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Amanpour

NBA Racism Probe; Running the City of Angels; Imagine a World

Aired April 29, 2014 - 14:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN HOST: Good evening, everyone, and welcome to the program. I'm Christiane Amanpour, reporting live from Los Angeles tonight.

The sports and racism story that has rocked this city, this state, this country and the one that's also rebounded across the world is about to reach boiling point. Moments from now, the National Basketball Association will hold a press conference and Adam Silver, the new commissioner, is expected to enter that room and lay out the players' demands that Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling be severely sanctioned if not thrown out.

Now this video shows him and his wife fending off the press after the website TMZ released an audio recording of a man purported to be Sterling telling his female friend that he didn't want her bringing any black people to Clippers games.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

DONALD STERLING, OWNER, L.A. CLIPPERS (from captions): You told me you were going to remove those. You said, "Yes, I understand you.' I mean you change from day to day. Wow. So painful, wow.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (from captions): People call you and tell you that I have black people on my Instagram. And it bothers you.

STERLING (from captions): Yes, it bothers me a lot that you want to broadcast that you're associating with black people.

Do you have to?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (from captions): You associate with black people.

STERLING (from captions): I'm not you and you're not me. You're supposed to be a delicate white girl, a delicate Latino girl.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (from captions): I'm a mixed girl.

STERLING (from captions): OK. Well (INAUDIBLE).

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (from captions): And you're in love with me. And I'm black and Mexican. Whether you like it or not.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

AMANPOUR: Now Sterling has yet to deny those remarks, allegedly made to his girlfriend. But it is worth remembering that about three-quarters of NBA players are black while an overwhelming majority of team owners are white.

Joining me tonight for his only one-on-one interview, the mayor of Los Angeles, Eric Garcetti. We'll get his reaction to this story as we wait to see how the NBA will clip Sterling's wings.

But this isn't the only issue on the mayor's plate, of course. Garcetti is coming up on his first year in office and I'll talk to him about his greater goals for one of the world's most fabled cities, one of the most ethnically and racially complex in this country, where almost a third of residents are foreign-born, coming here from 150 countries and speaking more than 200 languages.

At 43, Garcetti is the city's youngest mayor in a century. He is the first Jewish mayor, but he's also part Mexican, bilingual, a Rhodes scholar and he's lived in Southeast Asia and studied ethnic conflict.

So Garcetti embodies the Los Angeles of today, diverse, eclectic and focused squarely on the world.

Mayor Garcetti, welcome. It's an honor to have you on our program tonight.

ERIC GARCETTI, LOS ANGELES MAYOR: It's an honor to be with you, Christiane, thank you so much.

AMANPOUR: So here we are in Los Angeles and something that has besmirched the reputation of the city is what has happened, allegedly attributed to the owner of one of Los Angeles' teams, the L.A. Clippers.

As we just said, the NBA is going to say something today.

What should the NBA do about Sterling?

GARCETTI: Well, the words that we heard most probably out of Don Sterling's mouth, and we do anticipate that the commissioner will confirm that they were his words, don't represent this city.

As you mentioned, this is probably the most diverse, open-armed, most incredibly culturally rich place ever assembled in human history. It is a tolerant place; it stands against racism and the words of one owner of one basketball team should immediately be condemned. And I hope that the league will take the strongest penalties against him.

These players proudly wear Los Angeles on their uniforms. Those words do not represent our city.

AMANPOUR: What do you think the NBA will do and should do?

Obviously the players want him somehow to be thrown out of his position as owner. Others want him to be severely sanctioned, maybe heavy fines.

What do you think is likely to happen to Mr. Sterling today?

GARCETTI: I think it's likely that they will confirm that it was him. I think it's likely that they will suspend him. I think they will ban him from games, including our playoff game and for all the players out there who might be watching from the Clippers, we are 100 percent behind you tonight.

And this city loves you. And you are the Clippers.

But I also think that longer term they will look at ways of trying to transition ownership. But that's easier said than done. But all of us would like to see that. We think that this does not reflect who we are; we know it's not the L.A. that's on the move and has the most diverse and creative economy in the world, that brings people here from every corner of the globe and we have no place for that here.

