Hello
and thank you for joining us. We begin with Kenya. As William RTO represents
Africa at the G7 summit in
France,
Nairobi is seeking to turn the new US China rivalry into an industrial
opportunity.
Speaking
on the sidelines of the G7 summit, President William RTO said that Kenya and
the United States are
finalizing
an agreement covering rare earths and other critical minerals. But R made one
thing clear. Kenya will no
longer
export raw materials. They must be processed inside the country. Guto says the
deal is not a conventional
western
aid package but a mutually beneficial transaction between Washington and
Nairobi.
The
relationship we are building with America is one that is mutually beneficial.
We have we are finalizing an agreement with America on some of our
rare
earth and critical minerals. We've agreed with them on what is mutually
beneficial between Kenya and the United States.
But
this story is about far more than mining. For decades, Africa exported raw
materials. While the real profits were
captured
elsewhere in Europe, America or China. Now, this model is growing facing
growing backlash. Across the continent,
a
new wave of resource nationalism is emerging as African countries demand more
value from their natural wealth.
R
pointed to developments in the Democratic Republic of Congo is the same thing
that they are doing in
in
in in DRC to make sure that uh whatever agreements whatever deals are being
fashioned
are deals that benefit the country in the way we have said these uh
natural
resources can no longer be exported and protest processed elsewhere. They have
to be processed in
in
in country and in continent. They have we have to create value out of them. We
are ready to share the benefits
of
that value with those who invest with us.
The
timing of the deal is not accidental. Critical minerals have become the oil of
the 21st century. They
power
electric vehicles, missile systems, semiconductors, and advanced defence
technologies.
But
China currently dominates much of the global processing industry as Washington
looks for alternative supply
chains.
Countries like Kenya are becoming more strategic and Nairobi is trying to turn
that geopolitical moment
into
economic leverage as the United States and China compete for influence in
Africa. And Kenya's own
mineral
reserves are modest compared to giants like South Africa or the DRC. But
Nairobi has bigger ambitions. It wants
to
become East Africa's processing hub and insert itself into global supply
chains. All without choosing sides. Now RT's message to the G7 was simple.
Africa
does not want relationships based on extraction. It wants partnerships built on
investment.
We're
going to reject any relationships that are based on extraction of our natural
resources, energy resources,
human
capital. We are instead going to build relationships with partners who
are
interested in investments in our continent, not extraction.
The
mineral zeal also fits into a much broader US Kenya partnership. Kenya is
America's first major non-NATO ally in
sub-Sahara
and Africa. The US is expanding military infrastructure at Kenya's Manda Bay
with a massive $71 million runway expansion.
Now
Washington is also deepening maritime ties with Kenya through a $750,000 naval
investment in Mombasa.
The
United States is also investing in Kenya's digital and semiconductor
industries, making Kenya the first
African
country to receive direct funding under the US Chips Act.
But
not everyone in Kenya is comfortable with the deepening relationship. Critics
argue that foreign partnerships risk
undermining
national sovereignty and public suspicion has been fuelled by controversies
surrounding Widespread protests against the US Ebola quarantine facility have
repeatedly broken out across the country, putting
the
president's pro-Western policies under intense scrutiny. A good message to our
president R and also the American
president.
If there's any money that you gave R that money did not come to Kenya and he
did not start any business because of Kenya’s. R is a criminal and
we
are going to tell him that we have said no to Ebola here in Anuki.
The
growing pressure from public suspicion became highly visible during the
sidelines of the G7 summit where RO was forced to publicly defend the US
funded
Ebola isolation network constructed on Kenyan territory.
When
Ebola was announced by the World Health Organization, I did the responsible
thing. We immediately
embarked
on building isolation centres, preparing, training staff, making sure
that
we uh test people around our borders and we
set
out to establish 23 isolation centres around Kenya.
As
we did that, the United States stepped in and supported our effort with
financial support.
Despite
his closeness to Washington, R insists that Kenya will not be drawn into a new
cold war between the US and
China.
Analysts say that there is a contradiction at the heart of that message. Kenya
speaks the language of
resource
nationalism, but its economy still relies heavily on foreign capital,
international lenders, and external security partners.
William
R says that Kenya does not want to choose sides. It wants to turn superpower
rivalry into national advantage.
But
as competition between Washington and Beijing intensifies, Nairobi risks being
drawn into the new cold war that it is trying to profit from.
Now
for more on this, we have with us Narim who is a political analyst joining us
live from Nairobi. Welcome back to First Post Africa.
Thank
you.
Now,
RTO is demanding 100% domestic mineral processing, but we know that refining
requires massive industrial power.
Does
Kenya actually have the energy grid and the infrastructure that is necessary to
back up this resource nationalism or
is
it an empty bluff to get more US capital?
Kenya's
energy is not just rhetoric.
Scaling
infrastructure is part of a long-term industrialization.
There
have been geothermal and grid expansions over the years. So, they must be
scaled up. However, that must also
create
opportunities for Kenya's majority young population. And that means Kenya needs
these agreements to
ensure
that there's participation across the value chain. So, it would mean not just
extraction but local processing,
manufacturing,
downstream industries, the communities affected for instance they must be able
to see tang sustainable economic results
not
just the macroeconomic picture. So, to prioritize skills transfer from
vocational training employment pathways
they
do have to benefit from this and the career opportunities and entrepreneurship
it brings. So, I'd say it's not just rhetoric. It's actually he
doesn't
have a choice at this point to be able to feed to the multiple population of
young people that we have on this in this country on this
continent
and the amount of them that are skilled and educated.
H
now R talks about African sovereignty at the G7 but at home he is facing
fierce
protests over the US Ebola facility and expanding American bases.
How
sustainable is his pro-Western foreign policy when his own citizens at home are
scrutinizing the deal?
It's
going to be diff uh R's pro western
a
lot of direct power in terms of being engaged publicly balancing
between
public trust which extremely vital especially for youth who do seek a
safer
future. You saw the number of people who are protesting. Many of them are young
people and the challenge we've
been
having is the lack of transparency and the communication of some of these
agreements only coming after the fact.
So,
for him to balance sustaining the legitimacy, he must remember how important to
have domestic legitimacy in
the
process and not just foreign relations, right? And Kenya claims that it can
serve
the west's mineral needs without choosing sides. Uh but China completely
dominates rare earth processing technology.
Now
if Nairobi signs this exclusive deal with Washington, how can it realistically
avoid economic retaliation from Beijing?
So,
remember also the US president did travel to China with his cabinet and
business partners as well. So even these
global
powers are having their own side agreements. So, in any US deal Kenya must
maintain diversified partnerships just
so
that we are not left vulnerable economically vulnerable to any single
global
power. So that's where I see the benefit comes because we do have to think
about Kenya's youth and how we can
benefit
from skills and jobs transfer. But to sit on the fence consistently is not
something
that's going to work. At some point uh our country, our president is going to
have to have a stand and we cannot balance uh both powers. But just
being
clear on some of these agreements, but definitely not aligning specifically and
exclusively to one country. That
cannot
work in this day and age, especially with our technological advancements and
the way global markets are moving.
Right,
Narina? It's always great to have you on the show. Thank you. Thank you.
https://youtu.be/ebP1u1v6sgw?si=n2o_1THzBnSvYbzH
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