Can Africa Take Ownership of the AU-US Infrastructure Deal?

The African Union and the United States have begun turning a new infrastructure partnership into an operating platform, but the central question is whether Africa will control the initiative or simply receive outside financing.

The Strategic Infrastructure and Investment Working Group, approved by the African Union Commission and the US government in January, is identifying projects and building institutional mechanisms. African Union Commission Chairperson Mahmood Youssouf and US Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau agreed that the group would align US capital and financing tools with projects backed by the AU. The work will draw on Agenda 2063, the Programme for Infrastructure Development in Africa and the African Continental Free Trade Area.

The US Bureau of African Affairs is coordinating with the US International Development Finance Corporation and the Export-Import Bank of the United States to create a cross-departmental task force involving agencies and US companies interested in investing in Africa. On the AU side, the chairperson’s cabinet is organising the commission’s contribution to the group. The partners have selected a deliberately narrow first slate: a jetty and port expansion in Nacala, another petroleum jetty in Mozambique, Namibia’s Walvis Bay integrated hydrogen hub, the long-delayed Inga hydroelectric scheme in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and a data centre. The data centre is the only project outside the PIDA pipeline.

That choice is meant to reinforce African ownership. The first phase of PIDA mobilised $82 billion against an initial $68 billion target, while its second phase requires $161 billion. Private capital has been reluctant to meet that level, leaving African governments and sovereign borrowing to carry much of the burden. Africa’s annual infrastructure financing gap is commonly estimated at $68 billion to $108 billion, and sovereign borrowing has contributed to the continent’s debt distress.

The AU is organising the partnership through its infrastructure, energy, economic development, tourism, trade, industry and mining departments, while the AU Development Agency will handle delivery. The projects follow an integrated corridor model, linking transport, energy, information and communications technology, and water infrastructure. Yet this is also the first time the commission will lead a commercial relationship with a major partner that directly involves private capital. That new responsibility could become the AU’s biggest test.