We have no place for that sort of leadership or ownership of any business in L.A.

AMANPOUR: OK, Mayor, as we wait for these sanctions, we also know that many of the sponsors and advertisers of the Clippers have in fact pulled their support. And as you say, it should not represent this city and this state.

So let's talk about the challenges of this state. You have said that -- and you're about to come into your first year as mayor -- that the city needs not just reinvigorating but rebranding.

Why do you say that?

GARCETTI: Well, you know, Los Angeles has an embarrassment of riches. We are a place that people come to from every continent of the world, from every state in the union here. And everybody comes to Los Angeles because of a few fundamentals, amazing geography, incredible weather, the diverse culture and the openness.

I mean, we are a place that right now is arguably the northern capital of Latin America, the western capital of the United States and the eastern capital of the Pacific Rim. You know, if we didn't have a city here, we'd probably have to build one. It's really at that nexus of the world economy.

And I want to continue to build this city that, whether it's Hollywood and music and fashion, whether it's engineering and looking at rovers that we're putting up on Mars or rethinking NASA's space launch program here, that we have the cutting-edge companies, people, ideas.

In some ways, it's the best platform in a modern world to test your idea, your company, your story. L.A. is like testing it on the world in a single place.

AMANPOUR: You mention Hollywood. So I want to take that one first.

As head of the city council, you take a lot of pride in reinvigorating Hollywood.

But the fact of the matter is that some of the key, let's say, late- night shows have moved; the "Tonight" show have moved to New York; a lot of film production companies, a lot of studios are going outside this city to film because it's just too expensive.

Since Hollywood is such a brand for Los Angeles, how are you going to bring them all back? Can you?

GARCETTI: I think we can and I'm very excited to do that.

But to your first question, I think we have this embarrassment of riches, but we often haven't put the ingredients together. That's where political leadership comes in. That's where I can rally, you know, the 10 million creative souls that are here just as we did in the 1984 Olympics when we saved the Olympics.

Right now we're seeing Hollywood leave Hollywood. And so I have appointed a film czar for the first time, Ken Zifrin (ph) is currently our film czar, probably the finest entertainment lawyer in the land.

And we're going out there and meeting with studio executives and bringing them back while we try to convince our state leaders to expand our state incentives program that other places have done.

Already we're bearing fruit; six or seven series I've helped bring back through a combination of tax incentives and good old-fashioned Jewish guilt, as I joke. You know, these things, when we look at the ability to bring people back to where it all started, we know the most creative people are here. We've got to be more competitive. And we've got to hustle for business.

Our weather isn't enough to sell the place. And it's the same thing with aerospace, with manufacturing and we're the manufacturing center of America. We had a record tourism year last year with 42 million visitors. And we're at really the trade hub of America with, you know, 43 percent of the goods that come into our country, coming through our ports here.

But we're not going to rest on those laurels. So my plan is to really invest in the next iteration of what a modern city looks like, open, open- minded, creative, three top 25 universities, the only city in the country to have that. And investing in the people and the infrastructure to succeed in the future.

AMANPOUR: So you talk about infrastructure; we've heard a lot about one of the very high-speed train routes that the governor wants to establish.

But we also read about the terribly crippling traffic gridlock, even sidewalks that, you know, you need to fix and people are asking you to fix those here in Los Angeles.

There has been a commission which has actually called Los Angeles a city in decline.

"L.A. is barely treading water while the rest of the world is moving forward. We risk becoming a city in decline."

How hard is that going to be to fix, given that you have still a fairly massive budget shortfall, several hundred million dollars?

GARCETTI: Well, you know, I respectfully disagree with the commission that said we're in decline, though I think we face some of those challenges together.

T his is a city, as I mentioned, that had more tourists than ever before, more students than ever before, more residents than ever before. So people still want to come here.

But we have record investment, the largest public transportation investment program in the country right now. It's taking the car capital of the United States and turning it into a public transportation and a walking and a biking capital.

