Speaking on a panel at the inaugural Africa Mindset Reset Forum, hosted by the African School of Governance (ASG) at the Kigali Convention Center, Kagame said Africa has "everything in place to succeed": people, resources and lessons from its own history, yet keeps falling short because of attitudes Africans have not confronted.

He said the continent has been reduced to "simply admiring others," pointing out that this often means admiring people and institutions outside Africa rather than fellow Africans doing good work at home. That habit, he argued, leaves the continent open to being dictated to by others, while Africans themselves lament and complain rather than act.

"Why don't we do things so that we can actually admire each other?" Kagame asked, adding that there are capable people within Africa whom others on the continent should be joining and supporting, rather than looking elsewhere for inspiration.

The Head of State noted that Africa's obstacles are less about missing resources or policy frameworks and more about a mindset that has not caught up with the continent's ambitions. He said Africa cannot change without changing its own behaviour and attitudes, and that intentions must be matched with action and visible results.

Kagame co-founded the African School of Governance alongside former Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn. The school, officially inaugurated in January 2025, was created to train a new generation of African leaders grounded in homegrown solutions to the continent's challenges.

Other leaders echo the call for accountability

Former South African President Thabo Mbeki, sitting alongside Kagame on the panel, said none of Africa's problems can be resolved without addressing the quality of its leadership. He argued that leaders on the continent owe each other honesty rather than diplomatic silence, saying failures in one country inevitably affect its neighbours.

Mbeki urged young Africans to stay committed to the cause "until the Africa we want does indeed emerge," comparing the effort to running a marathon without dropping out.

Former Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn, ASG's co-founder and chairman, said the continent's leadership has often been driven by a "rent-seeking" mindset rather than a developmental one. He pointed to Ethiopia's own turnaround, from a country reliant on food aid in the 1970s to a grain surplus producer, as evidence that a deliberate mindset shift among ordinary farmers and officials can change a country's trajectory within a generation.

Ghana's Vice President, Naana Jane Opoku-Agyemang, said Africa's problem is not a shortage of policies or plans but a failure to take ownership of its own story and decisions. She called for capacity building that raises young Africans differently from previous generations, moving them from being "a victim of the circumstance to an active agent of change."

ASG President Francis Gatare, opening the forum, introduced "Meta Africanism" as what he called the next stage of Pan-Africanism, a shift from resistance and solidarity toward collective construction, agency and disciplined implementation of Africa's own plans.

The forum, running from August 25 to 26 in Kigali, has drawn more than 2,500 participants in person and thousands more following online.