The fact that this has been discovered in Africa doesn’t mean that it originated there in the first place.
> Several scientists said they suspected that the variant had been spreading undetected in countries with lackluster sequencing efforts before it surfaced in Botswana and South Africa, giving it more time to scatter globally. Nevertheless, European nations did not find the variant until after South Africa alerted them to it, demonstrating the gaps in their own surveillance efforts. [0]
> Several scientists said they suspected that the variant had been spreading undetected in countries with lackluster sequencing efforts before it surfaced in Botswana and South Africa, giving it more time to scatter globally. Nevertheless, European nations did not find the variant until after South Africa alerted them to it, demonstrating the gaps in their own surveillance efforts. [0]
More on this can also be found here [1].
[0] https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/27/world/africa/coronavirus-...
[1] https://www.linkedin.com/posts/graemecodrington_interesting-...