Mombasa Convention Centre

The Mombasa Convention Centre is a project within the Tourism theme. It is a proposed international convention and exhibition centre for Mombasa, intended to let the coast host large conferences, exhibitions and other business events (the “MICE” market of meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions). The idea has been put forward several times since 2012. It now appears in three overlapping forms: a flagship project in the Mombasa County Integrated Development Plan for 2023 to 2027, a “Mombasa International Convention Centre” in the national Ministry of Tourism’s strategic plan, and a “MICE Convention Precinct” promoted by the Economic Development and Investment Council for Greater Mombasa (EDIC). Their costs, sites and sizes differ, and no published document reconciles them. The infobox uses the county plan’s budget of KES 10 billion.

What it is

EDIC describes the project as a purpose-built venue for conferences, exhibitions and events, comprising a convention centre, a hotel and a MICE bureau, with capacity for 5,000 delegates and a budget of US$120 million. It proposes a build-operate-transfer public private partnership in which the county government provides prime public land in kind, and projects 2,500 jobs in the first five years.¹ EDIC’s list of priorities places it in Nyali, Mombasa.²

The county’s own plan lists a flagship project called “MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conference & Exhibitions)” in Nyali Sub-county, to provide ultramodern conference facilities and make Mombasa “a conference Tourism destination of choice”, over 2023 to 2027 at an estimated KES 10 billion, led by the county department of Tourism, Culture and Trade and the Mombasa Investment Corporation.³ The same plan lists “Construct the Mombasa Conference Center” among the governor’s commitments.⁴ The county’s 2026/27 Annual Development Plan restates the flagship with the indicator “Investor secured for establishment of MICE” and names the Mombasa Investment Corporation as lead, with the Trade and Lands departments.⁵

At national level, the Ministry of Tourism and Wildlife’s strategic plan for 2023 to 2027 includes “Construction of Mombasa International Convention Centre” alongside proposed centres in the Great Rift, Isiolo and Eldoret, under a wider aim to develop convention centres across the country.⁶ A national investment listing describes a Mombasa convention centre for up to 5,000 delegates at US$80 million, sited near the port and major hotels, for which the county government is seeking strategic investors.⁷

Estimates of cost therefore range from US$80 million to US$120 million, against KES 10 billion in the county plan. A county urban regeneration plan forwarded to the national government in about 2019 put a Mombasa International Convention Centre at US$58 million to US$97 million.⁸

Rationale

EDIC argues that the coast has no international-standard MICE facility, that existing venues cap at about 2,500 delegates, and that Mombasa hosts only 5 of Kenya’s 29 major association meetings a year. It points to Kenya’s 2.5 million tourism arrivals in 2025, growth of 14 per cent in coastal international arrivals and of 140 per cent in cruise tourism, and aims at the “bleisure” market of business travellers who extend their stay. Governor Abdulswamad Sharif Nassir has used the same association-meeting figures, telling the Kenya Coast Tourism Association that Kenya hosted only 29 of more than 11,000 association conferences worldwide, five of them at the coast, and urging the industry to set up convention bureaus and push for open skies.⁹

Official figures put Kenya’s 2025 international arrivals at about 2.7 million, earning about KES 500 billion, with business travel accounting for 19 per cent.¹⁰ The Ministry of Tourism reports that MICE travellers made up 27 per cent of international arrivals in 2024.¹¹

Status and timeline

The idea is old. In October 2012 the Tourism Minister said the ministry had been allocated 10 acres at Haller Park for a green international convention centre and was seeking development partners.¹² In March 2017 the Tourism Finance Corporation sought investors for a conference centre on a four-acre coastal plot.¹³ In 2018 the Kenya Tourism Federation said the industry was pushing for a Mombasa centre for up to 5,000 people.¹⁴ The county’s 2018 to 2022 plan budgeted KES 300 million for “construction of international conventional Centres” in Nyali, with a target of one fully operational international convention centre under a public private partnership.¹⁵ That centre was not built.

The State Department for Tourism reports that a feasibility study for the Mombasa International Convention Centre was carried out during 2018 to 2022.¹⁶ That study has not been published. The county’s 2023 to 2027 plan records that the land for the convention centre still had to be identified and secured, and lists as a risk the “delays in identification of land and an updated feasibility study to support the investment”.¹⁷ In its review of 2024/25, the county reports a target of one convention centre and an achievement of none.¹⁸

EDIC says its pre-feasibility study is complete, that eight hotel operators have been engaged, and that discussions are advancing with three; none is named. Its council reviewed the investment case for the convention precinct at its second-quarter meeting in 2026.¹⁹ As of October 2026 no site, operator, financier or signed agreement has been made public.