When we close down our streets for events like Cyclivia (ph), which brings bicyclists out and we see 50,000 people on the streets of L.A., we know that there's an excitement out there about the new Los Angeles.

When we have a single weekend like we did a couple weekends ago, we have the tallest building west of the Mississippi laying the longest concrete pour in human history, right after another billion-dollar groundbreaking two days before, we literally are seeing billions of dollars of investment each week here and tens of thousands of jobs. Our unemployment rate has dropped by 2 percent.

So we face those challenges, but we face them with excitement, with openness and with innovation. It's always defined who L.A. is. It's not that we haven't faced challenges in the past, riots, earthquakes, recessions. But L.A. is so good at reimagining itself and really reimagining the urban landscape and inspiring the world and doing that, that's what L.A.'s going to do for this next 10 years under my leadership.

AMANPOUR: Let's talk about people moving forward. You spoke obviously about the entrepreneurship, the technological advances. We know that this state is the leader in the tech revolution.

But again, here is what some people say and what you've all acknowledged, that "while the poverty rate in Los Angeles has gone up in five years since the recession started, high-wage jobs are being created here faster than low-wage jobs." And that, in fact, apparently surprises people, you say.

How can we create more high-wage jobs and still have a higher poverty rate?

So how do you unknot that conundrum?

GARCETTI: Well, it's a great conundrum to have. I'd rather have that than not having high-wage jobs. But what it spoke to to me is we're not creating enough pathways for young people who grow up in this city to fill those high-wage jobs.

So instead, we're attracting incredible people from around the country and around the world to come to Los Angeles. And I want to continue to welcome them.

But I think that's a bridge that I can build. This summer, I'm starting something called the Summer of Succeed, it will marry a youth jobs program with our parks being open late at night and something called the Summer of Learning, where we're going to be cutting-edge 21st century teachers being taken the very best and brightest engineers and professors and other experts to give young people in our city digital badges that will keep in a city-run digital resume that kids can take to a college application, take to their teachers at the end of the summer, or to a prospective employer.

You know, we here in Los Angeles have jobs in industries that are on the move. I just want to make sure nobody's left behind, that we don't have a barbell economy, that we don't have an emptying out of the middle class. That's why I'm fighting for those entertainment jobs. That's why I'm fighting for those manufacturing jobs.

But we can't fight the fight with the old tactics. We have to be nimble. We have to be forward-looking. It starts with our education system and then attracting those key industries. And already we're seeing some very hopeful signs that L.A. is well poised to win in this global economy, not just because of our geography, not just because of our hardworking people, not just because of our weather but because of sound public policy moving forward.

AMANPOUR: Well, I want to talk to you about weather and environment and climate change. I must also say that we're about a minute or just over a minute, we're being told the NBA presser will start.

But I want to ask you about -- you talk a lot about the weather. Climate change, the environment, you yourself apparently drive, I think, an electric car or something like that.

Is that right?

GARCETTI: I have for a number of years.

AMANPOUR: How prepared --

(CROSSTALK)

AMANPOUR: -- how prepared is Los Angeles to weather a major storm, a major crisis?

GARCETTI: Well, you know, we're facing two potential crises, one that is with us, with the drought, and one that recurs with earthquakes.

With the drought, I'm very proud of my city. I think we're leading the way to a greener future, perhaps the greenest city on the face of the Earth, more solar insulation than anywhere in America. But with the drought, we're consuming the same amount of water today as we did 30 years ago, with a million more residents. How do we do that? By just having sound public policy to have low-flow toilets and shower heads, by taking grass out that isn't being used by nobody and putting more drought-tolerant beautiful flowering plants there. Those sorts of things that can help us recycle water and reuse water, but with an earthquake, that's something that's a little less predictable. But it's not a question of if. It's a question of when.

So I've asked Dr. Lucy Jones (ph), who's probably the best seismologist at the United States Geological Survey, to actually live here in City Hall for a year. And she's coming up with a plan for us to strengthen our buildings, to strengthen our infrastructure for communications and water so when fires break out after an earthquake, so we can talk to each other and we can put those fires out.

