More than 3000 Kenyans residing in the Diaspora have begun on a quest to establish a Multi-Billion ultra-modern metropolis in Magarini cub county of Kilifi county, in what can easily be defined as a move never witnessed in the annals of development in Kilifi county.
Proximity City Point of Return will have modern suburban residences, modern commercial and office buildings, industrial parks, vast agricultural projects, a state-of-the-art university, and a sporting facility.
It is intended to attract commercial and light industrial activities and will be owned and operated by a diverse range of diaspora community members, leveraging the diaspora community’s collective intellectual, financial, and communal capacity.
The goal of Proximity City is to create global standards for how Diaspora groups may be mobilized to build world-class solutions for their home society.
Already, a section of the Diaspora community has arrived in the country and attended the Sandies Dream of Africa Conference, where they met with investment experts, bankers, innovative organizations, and Kilifi County Government officials, after which they will visit the site where the city will be built.
Prof Lukas Njenga, Chief Executive Officer of the Diaspora Institute of Employability and Enterprise Development (DEED institute) and leader of the Proximity Point City of Return, stated that they have picked Kilifi County as a destination for diaspora home returns.
Mr Njenga said the Idea of the project was perceived after finding out that those in the diaspora have nothing to show for their hard work, and remittances whenever they come home and decided to convert all their efforts in one place and do something meaningful.
“The Vision of Developing Proximity Point city of Return was put together so that we could develop the resources based on our skills to have an industrial park an agribusiness campus, a residential facility, holiday making facility, the idea has grown we have over 3,000 people now participating in the process of making this happen but more than that we have them here in Malindi,” he said.
Among those present he said were people from California, New Jersey, the UK, Glasgow London, and Australia, who came to express their personal engagement in particip[ation in the vision of developing the city.
The CEO said the City Once Complete shall cover a large part of Magarini adding that they are developing the Agricultural campus while the development of residential areas is in the process at Kuresa area.
He said the Industrial park will be located near the border of Kilifi and Tanariver while the entertainment park shall be located along the beach area from Mamburui going forward.
“We are negotiating a big stretch with the National and County Governments to do our beachfront activities, so by and large from Mamburui area going up we are really engaging in most of those ideas, we have acquired the land so we are moving to the next level,” he said.
Maurice Witina from the USA said he learned about the symposium through a group that they are members of and found it the most secure channel of investing their money through the Proximity point city of return.
Maryanne Goets a director and Animal Conservancy Proximity Point group who is a Kenyan Living in North Carolina USA said the new city was being built in Kilifi by Diaspora for Diaspora because a lot of them in the diaspora would like to come back home and settle but there are no enough facilities and amenities they would like.
