We have two construction projects on site in Swaziland, where the 165-room Hilton Garden Inn in Mbabane will open its doors in the next few weeks. Also in Swaziland, we have more than 150 units of housing in construction. We worked with Steve Hall Development Consultants as our local JV partner, and are very pleased with the working relationship that has developed.

In Maputo, we are working on a business hotel of 150 rooms in Maputo, for which a global operator has been secured and funding is being concluded. We are working with Vedor Arquitectos on the concept.

In Zambia, a large mixed-use project is keeping our design teams busy in the next two months.

In Mavoko in Kenya, we are a few months away from the completion of a very long-running project, the 24.000 square metre Crystal Rivers Mall, undertaken for the Safaricom Staff Pension Scheme as client. Our co-architect is MMI International, who have joined us on the difficult journey of building this Mall with a Kenyan main contractor who is well out of his depth in this project.

Also in Nairobi, we are just casting the first floor slab above ground (after two basement levels) of a 22-storey tower known as The Habitat. The project is the initiative of Ekco Investments, a local Kenyan family business of high calibre and high expectations. Our co-architects Design Source Limited are the great associate partners that we already knew and respected them for when this project started and they introduced us to the client.

In Airport City in Accra, seeds sown in 2013 are bearing fruit. Together with rhayCAD Chartered Architects as our local partners, we have submitted building approval plans for a 340-room hotel and apartment complex to be operated by Accor Hotels under the Pullman brand. The project is now in full documentation. Ground could be broken by the end of 2018 for our Ghanaian clients, Platinum Properties Limited. We are working hard to resolve the design and detailing before the main contractor is on our case with Requests for Information.

Paragon Interface Architects is implementing a multi-level office interior for an oil sector services company in Lagos, under the leadership of Profica as project managers. We value this relationship and the opportunity, which was won in a competitive bid.

We are implementing collaborative workplace projects in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, based on a competition-winning concept design of late 2017.

Other project discussions are in the air for locations such as Senegal, Mauritius, Uganda, Tanzania, Côte D’Ivoire and more opportunities in Ghana.

As Kevin Teeroovengadum said on a public stage at the API Summit in 2016: ‘If you have not yet realised that African property development is a very long-term game, you should leave this game now’. Well, it’s 2018, and we are still in ‘the game’. We know what it takes to implement on the African continent, and we do it with the passion and commitment that Paragon is known for.