Organized Private Sector Charitable Giving: Reflections and Lessons from the Coalition Against COVID-19 (CACOVID) Initiative in Nigeria

Abstract

Little research has addressed the charitable activities of Africa’s corporate sector in the context of COVID-19. Focusing on the Coalition Against COVID-19 (CACOVID), a Nigerian organized private sector initiative to support government’s response to COVID-19, we explore lessons and challenges for Africa’s corporate philanthropic efforts to address the region’s development concerns. While CACOVID cannot be fully divorced from the profit-making impulse of leading Nigeria’s private sector brands, it generated significant resources which helped to advance the Nigerian government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Emerging lessons from CACOVID include the significance of credible leadership for Africa-led and -owned philanthropy; the immense philanthropic potential of Nigeria’s organized private sector; the continued indifference of local philanthropy to the root causes of marginality and inequity; and the potential risks for similar charitable schemes from ignoring traditional African norms of giving and relying on ungainly and politicized state structures to deliver their activities. Initiatives such as CACOVID would benefit from greater transparency and accountability not just to their initiators, but also, and more importantly, to those whom they purport to serve.