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SMEs are the engine of African economies, representing over 90% of businesses and roughly 80% of employment. In the US, SMEs account for 44% of economic activity, and in the UK, SMEs employ 61% of the workforce.

I have a deeply religious friend. During the December holidays, he travelled to Zimbabwe to attend a mega church. On the final night of 2025, he joined a crossover service ushering worshippers into 2026.

Early the next morning, he called me, all ecstatic.

The son of his prophet had touched his head. He felt anointed. My friend had been declared blessed. 2026 would be his year.

He had also received oil. Miraculous oil, he said. Some of it, he wanted to share with me.

I hesitated. I value my friend too much to refuse and cause offence. Yet I was spiritually conflicted. If I accepted the oil, I knew I would never use it.

That moment captured a deeper tension, one that would surface repeatedly as I thought about faith, power, and economics in Africa.

My friend is a waiter. He tithes monthly and gives offerings weekly. He survives, as many do, by discipline and faith.

His prophet owns a Bentley and a Rolls-Royce. He flies private with the same ease my friend boards a kombi.

Drive through almost any major African city, and there is a stark contrast.

Potholes, informal trading, failing clinics, and crumbling infrastructure mark one street. The next houses a gleaming religious complex: air-conditioned auditoriums, LED screens, private security, and parking lots filled with luxury vehicles.

Across much of the continent, religious institutions rank among the most financially liquid and socially influential entities. Yet they operate largely outside public accountability frameworks. Tithes and offerings flow weekly, often from citizens living near or below the poverty line, while public services remain underfunded and overstretched.

When moral authority accumulates without civic responsibility, power concentrates without scrutiny.

In some countries, religious leaders function as parallel power centres. They endorse politicians, shape public opinion, and influence voting behaviour. All without the transparency obligations applied to corporations, unions, or civil society organisations.

Because of our faith and beliefs, so much collective capital circulates outside the development ecosystem.

Roads, clinics, schools, and sanitation systems fail inspite of our prayers. They fail because capital, governance, and accountability are misaligned.

…

The Redeemed Christian Church of God claims over nine million worshippers, more than 40,000 branches in 190 countries, and a headquarters in Nigeria the size of a small city.

Its head pastor is reportedly worth over $100 million.

Africa hosts more than 20 such mega churches, collectively drawing millions of attendees.

At least five of the world’s richest pastors are African.

Religious authority across Africa increasingly spills into politics. Prophets and pastors go beyond giving moral guidance; many now shape electoral behaviour, openly or implicitly directing congregants toward particular parties or leaders.

This becomes especially dangerous when such influence supports political movements with documented records of repression, economic mismanagement, and institutional decay. Failed economies and weakened freedoms are reframed not as policy failures but as temporary trials preceding divine breakthroughs.

Through prophecy, citizens are encouraged to endure rather than interrogate. Sacrifice is spiritualised. Patience is moralised, and accountability is deferred.

The promise is always future-oriented: a coming season, a breakthrough, a better tomorrow. But that tomorrow may never arrive for those being asked to wait.

When political loyalty is sanctified, democratic choice erodes. Leaders cease to be judged by delivery or competence, but by perceived spiritual alignment. Criticism becomes faithlessness. Failure becomes divine timing.

We are witnessing a dangerous fusion of spiritual authority with political impunity.

Prophecy is replacing policy debate, and faith is substituting civic scrutiny. Then we wonder why democracy is weakening.

Faith can sustain individuals through hardship. However, it cannot substitute for competent economic management.

Across the continent, many governments struggle with weak fiscal discipline, inconsistent industrial policy, overreliance on commodities, and limited long-term planning. These are technical problems requiring technical solutions: credible institutions, sound budgeting, policy continuity, and execution capacity.

Yet in fragile states, prayer often becomes a stand-in for policy. Citizens are encouraged, explicitly or implicitly, to endure rather than demand. Political failure is reframed as spiritual testing. Structural collapse is moralised instead of corrected.

