The village of Mbodiène lies 100 km south of Dakar on the Atlantic coast. Herds of zebu graze on the wild grassland nearby, which untouched by crane, jackhammer or builder, should nevertheless be a vast construction site. In 2020, the land had been granted to Akon (named Alioune Badara Thiam), an American rap singer of Senegalese origin, to build a futuristic city in his name.
Originally budgeted at around $6 billion (about €5.5 billion), the completion date for the first phase of the Akon City project, forecast for the end of 2023, was pushed back to 2025 due to the Covid-19 pandemic. It was supposed to include roads, a shopping mall, luxury hotels, a hospital, a police station and a photovoltaic power plant. So far, only the structure of a curved building has seen the light of day: the future city's Welcome Center, according to local authorities.
On June 28, the Société d'aménagement et de promotion des côtes et zones touristiques du Sénégal (Sapco), part of the tourism ministry, sent a formal notice to the artist warning him of the consequences if work were not resumed by the end of July, when the government could revoke almost all the land granted him, which would be 50 out of 55 hectares for which he does not yet have title deeds. This would effectively put a definitive end to Akon City. When contacted by Le Monde Afrique, the teams in charge of the project, notably the main contractor KE International, were unresponsive to its enquiries.
"For the moment, we're holding onto the hope that the project will get off the ground," said Marcel Diome the chief of Mbodiène village. "So far, Akon has done everything he promised. So we believe in him, even if it's a bit slow." Diome said that the star had already financed the construction of a basketball court, a youth center and the football stadium enclosure. Achievements that are a far cry from the futuristic city Akon had announced, but for the chief they are proof of the artist's commitment.
At the time of its launch, "Akon City" embodied the promise of a new, green and high-tech city, imagined by Akon himself and backed by former president Macky Sall (2012-2024). The first plans, unveiled in 2018, had received extensive media coverage and presaged a city with ultramodern infrastructures and curved architecture – a city worthy of Wakanda, the fictional African kingdom in the Black Panther films, and which would have nothing to envy Dubai. "I want my buildings to look like sculptures," the American singer said at a press conference in 2020. His comparisons with the Marvel Studios blockbuster had "increased [his] motivation tenfold."
In addition to luxury hotels, oversized shopping malls and film studios, Akon had envisioned hospitals, high-tech universities and a 120-megawatt solar power plant to generate a local, autonomous electricity supply. The city would even have its own akoin cryptocurrency, which according to the singer aims to "to stimulate microexchange and financial stability in Africa and beyond." Akoin was launched in 2020, but according to the BitMart website, in just a few months, its price has plummeted from a value of $0.15 to $0.00035 today.
It is not the first time Akon has received a formal notice. In 2022, the lack of work being carried out earned him a formal reminder from Sapco. At that time, the project team had conducted geotechnical studies and had carried out some minor earthworks. In early 2023, the framework of the famous Welcome Center appeared, but there has been nothing since then. At the end of 2023, in response to mounting criticism of the lack of progress on the site, Akon told the BBC in an interview that his project was "100,000% moving" and that the "critics will look 'super stupid' in the future."
Some media outlets in Senegal have not hesitated to suggest a swindle, although not proven. In 2022, the online news site Dakaractu.com, questioned whether "Akon City" might not be a Ponzi scheme.
"There was no personal enrichment or scam," said a former Dakar-based Akon collaborator, who resigned in early 2023 along with a dozen other consultants. "Akon spent several million of his own money on this project. But he hasn't managed to confirm the investment pledges, even though he's not in a position to finance everything on his own," he said, and felt there was "lack of commitment" from the American star, which presents a major problem for an ultra-personalized project whose credibility depends almost exclusively on the person behind it.
The financing of "Akon City" has always been nebulous, to say the least. In 2020, the American company KE International told Le Monde Afrique that it had "already raised $4 billion from investors led by Julius Mwale," a Kenyan businessman, who is involved in a similar project in Kenya, the Mwale Medical & Technology City, which is also struggling to get off the ground. According to several of the project's former collaborators in Dakar, the promises of funding for "Akon City" have never materialized.
"For the people of Mbodiène, "Akon City" is still a dream," said Diome, who does not despair of seeing the old cornfields and pastures replaced by futuristic buildings. In view of the Youth Olympic Games, to be held in Senegal in 2026, demand for accommodation is set to soar between Dakar and the Petite Côte, the stretch of coastline south of the capital. Mbodiene village and the land promised to Akon, are therefore interesting to several investors wishing to build less grandiose, and more realistic hotel complexes.
Translation of an original article published in French on lemonde.fr; the publisher may only be liable for the French version.