President Obama in Kenya: 'Africa is on the move'

Image

US President Barack Obama has praised Africa's economic and business potential in a speech in Nairobi on the first full day of his visit to Kenya.

"Africa is on the move... People are being lifted out of poverty, incomes are up (and) the middle class is growing," he told a business summit.

He is due to visit a memorial to the 1998 US embassy bombing, before talks on security with Kenya's president.

His first visit as president to his father's homeland began on Friday.

BBC Africa Live: Obama in Kenya udpates

The trip has been described as a "homecoming" by Kenyan media, and crowds cheered Mr Obama's motorcade as it travelled from the airport.

In Nairobi on Saturday morning, the US president presided over the opening of a Global Entrepreneurship Summit.

Africa needed to be a "future hub of global growth", Mr Obama told young entrepreneurs and businesspeople, adding that governments had to ensure that corruption was not allowed to flourish.

Mr Obama said Kenya had made "incredible progress" since his last visit.

"When I was here in Nairobi 10 years ago, it looked different from what it looks today," he said.

Later, Mr Obama is scheduled to visit the memorial park on the site of the US embassy attack.

More than 200 people, including 12 Americans and 34 local embassy staff, died in the blast which was blamed on al-Qaeda.

Related Articles

Netanyahu held secret meeting with Emirati president in UAE during Iran war, PM's office says

It has ​pursued an assertive ⁠foreign policy and carved its own sphere of influence across the Middle East and Africa.

  • World

    13-05-2026

  • 06:20PM

Minneapolis Man pleads guilty to assaulting US Representative Ilhan Omar

On Jan 27, Kazmierczak sat in the front row at an official Minneapolis town hall meeting hosted by US Rep. Ilhan Omar,

  • World

    08-05-2026

  • 09:04AM