s. This followed the de-industrialization of Britain in the 1980s. As factories moved to Asia and Britain turned into a services and financial hub, there was no more need of training of technicians in large numbers. Germany which retained industries and continues to be the world’s industrial power continued to have TVETs. Many African countries have converted TVETs into universities. Some have succeeded others have failed in their objectives of doing so. Kenya converted its biggest TVETs, the Nairobi Polytechnic and the Mombasa Polytechnic into the technical university of Kenya and technical university of Mombasa respectively. Listening to the Vice Chancellor of the Technical University of Kenya Prof. Adwol you can see clearly that there are clear about their mission, the production of technologies rather than simply university graduates without purpose. The figures of Uganda are disheartening. The number of students in TVETs in Uganda is approximately 70,000. When the number of students in universities is over 200,000. It should be the other way round. For every graduate we need, 3 to 6 technicians and/or technologists. The second revolution in education and preparing for industrialization in Uganda will depend on how we are able to do that.

Whenever we return from these CAPA conferences, we appeal to government to style its TVETs policy but this is a seed that possibly lands on the hard rock. Kenya, Nigeria, Ghana and South Africa have organized TVETs so well that they are indeed on the right path to industrialization. No wonder they already have some semblance of industries in their countries. Uganda needs to overhaul its TVETs structures if it is to even attempt to catch up with its sister countries on industrialization. Dr. Chandria owning a TVET institution and one of the region’s biggest industrialist sends a message on his understanding of what industrialization requires. One of the interesting things about Manu is his simplicity, approachability and an unassuming character and a man who carries his ego in his pocket. There are lessons to pick from this great industrialist.