Professor Shadrick Mazaza gave the first presentation for the day on Transformation and Authenticity: Unlocking the Human Potential. In 2013, Prof. Shadrick came across an article titled Agenda 2063. The aim was to harmonise the development and integration of the African continent. Some of the challenges ahead are the large diversity of tribes, groups and cultures among the continent. To find ways to unite Africa whilst embracing everyone’s differences, Shadrick founded the African consciousness Institute, with the focus on transformation. He spoke of the three types of transformation that each African needs to undertake in order to bring about unity and change: personal transformation, inter-personal transformation and socio-economic transformation. In order for the last type of transformation to take place, the first two need to be achieved.
The Professor urged the importance of raising awareness of Agenda 2063 to open up discussions on what each person can do to contribute to the vision. In order to achieve transformation, he said three things need to happen, Africans need to wake up, show up and speak up. He gave further tools that entailed knowing yourself in depth, through careful self-observation, one can really see who they are instead of who one thinks they are. The next step would be to know about the laws of nature and how these natural laws can help us.
Professor Shadrick gave the equation, the level of knowledge plus the level of being equals the level of understanding. One needs to acquire knowledge if one wants to raise to a higher level of wisdom. Mazaza explained that to understand the human, one needs to understand their own set of values which is unique to every person, bearing in mind that our values dictate what we see and how we react to situations.
