This morning I spent some time on the phone with an entrepreneur in Accra. He has a thriving financial services business, and is keen to share his insights with audiences in London. After I put the phone down I picked up the FT, and read William Wallis’s oped ‘Why Africa is leaving Europe behind‘. Wallis contrasts Africa’s fast growing economy and improving governance with the travails of its former colonial powers: rising debt, public spending cuts and social unrest. Wallis notes that David Cameron seems to have learnt to talk to Africa’s leaders as potential business partners, rather than lecture them for  their imperfections. But he describes Cameron’s recent visit to Africa (cut short by the HackingGate scandal) as a “barely perceptible blip”. China, India, Turkey and Brazil are “queuing up to seize the opportunities of African resources and markets” and the UK, and Europe’s other post-colonial powers, are being left behind.