And we're going to be rating buildings for the first time, just like restaurant ratings you see in some cities, when you walk in, we're going to be rating buildings so people know when they walk into that building how safe it is seismically. Those two things together should make a more resilient Los Angeles that can weather both the drought and make sure when an earthquake comes we're better prepared.

AMANPOUR: So let me just read this, something you said a little bit earlier.

"We are as prepared as any other U.S. city for a disaster, which is to say we're wholly unprepared."

Do you still stand by that?

GARCETTI: I do. I mean, in the sense that we've made good strides since I think I've become mayor, but the average Angelino, just like the average American and person in the world, doesn't really believe disaster is going to come until that moment that it arrives.

So what I want to leave behind is not just the strength and infrastructure of buildings, but the human infrastructure, to make sure every Angelino has a plan of where they go with their family.

You know, the last time in 1994 when we had an earthquake, the Internet wasn't really here. And nobody had cell phones.

Today we expect we're going to be able to communicate with each other; we'll be able to text each other, call each other. And those communications infrastructure may be completely obliterated by an earthquake. So we have to go back to an analog way of preparing, having the water ready, having a plan ready, whether it's in our workplace or whether it's in our home, where do we go, how do we get through those first three days to make sure the city can get back on its feet as we always have? But that doesn't happen just because government is able to roam the streets and take care of people. We have to make sure that every household and business is just as prepared, too.

AMANPOUR: Mr. Mayor, I want to take you back before you became mayor and that is your expensive experience around the world. And reading your biography, it seems that at one point you wanted to perhaps join the State Department.

What did you learn by visiting 80 countries, by living abroad, by studying at Oxford as a Rhodes scholar in England?

GARCETTI: Well, you know, I think a lot of people see -- say here in Los Angeles with our diverse population, you see the face of the world on the streets of L.A. And that's certainly true. But traveling and living and working and studying abroad, for me, I found the opposite to be true. I could be on the streets of Addis Ababa or Mumbai, of Tel Aviv or Beirut. I could be in Mexico City, and I saw the face of Los Angeles on the streets of the world.

So I think growing up here gives me a comfort and a cultural fluency to really go out there and bring business from Asia, Latin America, to Los Angeles, to feel comfortable in Africa and Europe and to immediately be able to promote my city that, you know, if I'm asked why you're running for local government, you're professor of international relations; you've been an activist abroad. And I said, have you been to L.A. lately? It is the United Nations. It is the diversity of the world. There's no better place, no better laboratory to test your idea, product, experiment, your story line than here.

It's like testing it on the world in a single place.

AMANPOUR: Yes, and that brings us, of course, to immigration, so many Hispanics as well as people from all over the world, foreign-born, who've come here.

But so many Hispanics and Latinos, we know that they're going to be the majority population, the majority language. And yet the system in many, many ways fails them terribly, especially the education system.

What is Los Angeles going to do to right that imbalance? Because if they don't have the opportunity, they're going to be a majority population unable to take on that challenge and responsibility.

GARCETTI: Well, I love how you framed that, because it's true. All Americans, whether you're Latino or not Latino, have a stake in making sure the immigrants who, again, don't just come from Latin America, but come from Asia and Europe and Canada, that they're fully integrated into our country. It's been the strength of our country. It'll be the demographic growth of our country. And the economic driver of this country. We're not waiting for Washington to take action, whether it's California, giving driver's licenses to everybody or whether it's here in the city of Los Angeles, where we've been able to set up ways of being able to get students integrated fully into the life of Los Angeles. And I set up an office of immigrant affairs here as a mayor. But we do call on our national government to give a vote to Republicans and Democrats alike in Congress, a majority of whom want to see immigration reform because in practical terms, they know that it's good for America.

This isn't about favors for anybody; this isn't about where the rules were broken or not. This is about being practical, pragmatic and making sure that we have that workforce for tomorrow.

