APRA: Mauritius 2014 – Setting An Agenda For PR In Africa

The 26th Annual Conference of the African Public Relations Association held at the Le Meridien Hotel in the exotic island nation of Mauritius from May 28 -31, 2014. The conference, which had as its theme: “Advancing Africa’, was well attended by about 130 delegates from Kenya, Ghana, Gambia, Zambia, Tanzania, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Uganda, Mozambique, South Africa, United States of America, United Kingdom, COMESA and the host country, Mauritius. Nigeria of course (you guessed it!) had the largest contingent, led by Mr. Yomi Badejo-Okusanya who is currently the Secretary-General of APRA.

APRA enjoys the strong support of the African Union, and this was amply demonstrated by the presence of His Excellency Mr. Erastus Mwencha, Deputy Chairperson of the African Union Commission (AUC), who delivered the keynote address at the beginning of the conference. Mrs. Usha Dwarka Canabady, acting Foreign Affairs Secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Mauritius, was also in attendance.

It was three days of interesting presentations and PR case studies from across the continent. I was a panel discussant on: “PR Consulting in Africa: Shifting Gears”. I found it illuminating to share PR consultancy management experiences with contemporaries from other African  countries.

At the end of the conference, a communiqué was issued, which contained the following resolutions:

• That APRA, with support from AUC and other relevant institutions, will immediately commence the development of a comprehensive programme of action to position Africa as a rising continent
• That a team of communication professionals from the continent be constituted to draw the road map for implementing ‘Campaign Africa’ – an initiative. The team will work with the AUC
• That Africa’s immense potential for development is fully exploited for the benefit of its citizens. To this end, APRA will promote efforts aimed at removing barriers that hamper free flow of ideas, goods and services such as language, trade and inter-country movement restrictions, rigorous visa processes.
• That practicing PR professionals must always be ethical and observe the codes of professional ethics as enshrined in the APRA Charter. In line with this, APRA must deepen members’ knowledge of Corporate Governance and encourage compliance by their  institutions
• That Corporate Social Responsibility should be a strategic intervention delivering maximum impact to communities where it is executed
• That, as an alternative to the dominance of foreign PR consulting networks in Africa, APRA will immediately establish an indigenous version known as PR NETWORK AFRICA. This will be a network of independent PR agencies from different countries across Africa which will work to grow the standard of practice, and hopefully provide a counter-force to the threatening dominance of the global networks. Yours truly was appointed as head of a three-man committee to lay the groundwork for the birthing of PR Network Africa.

All told, it was a good outing that provided wonderful opportunities for networking and note sharing. APRA is clearly demonstrating a commitment to advancing the scale and standard of PR practice on the continent. How far it goes in this quest will depend largely on the level of dedication and active involvement of the practitioners themselves.

Next year’s edition of the annual APRA conference is scheduled to hold in Lome, Togo.