How the project is being procured

No Terms of Reference, request for proposals or transaction advisory tender for a Mombasa convention centre has been published by the National Treasury’s PPP Directorate, and the project does not appear in the Directorate’s June 2026 status report.²⁰ The county plan frames the route as securing an investor through the Mombasa Investment Corporation, and EDIC presents a build-operate-transfer partnership with hotel operators already in talks. The legal pathway, whether a competitive tender or a privately initiated proposal under the Public Private Partnerships Act, has not been stated.

Who is involved

EDIC describes itself as a multi-stakeholder council for Greater Mombasa, covering Mombasa, Kilifi and Kwale, co-created with the Swahilipot Hub Foundation and incubated by GDI Africa. Its council is chaired by Dr Kevit Desai and its executive director is John Kashangaki. It says it is not a lender, and that it structures projects and mobilises blended finance. The County Government of Mombasa, through its Tourism, Culture and Trade department and the Mombasa Investment Corporation, leads the county flagship. The Ministry of Tourism and Wildlife and its State Department for Tourism carry the national version. No hotel operator, financier or transaction adviser has been named.

• Economic Development and Investment Council for Greater Mombasa
• County Government of Mombasa
• Ministry of Tourism and Wildlife

Concerns and counterpoints

No critic has yet commented in public on the EDIC proposal itself. The points below come from the official record and from commentary on the coast’s conference market and on convention centres more generally.

Demand and existing venues

EDIC’s case rests on the claim that coastal venues cap at about 2,500 delegates. Since then the privately built Tembo International Convention Centre at the PrideInn Flamingo resort hosted the 11th Our Ocean Conference in June 2026 with more than 6,000 delegates, and PrideInn’s managing director Hasnain Noorani described it as the largest convention centre on the coast.²¹ Industry voices quoted by Tourism Update argue that the binding constraints are elsewhere: hospitality consultant Håvar Bauck says many older coastal hotels are worn down and short of management capacity, Victor Shitakha of the Kenya Coast Tourism Association points to ageing resorts and a lack of international luxury brands, and Noorani says the infrastructure is now built and “the only thing left is to go out and tell the world”.²² Governor Nassir’s own remedies for the low conference count were convention bureaus, open skies and direct flights, rather than a new building.

National competition and public cost

The national government is already building the Bomas International Convention Complex in Nairobi, whose cost has risen from KES 31.5 billion to more than KES 42 billion; the Auditor-General has flagged direct procurement and the use of the Tourism Fund without adequate oversight, and Jeffers Miruka of the Association for Kenya Business Events says shifting timelines weaken Kenya’s credibility as a destination.²³ A second large publicly backed venue on the coast would compete for the same limited pool of international association meetings. Elsewhere in the region, the Kigali Convention Centre’s cost rose well beyond its original budget,²⁴ and Arusha’s AICC was reported to be losing about TSh 1.8 billion a year after its anchor tenants moved out.²⁵ In the wider literature, Heywood Sanders’ Brookings study argued that convention-centre supply has outrun demand and that consultants’ feasibility studies tend to overstate hotel-night gains, a view the convention industry has contested.²⁶

Delivery record, land and transparency

The county’s own plans show the project carried forward since at least 2018 without a site or a built centre, with the land still unidentified in 2023 and nothing achieved against the 2024/25 target.¹⁸ EDIC’s model relies on prime public land given in kind, but no parcel, valuation or allocation process has been published, and the national feasibility study is not public. Public land on the Mombasa shoreline has a contested history: rights groups including Muslims for Human Rights and Haki Africa have accused the county and NEMA of shielding beach developments that encroached on the shoreline, a charge the county said it would investigate.²⁷ These concerns are not about this project, but they bear on how any in-kind land allocation for it would be scrutinised.

Sources

• Mombasa County Integrated Development Plan 2023-2027, County Government of Mombasa, 2023.
• Mombasa County Integrated Development Plan 2018-2022, County Government of Mombasa, 2018.
• Mombasa County Annual Development Plan 2026/2027, County Government of Mombasa.
• Ministry of Tourism and Wildlife Strategic Plan 2023-2027, Ministry of Tourism and Wildlife.
• State Department for Tourism Strategic Plan 2023-2027, State Department for Tourism.
• MICE Convention Precinct, Economic Development and Investment Council for Greater Mombasa.
• Mombasa Convention Centre, Invest Kenya.
• Kenya PPP Projects Progress Status Report, 30th June 2026, PPP Directorate. The convention centre is not listed.