To the Latino kind of folks who have been here for many generations, like my family, my grandfather was born in Mexico, fled during the revolution when he was 1 year old in his mother's arms. We can see the success story of hard working -- some of the hardest working people in the world coming here. But you're right. That's why I'm so focused on giving skills to our young people who are right now in our high schools and making sure they don't drop out but move ahead and become those contributors to a modern economy, all of America benefits from that. And I think all of us will realize that in the coming years. I just hope Congress will take action now.

AMANPOUR: Well, that was going to be my next question to you. Immigrants are legal or non-legal, have been demonized basically in Washington. It's a terrible political football, while, as you say, so many of them have been born here, maybe to undocumented parents. So many of them could propel the economy of this country.

There has been word that perhaps Speaker Boehner might fast-track some immigration reform.

Do you think that that's likely?

GARCETTI: You know, I'm always an optimist. And you know, I'm the kind of baseball fan, who when we were down 11-2 in the 9th still thinks we can win the game. And I do hope that Speaker Boehner will. I've had meetings with other Republican leaders in the House, like Kevin McCarthy, who comes here from California, understands the importance of this.

And I do encourage them, because, look, I run as a non-partisan. I have Democratic and Republican supporters as a mayor of Los Angeles. I can't afford to look at a pothole and decide whether it's a Left or a Right issue. It has to be paved.

In the same way, we're looking for Congress to have America first in its mind. I wouldn't be here today as the 42nd mayor of the City of Los Angeles, the second biggest city in America and one of the world's great cities were it not for my own family story. Jewish immigrants on my mother's side; Mexican immigrants on my father's side, who came here, some of them came here probably without any papers. But they believed in this country. They invested in their well-being and in their family. They worked hard. And today I'm able to lead this city because of that. That is the American story. We need to create more of those instead of shutting them away into the shadows where we all lose.

AMANPOUR: Mayor Eric Garcetti, thank you very much for being with us.

We are still awaiting that NBA press conference. We don't know how long you can stay with us. But we hope to be able to come back with you for a quick comment.

But right now, we're going to take a break.

Thanks for being with us, Mr. Mayor.

GARCETTI: Thank you.

AMANPOUR: So while we do await that press conference, the inflammatory language of a basketball owner dominates the headlines, in another part of the globe, basketball has weathered another kind of storm.

President Obama flies home today from his Asia tour, meant to strengthen ties with America's allies in the Pacific. His last stop was the Philippines, where last November, Typhoon Haiyan left about 6,000 people dead and thousands more homeless.

But resilient Filipinos, many of whom live right here in Los Angeles, the expat community, at least, have begun to rebuild. And among the first things to rise again were their basketball hoops. Long the nation's most popular sport, basketball is more than just another game these days. It is a symbol of hope.

After a break, if hoop dreams can raise the spirit, clean hands can make the difference between sickness and health. One man's mission to change the world with a simple bar of soap. That's when we come back.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(MUSIC PLAYING)

AMANPOUR: Welcome back to the program. They sound simple enough, but soap and clean water are vital resources that many of us take for granted. So it's shocking to think that some people don't have access to either.

In fact, according to the World Health Organization, 2.6 billion people -- that's more than one in three of us -- lack basic sanitation. In Africa alone, 115 people die every hour from diseases linked to poor sanitation.

My next guest believes that hundreds of thousands of lives could be saved if people simply had access to soap. Really?

Derreck Kayongo, welcome to the program.

DERRECK KAYONGO, COFOUNDER, GLOBAL SOAP PROJECT: Thank you for having me, Christiane.

AMANPOUR: Good to see you here on this particular issue. And you just heard that this state is in a water crisis. But what you're dealing with is the -- is the consequences of health without sanitation.

In the United States, 2.6 million bars of soap are simply tossed away every day from hotels.

What are you doing to grab that unused resource and use it properly?

KAYONGO: What we did is set a small organization that is called the Global Soap Project, which recycles the soap. It comes from all these hotels to our factory in Atlanta. And we recycle it using volunteers literally. And we then partner with NGOs that distribute the soap.

AMANPOUR: Derreck Kayongo, we're going to have to hold that thought for a moment because Adam Silver is at the podium.

