Somali president heads to Egypt forum to court African investors

Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud landed in Egypt on Friday with a senior delegation at his side, bound for a gathering he says could shape how Somalia is seen by investors across the continent. His destination was New Alamein, a Mediterranean coastal city hosting the first Alamein Africa Forum, an event built around a single ambition: deepening investment and economic cooperation among African nations.

For Mohamud, the trip is a chance to speak directly to the people whose decisions could change what economic life looks like back home. On the social media platform X, the president laid out what he hopes to accomplish during his time among fellow leaders. “I look forward to highlighting Somalia’s growing investment opportunities and engaging fellow African leaders on enhancing economic partnerships,” he wrote. The message was aimed at an audience of heads of state, government officials, financiers and business figures, the very crowd the forum was designed to assemble.

The scale of that crowd is considerable. Around 1,500 African business leaders arrived in El Alamein, the northern Egyptian coastal city where the forum opened on Friday, to spend three days discussing trade, investment and economic development. The gathering runs from Oct. 2 to 4, and its stated purpose is to push forward greater economic integration and business cooperation across the continent. Behind the scenes, the event carries the weight of three co-organizers: the Egyptian government, the African Export-Import Bank, and the African Union Development Agency.

For the business leaders, officials and executives walking the forum’s halls, the conversations are practical ones about where capital flows next and which partnerships hold. For the countries they represent, including Somalia, the stakes reach further. When a head of state stands before peers and investors to make the case for his nation’s opportunities, the outcomes can influence the deals, projects and jobs that follow long after the delegates fly home.

Mohamud’s presence in Egypt places him among a broad cross-section of African leadership, and his stated focus is on engagement rather than ceremony. His X post framed the visit as a working one: presenting Somalia’s investment prospects and holding discussions with other leaders on how continental partnerships can be strengthened. The forum’s agenda of trade, investment and development gives those conversations a natural home.

Meanwhile, the timing of the forum is no accident. The gathering coincides with a series of high-level regional meetings that Egypt is hosting alongside it. Among them is a summit of the founding countries of AUDA-NEPAD, the African Union Development Agency that also helped organize the forum itself. Egypt is also hosting the eighth mid-year coordination meeting of the African Union, drawing additional senior figures to the country during the same window.

That layering of events means New Alamein and El Alamein become, for a few days, a meeting point for much of the continent’s political and commercial leadership. Delegates can move between a business forum built for dealmaking and coordination meetings built for aligning continental institutions, all within the same stretch of the Egyptian coast.

For Somalia, represented by Mohamud and his senior delegation, the forum offers a platform that smaller or less frequently spotlighted economies rarely get at this scale. Whether the president’s pitch to fellow leaders and the 1,500 assembled business figures translates into concrete partnerships will only become clear in the months ahead. What is certain is that he arrived on Friday intending to make that case in person, in a city filled with the people positioned to act on it.