Egyptian Minister of Finance Mohamed Maait said on Monday that the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) has great prospects for multilateral and cross-border development activities in Africa.
Maait, who is also Egypt’s governor at the AIIB, made the remarks in a statement ahead of the eighth annual meetings of the AIIB, which will be convened for the first time in Africa on Sept. 25 and 26 in Egypt’s Sharm El Sheikh.
He said that Egypt will be the voice of Africa during the annual meetings and will work to promote the Africa-Asia partnership to achieve sustainable development goals.
As a founding member of the AIIB, Maait said, Egypt aspires to effectively contribute to fostering the Africa-Asia partnership and improving the level of services provided to citizens of African countries.
“The eighth annual meeting of the AIIB in Sharm El-Sheikh will be a powerful take off for the bank’s promising projects not only in Egypt but also in various African countries, through launching a new phase of transcontinental cooperation based on providing more infrastructure investments,” the minister added.
The Egyptian government granted approval on Aug. 17 for a loan from the AIIB to support a metro line project in the northern coastal province of Alexandria.
As per the arrangement, the Beijing-based bank will supply Egypt with 250 million euros (approximately 272 million U.S. dollars) to finance the Abu Qir metro line, situated in the coastal city of Alexandria, northern Egypt.