(NBA PRESS CONFERENCE)

AMANPOUR: So there you have Adam Silver, the commissioner of the NBA, having laid out draconian punishment against Donald Sterling, the owner of the L.A. Clippers, confirming that in fact after an interview with Mr. Sterling, those were his -- as he called them -- "hateful views and opinions."

Let us bring back Mayor Eric Garcetti, the mayor of Los Angeles, who we've just been speaking to.

Mayor Garcetti, you heard all that. You predicted that he would confirm that it was Donald Silver (sic) and you predicted some of those tough, tough penalties that have been -- that have been imposed.

Give me your reaction right now.

GARCETTI: Well, we have the confirmation that we were looking for. And I applaud Commissioner Silver for taking the strongest steps he can at this point to call on Mr. Sterling to divest himself of this team and to transition the ownership to give him the maximum fine and to have a lifetime suspension.

Those are exactly the sorts of strong statements we need to stand up against these hateful comments. And again, my sentiments tonight are with those players. And I think this is taking hopefully a burden off their shoulders so they can concentrate on what they do well. They've worked their entire life to be in this point in the playoffs. This city is behind them.

And thank you to the NBA for standing up behind this city and for what's right.

AMANPOUR: Mayor Garcetti, thank you very much indeed. Thanks for being with us. I know you have to get back to the business of Los Angeles.

GARCETTI: (INAUDIBLE), Christiane.

AMANPOUR: And we're now going to continue our conversation with Derreck Kayongo. We spoke about his soap project.

But I want to ask you for your opinion on what we've just seen, because this was as Adam Silver has said, hateful racism expressed here in the United States, where the workers are the black people in the NBA and the owners are the white people.

How does this resonate as -- with you as an African?

KAYONGO: I think that this is where I love this country that when it's met with this kind of adversity and this kind of question, it has always reacted to come and lift itself up back into the limelight as a great nation.

I think that what the commissioner has done is really remarkable. My son is a basketball player. He's 14 years old and he's going to be a great basketball player. And I think I wanted to see that this is the kind of reaction that would come out, because I want my son protected. Everybody wants their son protected.

AMANPOUR: And of course you live here, let's not forget.

(CROSSTALK)

KAYONGO: Yes, I'm an American now. So I think that this is why I love this country. We are able to come back as Americans and realize who we are as a people and do something remarkable.

AMANPOUR: As we continue our conversation I just want to repeat what Adam Silver has done.

Fined Mr. Sterling $2.5 million, the maximum allowed under the NBA constitution; initiated a process with the Board of Governors whereby he wants to force the sale of this team, that Donald Sterling will no longer be able to own this team, the L.A. Clippers.

He has called for a ban immediately, Donald Sterling banned for life from ever associated with the Clippers or the NBA, will not attend another game for the rest of his life and will not be allowed, banned from any Clippers facilities and he will have no authority to make any personnel decisions regarding the team, the Los Angeles Clippers.

And let's not forget, the team was so embarrassed and so remorseful over the weekend that during its playoff game, on the weekend, they took off their jerseys. They turned their shirts around and they refused to put the name L.A. Clippers on their shirts.

They also wore black wristband and black socks and they including the veterans of this game had demanded that Donald Sterling have nothing more to do with this game. And you heard Adam Silver issue personal apologies to what he called were the pioneers of basketball in this country, including Bill Russell and Magic Johnson, whose picture with the girlfriend is what sparked this hateful rant from Donald Sterling.

So that is the resolution of this situation that has rocked this city, this country and reverberated around the world.

Let us continue, because what you're doing is actually about rebalancing the haves and the have-nots, what we're all talking about.

You talk about a soap and sanitation revolution.

How many lives can be saved in Africa or in any of these places where they basically don't even have soap to wash their hands?

KAYONGO: Well, think about it, Christiane. Every year, as you've mentioned in the beginning of the program, we lose a lot of kids to what are sanitation issues, 2 million of them actually die every year because of poor hygiene. My idea here was that here is a product simply being thrown away by hotels. We can recycle that and give to the kids and the mamas around the world and teach them how to wash their hands and that alone, according to the Centers for Disease Control states you can mitigate death by 40 percent just teaching them how to use soap.

