Akon’s $6B Senegal City ‘Scrapped’ for New Project

Akon’s grand plans to build a £4.3 billion futuristic city in Senegal have officially been scrapped five years after the singer promised to turn a remote stretch of West African coastline into a real-life Wakanda.

The Senegalese government has confirmed that instead of the ambitious plan, it was now making way for something more ‘realistic’.

Once touted as a high-tech utopia powered entirely by renewable energy and fuelled by its own cryptocurrency, the project has collapsed amid funding woes, stalled construction, and legal headaches.

The admission marks a stunning reversal for a project once unveiled with great fanfare in 2018, when Akon, 52, real name Alioune Badara Thiam, announced plans to build a futuristic smart city near the village of Mbodiène.

Designed with curvy skyscrapers and sleek modern infrastructure, early renderings of Akon City drew comparisons to Marvel’s fictional African metropolis Wakanda.

The city, Akon said at the time, would boast a hospital, mall, police station, waste centre, school, and even a solar plant all built by 2023 and running on his own digital currency, Akoin.

But nearly six years later, the 800-hectare site remains virtually untouched.

A single half-built reception centre stands alone in the barren field with no roads, homes, or electricity. 

Akon’s plans for a high-tech city has now confirmed to be scrapped , according to government officials 

Akon released renderings showing his ambition to build a futuristic city in Senegal, West Africa 

His plans were automatically compared to Wakanda, the fictional city in the Marvel movie, Black Panther

Even Akoin, the cryptocurrency designed to power the economy of the new city, has tanked.  

The token’s value plummeted and investors, leaving investors. Akon, who was born in the US but was partially raised in Senegal, eventually admitted the project had been mismanaged.

The ambitious plan also raised eyebrows from regulators. 

Senegal uses the CFA franc, a currency overseen by the Central Bank of West African States, which, like many central banks, is firmly against cryptocurrencies being used as legal tender.

In 2022, Akon insisted the project was ‘100,000% moving’, but no meaningful construction followed the glossy press events. 

Drone footage taken in recent months showed a flat stretch of grassland, eerily quiet.

Now, with the 2026 Youth Olympic Games on the horizon and the government focused on tourism infrastructure, officials are repurposing the land for a more modest development.

No details have been released on the new plan, but insiders say it’s likely to involve less fantasy and more feasibility, with the government keen to avoid another international embarrassment.

Akon City was meant to run on renewable energy and its own currency 

The huge land remains untouched with just one building standing abandoned 

Akon became a household name in the noughties after a string of top 10 hits, including the number one Lonely

Serigne Mamadou, in charge of Senegal’s tourism development body, Sapco told the BBC: ‘The Akon City project no longer exists.’

‘Fortunately, an agreement has been reached between Sapco and the entrepreneur Alioune Badara Thiam [aka Akon]. What he’s preparing with us is a realistic project, which Sapco will fully support.’

Akon became an international success in 2024 following the release of his debut album and several top 10 hits. 

In recent times, he has been less involved in the music industry after a series of singles that failed to replicate his earlier commercial success.