Speaking at the Investec Asset Management conference on investing in Africa, Jonah said the continent needed to see the benefits of a partnership between business, government and civil society.

"To ensure growth and competitiveness in any society, each of those three groupings carries a range of responsibilities," he said.

Businesses had a duty to themselves and to the countries they operated in not to damage the business environment by making themselves accomplices to corrupt practices.

AngloGold Ashanti has operations in North America, South America, Australia, Ghana, Mali, Tanzania and South Africa.

Jonah said companies must recognise that their right to operate was derived from the state structures of the countries and communities where they operated.

"We in our company call it the moral licence to mine, a licence that derives from consent of the people."

At the conference, poverty alleviation expert Hernando de Soto said the lack of legal property titles undermined development.