Kamala Harris will arrive in Accra, the capital of Ghana, on March 26. She will spend three days in Ghana, two days in Tanzania and will also visit Zambia (for one day), the vice president will return to Washington on April 2.
Particular attention during the visit will be given to the economic development of the continent, climate change, food security and youth issues.
In Africa, Kamala Harris will be closely followed as the first woman and first non-white to hold of Vice President of the United States. Kamala Harris’ mother was born in India and her father was born in Jamaica; Harris herself grew up in California.
“Everyone is in awe of Kamala Harris,” says Idayat Hassan, director of the Center for Democracy and Development in Abuja, Nigeria. “You can be whoever you want – that’s what she means to many of us.”
The centerpiece of Harris’ trip will be a performance in Accra and a visit to Cape Coast Castle, where enslaved Africans were once loaded onto ships bound for the Americas. Harris also plans to meet with the leaders of each country she visits and lay a wreath in memory of the 1998 US embassy bombing in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania’s capital.
Its itinerary also includes several less traditional destinations designed to highlight the dynamic future of a continent where the median age of the population is just 19.
For example, Kamala Harris plans to visit a recording studio and meet women entrepreneurs in Accra, as well as a technology incubator in Dar es Salaam. In Zambia’s capital, Lusaka, Harris is expected to meet with business leaders and philanthropists to discuss expanding access to global digital and financial systems.
The hope, according to White House officials, is to make Africa a destination for investment, not just aid, a point highlighted by Harris in his December speech at the U.S.- Africa in Washington.
