A young entrepreneur from Benin, Régis Farcia believes hard in the potential of his continent. He says his struggle is to convince the Africans in the diaspora to come to work back home. "What we have here is the way to succeed in making our Africa a winning Africa,” he explains.

By Razzack Saizonou

More than 6 ft tall, with an athletic build and a spring in his step, Facia had everything to succeed as a professional basketball player.

But this young man’s head was full of innovative ideas, and his instinct guided him down the path of commercial engineering. After completing business studies in Grenoble, France, and obtaining his Masters Degree in London, Facia returned to his native Bénin. This marked the start of an African success story.

Youth in the vanguard
Facia worked for an American company in Cotonou before starting his own express mail business: Top Chrono. By throwing himself into an adventure like this, the young entrepreneur demonstrated his main vision of motivating young Africans in the diaspora to return home and participate in their country’s development.

“I think our continent has potential, and my struggle is to encourage young Africans in the diaspora to come home. Coming back and working with what we have here is the way to succeed in making our Africa a winning Africa,” he explains.

The ultimate goal of this man in his forties is to make sure that “wealth and added value are created, that unemployment is reduced, that every African evolves to a higher level and, above all, that all households are able to understand and agree to material and social evolution for every phase of life.”

The private sector: a vehicle for development
This more than noble objective cannot be achieved without the important framework provided by the private sector, according to Top Chrono’s Director General. Régis Facia emphasises that “we must understand in Africa that the most valuable asset in our environment is the private sector.”

At the same time, he regrets that nothing is done in our countries to allow private economic operators to contribute to Africa’s economic development.

As the Vice-President of Bénin’s employers association, he believes that “public authorities do not play their part. It doesn’t feel as though policies are in place for the benefit of the private sector. Fiscal harassment is much more important than normal fiscal concerns. This is stifling to business, and can sometimes shut them down.”

Régis Facia

Photo: RNW

Top Chrono
In its fifteen years of existence, Top Chrono has expanded throughout the sub-region, with subsidiaries in Togo, Burkina Faso, Niger, Ivory Coast and Senegal.

Facia has faced his share of difficulties, but the entrepreneur-visionary dreams of making his experience seminal for young Africans.

“Top Chrono is an example of how you can start with nothing and still succeed in creating something,” he says. “It’s an example of how it can pay to take risks, and that we can allow others to be employed, families to feed themselves. And as far as that goes, young people need to learn how to take chances.

They need to acquire a sense of organisation. But all of this must fall under the ethics, the morality and the logic of discipline, because you can’t get anything done if there’s disorder. We must also implement political and economic mechanisms ensuring that youth which has known only the drama of joblessness can flourish one day and lead a decent life. That’s what my struggle is all about.”

With his engagement, Facia fights on to offer a more promising future to young Africans. It’s now up to them to follow his model company: Top Chrono, a textbook case!