This dynamic is convenient for power. When hardship is explained as destiny or divine will, urgency for reform fades. Leaders are judged on rhetoric rather than results.

History is unambiguous.

No country has industrialised through belief alone. Every successful development story, in East Asia, Europe, and parts of Africa, was built on deliberate policy, institutional reform, and sustained execution.

Faith may inspire resilience, but development requires competence.

…

Africa is home to roughly 30% of the world’s Christians and more than 20% of its Muslims. Fewer than 5% of Africans identify as non-believers.

Faith is the norm.

The Redemption Camp in Lagos hosts over one million worshippers in a single open auditorium.

There is a growing assumption that Africans pray and wait.

The reality is harsher.

Most Africans work relentlessly. Farmers cultivate without irrigation. Traders navigate hostile regulatory environments. Young people build livelihoods in the informal economy with no safety nets.

While citizens pray and persevere, vast untaxed liquidity circulates within religious institutions. Civil servants are taxed. Small businesses are taxed. Churches, largely, are not.

Some of Africa’s most prominent pastors preside over extraordinary personal wealth, private jets, luxury vehicles, and sprawling real estate while operating in economies where public services barely function.

The list is long and well-documented.

What prayer often reflects is powerlessness. When systems are unresponsive, courts are slow, markets are distorted, and leadership is unaccountable, people turn inward for meaning.

Faith becomes psychological infrastructure in the absence of functional public infrastructure.

The danger emerges when broken systems remain unchallenged because faith absorbs the shock. When prayer replaces pressure. When hope replaces organisation. When suffering is spiritualised instead of politicised.

We need change! And we don’t have to abandon our beliefs to achieve it. Change requires rebuilding systems so that effort leads to outcomes, accountability is enforceable, and progress is measurable.

Every founder in Africa builds within the realities described above. Weak institutions, policy uncertainty, informal power structures, and cultural narratives that reward patience over pressure.

Understanding how belief, power, and governance interact is essential to survival and scale.

1.

No amount of belief substitutes for enforceable contracts, predictable regulation, functional courts, or consistent policy. Markets respond to incentives and enforcement, not prophecy.

2.

Religious influence shapes consumer behaviour, politics, and regulation. This can distort markets and reward proximity over performance. Anchor businesses to customers, cash flow, and value creation, not personalities.

3.

Praying and waiting are the enemies of iteration. Entrepreneurship rewards speed, feedback, and adaptation. Waiting for policy change, divine intervention, or perfect conditions kills momentum. Progress comes from experimentation and iteration.

4.

Political faith is a business risk. When voters are mobilised through prophecy rather than performance, policy becomes volatile. Currency shocks, regulatory reversals, and populist decisions follow. Diversify exposure, hedge politically and avoid over-concentration.

5.

As entrepreneurs, we are cultural actors. In environments that glorify waiting, we must model a different logic: execution, measurement, and accountability.

Africa moves forward when we insist on systems that reward effort, competence, and responsibility.

Entrepreneurship, at its core, is constructive impatience.

Belief can sustain you. But systems will bring long-term success.

Application Deadline: 2 March 2026

Applications are now open for the 2026 UNHCR Innovation Fellowship. The Innovation Fellowship focuses on building the innovation skills and competencies of participants and supports them to engage with colleagues, partners, and refugees to bring innovative approaches into their operations or divisions. 

Over the course of the journey, Innovation Fellows learn and practice innovation methods and tools, embedding these new approaches into their everyday work. They focus on problem-solving, ideation, and experimentation to develop innovative solutions to real-life challenges in the field or at headquarters. 

Fellows are UNHCR’s ambassadors for innovation and lasting positive change both within and outside the organisation.

Ethiopian Airlines remains Africa's largest carrier, operating 1.8m seats in Feb 26, an increase of 5.4%, 91,900 more seats.

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