His Highness Prince Rahim Aga Khan, the fiftieth hereditary Imam (non secular chief) of the Shia Ismaili Muslims, is in Kenya for a three-day official go to that mixes diplomacy, heritage and growth. That is his first go to to the nation since his appointment as Imam, succeeding his late father, Prince Karim Aga Khan IV, in February 2025. The go to has significance, each symbolic and sensible, as a part of his function as Chairman of the Aga Khan Growth Community (AKDN), demonstrating the continuing ethos of partnership that has been in place for a lot of many years between the Ismaili Imamat and the Authorities of Kenya.
The expansion paradigm of the Ismaili Imamat in Kenya over generations has been constructed on an ethic of volunteerism and repair, institutional sustainability, and partnerships. It is important to the nationwide curiosity of Kenya and the Ismaili group that lives in Kenya and its jurisdiction. It’s that mannequin that has been the idea for Prince Rahim’s go to to Nairobi, together with his assembly with President William Ruto and senior Authorities of Kenya officers, in addition to visits to the AKDN establishments. The Imamat’s time-honoured mannequin is especially significant at a time when African states are themselves searching for companions in growth which are long-term and value-based.
In the course of the Aga Khan’s assembly at State Home in Nairobi, President Ruto prolonged congratulations to Prince Rahim on his accession to the Imamat and thanked him for the big function Prince Rahim’s late father performed in Kenya’s growth. The impression of Prince Karim Aga Khan IV was in depth in Kenya and guided the work of the AKDN up till immediately. In the course of the official luncheon, the President conferred Prince Rahim with Kenya’s highest civilian award, the Chief of the Order of the Golden Coronary heart of Kenya (C.G.H.). Earlier this 12 months, in March 2025, Princess Zahra Aga Khan was conferred the award of the Elder of the Order of the Golden Coronary heart of Kenya (E.G.H.) by President Ruto for her continued service to the well being system, schooling system, and social welfare packages of the Aga Khan Growth Community.
In his written handle, President Ruto mirrored on the tangible outcomes of the Imamat’s collaboration with Kenya. The AKDN-affiliated well being centres now obtain greater than 900,000 affected person consultations every year. Roughly 1,000 public faculties obtain help from the AKDN and the Community has additionally helped plant roughly 1.5 million bushes in Kenya over the last three years. These are tangible indicators of growth unfold all through Kenya’s central narrative of development, being a hit that belongs not simply to the Ismaili group however the Aga Khan’s legacy of growth.
For over 100 years, the Ismaili Imamat and Kenyan establishments have labored collectively to reinforce high quality of life for all Kenyans, with out distinction as to background. This ethos spans throughout many of the creating world the place the AKDN has tasks, together with neighbouring nations comparable to Uganda, Tanzania, Mozambique and Madagascar to call a number of.
Prince Karim Aga Khan IV, the Imam of the Shia Imami Ismaili Muslims who served from 1957 till February 2025, was a well-known determine in Kenya’s growth area and one of many nation’s most longstanding worldwide growth companions. His strategy was methodical and non-ideological, primarily based on constructing native capability supposed for long-term growth. The establishments he created throughout his Imamat function the muse for immediately’s well being, schooling and civil society in Kenya.
The Aga Khan College Hospital, Nairobi has developed into a serious regional centre of recent high-tech drugs, educating and coaching. It offers specialty care and medical schooling for professionals all through East Africa. It’s considered one of a small handful of hospitals in Sub-Saharan Africa to be accredited by the Joint Fee Worldwide, which establishes international norms for hospital high quality and security. In Mombasa, quite a few college students, usually from disadvantaged backgrounds, have entry to a world-class schooling from the Aga Khan Academy. Its Worldwide Baccalaureate (IB) program is designed to construct moral leaders and international residents.
The AKDN is about impression. Its establishments have helped set Kenya’s media agenda, by way of the regional media large The Nation Media Group, which was launched by Prince Karim in 1959. At this time, by way of the Aga Khan College’s Graduate College of Media and Communications, it’s enabling graduates to guide media by way of innovation, which is a part of the Imamat’s dedication to a free press and impartial media—a voice to the nation’s civil society.
At this time, Prince Rahim Aga Khan, who has performed key roles within the AKDN for greater than 20 years, is properly acquainted with Kenya and the East African area. Beneath his management, the priorities of the Imamat have developed to suit a altering world. His emphasis on sustainability, ingenuity, and empowering youth resonates properly with nationwide aspirations in Kenya below Imaginative and prescient 2030 and the Backside-Up Financial Transformation Agenda (BETA). His imaginative and prescient for growth, particularly round tackling local weather change, digital inclusion, and inclusive progress, displays Kenya’s aspiration to maneuver away from old school assist to resilient, home-grown options.
As Kenya grapples with the calls for of the necessity for financial progress and the necessity to deal with structural inequality, the mannequin of the Imamat offers a working different. It’s primarily based on moral ideas, long-term institutional funding, and powerful native possession. Nowhere is that this extra evident than within the actions of Industrial Promotion Companies (IPS), the AKDN’s development-finance arm.
AKDN’s environmental and rural growth work can be increasing. Reforestation, climate-smart farming, and clear water entry initiatives now profit complete communities in arid and semi-arid areas. These are programmes that join science to indigenous data and communities. They’re additionally consistent with Kenya’s nationwide obligations below the Africa Local weather Summit and different local weather finance methods within the African Union.
The Ismaili group in Kenya, regardless of being small in quantity, has helped form Kenya over the previous century. Its members work in each discipline as medical doctors, lecturers, enterprise professionals and volunteers. The ethic of service in the neighborhood is just not aspirational; it’s operational. Be it organizing well being camps, sponsoring schooling, catastrophe aid or eco-friendly initiatives, the group takes pleasure in being a pivotal a part of the social cloth of the nation.
Prince Rahim’s go to to Kenya this week underlines a renewed dedication to the nation. His conferences with President Ruto and authorities leaders have demonstrated a standard understanding: long-term partnerships, primarily based on values, are what form lasting nationwide growth.
As Kenya enters its subsequent part of growth, from city sprawl to regional integration, the values provided by the Imamat are inscribed in buildings, in communities, and in addition within the desires of the Kenyan individuals.
The management from Prince Rahim suggests continuity with a brand new course. His agenda speaks to the challenges which are more and more shaping African societies: local weather volatility, digital disruption and the job prospects of schooling that doesn’t simply produce expert staff, but in addition principled leaders. This agenda is very essential in a rustic like Kenya, which boasts a dynamic inhabitants and whose governance continues to be a piece in progress.
