Encouraging greater investment in the breadbasket of the world

Good governance in Africa at both national level, within governments themselves, and within the private sector, is not just a regulatory box-ticking exercise but a core requirement for attracting greater foreign investment, says Rebecca Thomson, a dual-qualified litigator and Head of Baker McKenzie’s Investigations, Compliance and Ethics practice group based in Johannesburg.

“If you get the governance bit right, then everything else falls into place,” says Rebecca, who will moderate a panel of leading African in-house lawyers in a session on “Integrity Under Pressure: How GCs Navigate Ethical Dilemmas and Compliance Gaps” at today’s GC Forum | Governance, Risk & Compliance.

“Africa is the breadbasket of the world,” she continues. “We have so much opportunity for investment, but too much of that is deterred because of the lack of governance within both African governments and the private sector.”

Rebecca says she can’t emphasise enough her strongly held belief that if you ensure good governance, everything else will follow. Placing enough importance on governance within an organisation, changing the culture of that organisation to be one of good governance, will allow more resources to be better directed to the actual work of the business, to winning business, to whatever is essential.

“If we could get that piece right, Africa would be unstoppable,” says Rebecca, noting the continent is full of great opportunities, likely to increase under the African Continental Free Trade Agreement, which encourages collaboration on trade and investment infrastructure to attract foreign investment. “We’ve got all this opportunity; we just don’t have the money to capitalize on it. But if you don’t have the governance structures in place, nobody is going to invest.”

Bringing together stakeholders and lawyers from across business sectors and African nations at events like today’s GC Forum | Governance, Risk & Compliance is extremely important, notes Rebecca, as it allows everyone to talk about such issues together, to brainstorm ideas, and come up with practical solutions.

Rebecca will moderate a session on “Integrity Under Pressure: How GCs Navigate Ethical Dilemmas and Compliance Gaps”, featuring Chrissy Dube of Good Governance Africa, Mpumi Mazibuko, Oyinlola Adebayo of Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria, and Nigel Maramba of Unilever South Africa. Her expert panel will offer real-world examples and practical approaches for making principled decisions under pressure, while discussing how to navigate governance failures, conflicting values, and ethical grey zones.

For Rebecca, ethics and compliance are inseparable, as also illustrated by her practice group at Baker McKenzie including ethics alongside compliance and investigations. While the latter was traditionally done by audit firms with forensics teams, there’s been a realisation that it’s vital to have both forensic skills coupled with the ability to assist with various legal matters when it comes to compliance.

“What I often advise my clients is that if you get the compliance and ethics part right, if you invest enough time, money, and expertise into that part of your business, then often you won’t ever need to instruct me on investigations,” says Rebecca, while admitting that as a longtime litigator investigations are what she gets out of bed in the mornings for. “So if everybody in a business is pulling in the right direction and engages with compliance and ethics with the type of importance they deserve, then you can avoid instructing lawyers to conduct investigations and assist with the reputational fallout that often follows.”

Rebecca Thomson will be speaking at the GC Forum | Governance, Risk & Compliance in Johannesburg today, 17 September. View the full agenda, here.