This is supposedly real. According to the rap star’s Twitter feed, an agreement between Akon and the country of Senegal has been finalized, which means that Akon City is officially here.
— AKON (@Akon) January 13, 2020 According to a CNN article from 2018, Akon noted that his city would be built on a 2,000-acre piece of land that was to be gifted to him by Macky Sall, the president of Senegal. At the time, the website for Akon’s city reported that the plot would be just five-minute’s drive from Senegal’s international airport. At this stage, it’s unclear whether that piece of land is still the confirmed site for Akon City.
All transactional activity is supposedly to be in cryptocurrency
The proposed official cryptocurrency of Akon City isn’t Bitcoin, or even Ethereum. Akon is actually prepping to launch his own cryptocurrency, dubbed Akoin.
Akoin was vaguely announced in 2018, around the same time that Akon revealed his grand plan to build a “Crypto City.” A video posted to the project’s Facebook page claims that “all transactional activity” in Akon City will be conducted using Akoin. What’s worrying is that, at this stage, there doesn’t appear to be any white paper for Akon’s cryptocurrency, so it’s hard to gauge exactly what we’re in for. The associated website does however hype the release of a white paper and an “explainer video” sometime before February this year.
Still, the lack of a white paper apparently didn’t stop Akon from shopping his cryptocurrency to potential investors. Akoin’s roadmap promotes that the project had sought to raise funds via private equity and donations between January and June last year. Until we know for sure how Akoins are distributed, as well as how the proposed network will be governed, it’s better to remain cautious in celebrating this endeavour, however pure Akon’s intentions. Hard Fork has reached out to the Akoin Foundation to learn more about the release of its white paper, and will update this piece should we learn more.