AMANPOUR: It's really incredible.

What about in basic, you know, in the labor room?

KAYONGO: Yes, where you have mamas giving birth to children and the midwives don't have soap or don't wash their hands properly without soap. And they leave what we call childbirth fever, a disease that in most women die from where they're not in this kind of hygiene situations.

I think here is a small idea that will answer that question very, very seriously. And that is soap, recycled soap can actually bring --

(CROSSTALK)

AMANPOUR: Did the hotels around this country or around the world where you try to get these unused bars of soap, did they think you were nuts when you asked them for, you know, please, put these in a paper bag and give them to me?

KAYONGO: If they thought I was nuts, they never told me about it. But I think what they saw was a remarkable idea that could solve their own problem, which was West, you are throwing away the soaps in the landfills, which is another problem that we have. And so my bringing them the idea was really a resurrection of the concept, oh, we could use all this waste to turn around and do remarkable work.

I think most hotels around the world are trying to do something good. They -- if you go to some hotels, they ask you to use your towel more than once. They ask you to turn your bedsheets.

So I think this is another step in their trying to go green and I think we are very happy about it.

AMANPOUR: Let's transition now to entrepreneurship like this in Africa. It is one of the fastest growing economies in the world, despite all predictions, even in the crisis, I think growth was fairly health around Africa. There are big behemoth economies there, Nigeria, Kenya, South Africa.

But every time we try to talk about the good news of Africa, we always then hear, well, what about the unholy corruption.

How devastating is that on a sort of -- not a macro government level but on a micro business person's level there?

KAYONGO: It is very devastating. And I think this is where I talk about transformative leadership. I think what Africa needs right now in all our leaders is for them to think about the importance of where this could be.

We want to leverage this continent to be -- to go out and to become one of the big powerhouses. But we can't do that if we are all talking about corruption. So I think what I'm invested in is I don't worry about so much the corruption. But what I worry about is can our leaders, can our people step back and say, can we do something (INAUDIBLE) world around . And that's what I'm doing, is changing that little piece around.

AMANPOUR: And what are you noticing amongst businesses there?

Are there billionaires who are also clean?

KAYONGO: Yes. There are billionaires who are clean. Africa, for the first time, I think, is seeing wealth that is based on real business consultant (ph) ideal. I am one of those people that is doing that. So I think when we invest ourselves in these particular ideals of business, as we are seeing globally, we are going to have real African billionaires who are not corrupt.

So corruption is there, but I think we have some good stories to tell.

AMANPOUR: And what is it going to take to reinvigorate all the continent? Because again, we look at Nigeria, which is now, I think, the biggest economy in Africa.

On the other hand, we have Kenya, that has just overtaken South Africa. We've got elections coming up in South Africa. That was the Rainbow Nation. That was the hope of the whole continent. And it's taken a bit of a hit.

What about leadership beyond business, leadership in Africa?

KAYONGO: I think that leadership in Africa is going to be rooted in one simple premise, the premise is going to be understanding the value of building a nation. If our leaders can become the John Adams of this -- what America was or Thomas Jefferson, they understood how to lead a nation into this grandiose idea of self-entrepreneurship.

What I see in America as a new American, living here as a former African but still an African at heart is that you do not get away with small things. They all matter. So when you're building a nation like South Africa or like Nairobi, Kenya, or Nigeria, you've got to remember that transformative leadership that serves your people well is what everybody is equal under the law.

The legal system has to work. So if the legal systems work in Africa, if we stop to fight each other on ethnic levels and start to see each other as equals, then we're going to make a continent that is unbelievably successful.

AMANPOUR: Rule of law.

KAYONGO: Yes, rule of law is big.

AMANPOUR: Derreck Kayongo, thank you so much indeed for being here.

KAYONGO: Thank you so much, Christiane.

AMANPOUR: And exciting show.

KAYONGO: Yes.

AMANPOUR: And that's it for our program tonight. Remember you can always contact us at our website, amanpour.com, and follow me on Twitter and Facebook. Thanks for watching and goodbye from Los Angeles.

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