The World Bank unveiled a policy for Africa that focuses on fighting corruption and boosting democracy after months of popular protests in North Africa led to the collapse of governments in Egypt and Tunisia. The World Bank’s board last week endorsed the plan, Obiageli Ezekwesili, the bank’s vice president for Africa, said in a video conference from Paris.

Jubril Saba, HR Director, Airtel Nigeria; Ituah Ighodalo, Senior Partner, SIAO; Dr Adeyemi Johnson, Consultant Cardiologist, First Cardiology Clinics, and Deepak Srivastava, COO, during Airtel Nigeria Men’s Day celebration held in Lagos, recently.

“Underlying Africa’s many development problems is the challenge of governance and political leadership,” the World Bank said in a report. “The events of the past few weeks in the Middle East have reinforced the notion that governance lies at the heart of the development challenge.”

Longtime rulers in Tunisia and Egypt have been ousted by protest movements in the past two months. Thousands of Libyans have fled to neighbouring countries after leader Muammar Qaddafi began firing and bombing protesters. Anti-government demonstrations have also erupted in Yemen, Bahrain, Oman, Jordan, Algeria, Morocco, Iran and Iraq.

“Most African countries are making an uneven political and institutional transition towards more open democratic political systems,” the World Bank said. While the number of dictatorships has declined since 1988, that hasn’t resulted in an increase in democracy, it said.

‘Social Accountability’ The bank aims to give citizens more information about government spending to increase “social accountability,” it said. It will also create a civil-society fund to finance organizations that scrutinize government spending.

“Governance and public sector capacity, instead of being another pillar, should be the foundation of our strategy for Africa,” bank said. The World Bank’s Africa policy is focused on investing in infrastructure, such as power plants and railways, to help improve competitiveness, rather than emphasizing efforts to achieve economic stability. The plan also aims to increase investments in health care and agriculture, to reduce the impact of economic shocks on the poor, it said. The Africa strategy is aimed at sustaining economic growth on the continent, which grew an average of 5 percent a year for a decade before the global financial crisis in 2008. Africa may be at the “brink of an economic takeoff, much like China was 30 years ago, and India 20 years ago,” the World Bank said in the report.