At a time when Africa is grappling with persistent institutional fragility, corporate failures, governance scandals, and leadership deficits across both public and private sectors, a new continental institution has emerged with an ambitious but timely mandate: to professionalise board practice, restore ethical leadership, and strengthen governance at the highest levels of African organisations.
The Directors Institute Africa (DIA) has been formally established as a pan-African leadership, governance, and board effectiveness institution, dedicated to building ethical, competent, and future-ready directors, executives, and trustees across the continent. Its formation signals a growing recognition that Africa’s development challenge is not merely economic or financial, but deeply institutional and that strong institutions begin with strong boards.
More than a training body, DIA positions itself as a governance movement, one that seeks to reshape how African boards think, decide, and steward organisations entrusted to them.
Governance as Africa’s Missing Link
For decades, Africa’s development discourse has focused on access to capital, infrastructure gaps, foreign investment, and resource mobilisation. Yet across the continent, organisations endowed with abundant resources, state-owned enterprises, large corporates, NGOs, churches, universities, and public institutions, have repeatedly underperformed or collapsed under the weight of poor governance, weak oversight, and ethical failure.
DIA is founded on a simple but powerful premise: Africa’s core constraint is not a lack of resources, but a deficit in governance quality, leadership ethics, and board effectiveness.
From corporate scandals and SOE bailouts to NGO failures, church leadership crises, and public sector inefficiencies, a common thread runs through many institutional breakdowns, boards that are ill-prepared for their fiduciary role, unclear about their responsibilities, poorly trained, ethically compromised, or disconnected from long-term strategy and risk.
Despite the presence of regulators, compliance frameworks, and professional bodies, there has been no dedicated pan-African institute focused holistically on-board excellence, ethics, and leadership culture across sectors. Directors Institute Africa has been created to fill this gap.
An Independent, Pan-African Institution
Directors Institute Africa operates as an independent, non-partisan, and knowledge-driven institution. It is not a lobby group, a regulator, or an advocacy organisation aligned to political or commercial interests. Instead, it positions itself as a neutral convenor, bringing together experienced directors, academics, regulators, executives, faith leaders, and development partners to shape Africa’s governance future.
Unlike country-specific institutes, DIA is deliberately pan-African, transcending national boundaries to facilitate continental peer learning, harmonised standards, and cross-border governance dialogue. Its continental orientation also extends to African diaspora leadership networks, recognising the strategic role of globally experienced African directors and executives in strengthening institutions back home.
Vision, Mission, and Purpose
The vision of Directors Institute Africa is clear and ambitious:
To become Africa’s leading institute for board leadership, governance excellence, and ethical stewardship.
Its mission flows naturally from this vision, to strengthen African institutions by:
- Training and certifying directors and board members
- Advancing governance thought leadership and research
- Promoting ethical leadership and accountability
- Creating communities of practice for directors across Africa
At its core, DIA exists to professionalise board practice, improve decision-making at the highest levels of organisations, and anchor African institutions, public, private, civil society, and faith-based, in sound governance, integrity, and long-term value creation.
A Philosophy Rooted in Integrity and Stewardship
DIA’s founding philosophy is anchored in five core values: integrity, competence, accountability, stewardship, and service.
In an era where governance is often reduced to compliance checklists and box-ticking exercises, DIA argues that governance is fundamentally about character, culture, and responsibility. Ethical leadership is not treated as a soft issue, but as a strategic asset, essential to institutional trust, sustainability, and resilience.
Importantly, DIA’s approach recognises African realities while aligning with global best practice. It seeks neither to import governance models uncritically nor to romanticise local practices, but to build contextually relevant, values-driven governance frameworks that work for Africa.
The Governance Gap DIA Seeks to Close
Across Africa, boards face recurring and well-documented challenges:
- Weak oversight and blurred boundaries between board and management
- Limited induction, training, and continuous professional development for directors
- Poor ethical leadership and accountability failures
- Inadequate succession planning and leadership continuity
- Weak risk governance, strategic foresight, and crisis preparedness
These challenges cut across sectors, corporates and SMEs, state-owned enterprises, NGOs, churches, universities, and public institutions alike.
While regulators focus on compliance and enforcement, and professional bodies often prioritise specific professions, no institution has comprehensively addressed the board as a collective leadership organ. Directors Institute Africa fills this critical gap by focusing on board competence, culture, ethics, and effectiveness as an integrated whole.
