Before the borders, there were African civilisations and monuments, and great minds that imagined what they should be. Ideas travelled through generations on the wind, nurtured by the soil into dreams, to be lived by those yet to be born from it.

Today we inherit questions unanswered, and the unfinished work of our elders, who imagined and laid foundations for possibilities beyond themselves. Africa is a place where new knowledge can emerge, where different ways of living can take form, and where the future is imagined and built.The African futures we envision lives through the things we create, and the institutions we establish.

We believe Africa's progress must be reconsidered and technology must serve the foundations that will secure our humanity. We believe in the power of community. We believe in the greatness of ideas. We believe in the generosity of shared knowledge. We believe in the possibilities born when different minds find common purpose.

Africans are heirs to a remarkable inheritance. We honour it by drawing on the wisdom of our past, while embracing new ways of doing things. Our prosperity, our identities and our societies should be built to reflect the lives we hope to live.

Let us think beyond what is familiar, imagine beyond what exits , and build beyond what we have known.Africans are more than witnesses to the making of this century. We are its thinkers, its architects, its stewards of our own destinies