Kenyan President William Ruto and Nigerian industrialist Aliko Dangote today broke ground at Lamu on a refinery and petrochemical complex designed to process 700,000 barrels of crude oil a day, which would make it the largest in East Africa. Construction is expected to take about three years. Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni and Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed were among the leaders present. Abiy’s attendance came as Ethiopian federal forces were fighting an opposition alliance led by Tigrayan forces.

The groundbreaking was held two weeks before African Energy Week in South Africa, Oct. 12-16, and came shortly after Ruto’s Sept. 25 visit to Lagos, Nigeria, to tour the Dangote refinery, about which the president wrote on X, “This huge achievement is a testament of what African governments, investors and financial institutions can do together.”

Ruto called the $16 billion (Sh2 trillion) complex “an investment in energy security, industrialisation, and regional integration” that would serve “the wider Eastern African region.” Kenya had spent Sh530 billion importing petroleum products last year, he said. “Africa’s resources must become the beginning of African industry, not the end of Africa’s contribution to global prosperity. ... We must produce more of what we consume. We must add value to more of what we produce.”