Mandate and Continental Reach
DIA’s mandate spans both geography and institution type.
Geographically, its focus is continental, Africa, while also engaging African diaspora leadership networks to facilitate skills transfer, mentorship, and global benchmarking.
Institutionally, DIA serves:
- Corporates and SMEs
- State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs)
- Public sector institutions
- NGOs, churches, trusts, and faith-based organisations
- Universities and educational institutions
- Development agencies and Development Finance Institutions (DFIs)
This inclusive scope reflects DIA’s belief that governance excellence is not the preserve of corporates alone, but a necessity for all institutions entrusted with resources, people, and public trust.
A Distinctive Value Proposition
Asked what differentiates Directors Institute Africa from other governance and leadership bodies on the continent, DIA Board Chair Mr Albert Edward Le Roux points to the Institute’s deliberately continental and practical orientation.
“First and foremost, DIA is pan-African,” he says. “We are not confined to one country. Our focus is on facilitating cross-border learning, developing continental governance standards, and creating a shared governance language that directors across Africa can relate to.”
According to Mr Le Roux, DIA is also intentionally practice-driven, drawing heavily from real boardroom experience rather than abstract theory.
“Our programmes are grounded in lived boardroom realities and African case studies,” he explains. “We are focused on what actually happens in boardrooms and how directors can lead more effectively in complex environments.”
Ethics, he adds, sits at the very heart of the Institute’s work.
“We place ethics at the centre of governance,” Mr Le Roux notes. “Integrity and accountability are not compliance exercises for us; they are strategic enablers of trust, sustainability, and long-term value.”
He further highlights DIA’s inclusive governance lens, which goes beyond the corporate sector.
“Governance challenges are not limited to listed companies,” he says. “Churches, NGOs, universities, and public institutions play a critical role in social stability and development, yet they are often overlooked in formal governance training. DIA deliberately brings these sectors into the governance conversation.”
Strategic Pillars of Action
To translate vision into impact, DIA’s work is structured around five strategic pillars:
- Board Education and Certification
- Ethics, Integrity, and Accountability
- Research, Thought Leadership, and Policy
- Board Advisory and Institutional Support
- Community and Convening
These pillars collectively ensure that learning translates into measurable board effectiveness and institutional impact.
The DIA Governance and Leadership Forum
At the heart of DIA’s convening role is its flagship platform, the DIA Governance and Leadership Forum, an annual gathering bringing together directors, executives, regulators, academics, and governance practitioners from across Africa.
Partnership as a Strategic Imperative
DIA operates on a collaborative partnership model involving corporates, SOEs, universities, professional bodies, churches, development partners, DFIs, and regulators, recognising that governance reform is a collective endeavour.
Governance of the Institute
In keeping with its mission, Directors Institute Africa is governed by robust structures, including a Board of Directors, an Academic and Governance Advisory Council, an Ethics and Integrity Committee, and a professional Secretariat.
The Institute is led by a geographically diverse founding Board of Directors, reflecting its pan-African mandate. The Board is chaired by Mr Edward Le Roux (South Africa), an experienced governance practitioner, and supported by Vice Chair Dr James Tsabora (Zimbabwe), a respected academic, legal scholar, and governance expert.
Other elected board members include Dr Solomon Taru Chikanda (Zimbabwe), Dr Cynthia Kunda Simwaka (based in Zambia), Mrs Averess Ndhlovu Chella (based in Malawi), Mr Kenneth Tshepo Tshweneetsile (Botswana), Mr Takesure Chimenya (Zimbabwe), Dr Tendai Mabvure (Zimbabwe), and Dr Shylet Chigewende (Zimbabwe).
Additional board members from Nigeria and Kenya will be announced in the coming weeks, further strengthening the Institute’s continental reach and representation across Africa.
Phased Implementation and Growth
DIA’s rollout will occur in three phases over a 36-month horizon, moving from institutional consolidation to continental expansion and policy influence.
A Call to Africa’s Boards and Leaders
As it begins its journey, Directors Institute Africa issues a clear call to action strong boards build strong institutions, and strong institutions build Africa.
Conclusion: More Than an Institute, a Movement
Directors Institute Africa represents a strategic intervention in Africa’s governance ecosystem. By strengthening boards, embedding ethics, and cultivating competent leadership, DIA seeks to help rewrite Africa’s governance story, from one of fragility to one of integrity, stewardship, and enduring value.