Akon and wife, Rozina, were recently been hosted in Rwakitura by President Museveni and First Lady Janet Museveni
Senegalese- American musician Aliaune Damala Badara Akon Thiam commonly known as Akon is planning to build a City in Uganda.
The internationally recognised RnB singer says Uganda’s tourism potential attracted them to consider it among one of the ten countries in Africa where they will build an Akon City.
Akon, one of the black Americans moving to harness the potential in Africa wants to build a city that he says will attract more business in Uganda and promote the country’s tourism potential.
He says the main goal is to promote tourism in Uganda, develop infrastructure and establish solar energy projects both in the City and in rural areas in Uganda.
He says together with his team, they shall conduct all the necessary studies before they start building a city that will take close to 15years to be complete. “It’s a long term project,” said Akon while addressing the press at the President’s office on Monday.
Akon says the City shall have what he calls a health District where a 10,000 bed capacity hospital shall be constructed, an entertainment district with audio recording and video studio and an educational district with schools among other facilities.
He says the objective of the Akon City that he is replicating in different parts of Africa is to unite the continent and get it to use her own resources to develop itself. He holds the view that Africa has developed other parts except herself.
“Without Africa, the world wouldn’t exist. Without Africa economy itself wouldn’t exist. And I don’t see a reason why we can’t build something up here for people that’s up here,” says Akon
Akon says partly why Africa hasn’t developed as it should is because we don’t trust each other and aren’t united. He says there is benefit to uniting like the United States of America and United Arab Emirates.
As part of the plan, Akon shall introduce the A Coin, a crypto currency which he hopes shall spread to be used in different parts of Africa and reduce cash transactions.
The Minister of State for Urban Development, Isaac Musumba says Government shall work with Akon’s team to identify a place to build the City.
Musumba says they are looking at having atleast a square mile of land for Akon to establish the project under a theme to be agreed upon by the two parties.
Uganda is not the first place Akon has chosen to establish a city. Last year, Akon announced a 6 billion dollars project to build a City on 2000 hectares of land in Mbodième, a small coastal village in western Senegal.
The first phase of the project in Senegal started last year and is expected to be completed in 2023. The project will result in the construction of roads, a Hampton’s hospital campus, a Hampton’s shopping mall, residences, hotels, a police station, a school, a landfill for the city’s waste and a photovoltaic solar power plant to supply the whole area.
Akon plans to have similar cities in Ghana and Ethiopia.
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