The modern corporate world is saturated with leadership. It is also chronically short of something far rarer: institutional weight-carriers. These are highly competent professionals who, like pillars, silently hold organisations upright. They provide resilience against external shocks and internal failure, ensuring that systems do not collapse when pressure rises. Everyone is being trained to "lead": to speak, to posture, to project confidence. Almost no one is being trained

In the aftermath of banking sector clean-ups across Africa, regulators face a crucial challenge. They must balance enforcing accountability for misconduct with preserving incentives for prudent risk-taking. This balance is essential for financial intermediation, innovation, and long-term financial deepening. Restoring Order in Emerging Markets Across emerging markets, recent financial sector clean-ups have restored order after periods of regulatory laxity. Banks have been clo

In many of the world's most rigorous academic settings, it is common to hear a professor begin an answer with a disclaimer: "This is not my area of expertise." The phrase is not an admission of inadequacy. It is a signal of discipline. In such environments, knowledge is treated as bounded. Authority is respected precisely because it acknowledges its limits. The statement functions as a marker of seriousness: it tells the listener that what follows will be careful, conditional

This essay examines why a generation that inherited functioning institutions failed to transmit them to the next. It argues that Africa's current crisis is not primarily demographic, but generational: a failure of stewardship that occurred when external constraint eased and policy choice returned. The judgment is delivered calmly, but it is delivered.