by Kevon Browne
St. Kitts and Nevis (WINN) – The 32nd Annual Meetings of the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) recently concluded in Abuja, Nigeria, under the unifying theme, “Building the Future on Decades of Resilience.”
The event gathered influential leaders and stakeholders from across Africa and the Caribbean to foster dialogue on trade, investment, and innovation for sustainable development.
Prime Minister of St. Kitts and Nevis, the Hon. Dr Terrance Drew, delivered a keynote address on the opening day.
His address underscored Afreximbank’s consistent responsiveness to the needs of its people, promoting development, inclusion, and opportunity.
Dr Drew emphasised the burgeoning importance of the bank’s relationship with CARICOM, advocating for deeper economic and cultural integration between Africa and the Caribbean.
St. Kitts and Nevis has already initiated significant investment ventures through its partnership with Afreximbank, aiming to forge connections that benefit current and future generations.
Prime Minister Drew later participated in a panel discussion titled ‘Leveraging a Common Heritage: The Afreximbank Caribbean Initiative,’ highlighting the strategic collaboration between the two regions.
During his keynote, Dr Drew lauded Afreximbank’s enduring impact, reflecting on its 32-year journey.
“Let me extend heartfelt congratulations to Afreximbank for reaching this milestone. 32 years of courage, resilience and service to its people. 32 years of choosing vision over fear, action over hesitation and competition and community over competition. From its founding, this bank has taken on a mission far greater than commerce. It has carried the burden of opportunity-building systems that empower African peoples and economies to chart their own course, to finance their own progress and to trust their own. Institutions like this one answer their own questions about what is possible. That mission is still unfolding, and it is still as urgent as ever.”
He paid a special tribute to Professor Benedict Oramah, President and Chairman of the Board of Directors of Afreximbank, acknowledging his transformative leadership.
“Under your stewardship, Afreximbank has become more than a financial institution. It has become a living testament to what is possible when leadership is not only competent but deeply conscious. You have expanded the horizon of what African leadership and institution-building can mean. You have been both strategic and soulful, firm in your technical leadership but also emotionally intelligent in how you have guided relationships, built trust and told a new story about what Africa and its diaspora can build together.”
Recounting his first meeting with Professor Oramah in 2022, Dr Drew stated, “I speak of this not in abstraction but from a place of deep personal reflection. When I met Professor Oramah for the first time in 2022 in Barbados, just one month after taking office as Prime Minister, I was struck not only by his clarity of purpose but his generosity of spirit. That meeting planted a seed, and I left with the firm conviction that the work of connecting Africa and the Caribbean was not just about speeches and symbolism. It was about systems. It was about finance. It was about reshaping the machinery of cooperation across the Atlantic so that it no longer simply echoed our history but actively built our future. From that first conversation, it became clear to me that Afreximbank under President Oramah’s leadership was not simply welcoming the Caribbean into its orbit. It was embracing us as kin.”
He further elaborated on the significance of St. Kitts and Nevis being the first CARICOM nation to sign an MoU with Afreximbank.
“That is why St. Kitts and Nevis was proud to be the very first country in the Caribbean to sign a memorandum of understanding through Afrixembank. That was not a diplomatic formality. It was a deliberate act of trust. As a Prime Minister and a government, we believed in the bank’s vision. We believed in his vision, and we took a step not just on behalf of our country but on behalf of the entire CARICOM region. That step has proven to be one of the most impactful and future-facing decisions we have taken in recent years.”
Dr Drew also highlighted a personal connection, “It is also why above the desk in my office hangs a painting, a gift from Professor Oramah, and I see it every day. And I do not just see the art. I see a reminder that partnership is built not only on contracts but on character, that beyond the bureaucracy of intergovernmental relations lies something that is far more powerful. Those things are relationships, trust, shared identity, shared accountability, and shared ambition.”
The Prime Minister emphasised that resilience must now be coupled with reinvention.
“That is why…as we gather under the theme, Building the Future on Decades of Resilience, we must remember that resilience alone, though critically important, is not enough. Resilience is what carried us through colonisation, through exploitation, through decades of underdevelopment, through decades of being shut out and listened to the story of what brought the Afreximbank together, of course, pleads to this. But resilience must now be matched with reinvention, with the courage to reimagine ourselves as architects as we build our countries and economies together. That is where Afreximbank’s true legacy lies, not only in what it has protected and built thus far, but what it dares to build in the future. Today, the Caribbean is no longer a distant observer to Africa’s renaissance. We have become an active partner as the sixth region of the African Union. So thanks to the Afreximbank, we have moved from the margins to the centre.”
The establishment of Afreximbank’s regional office in Barbados, its first outside Africa, was described as a profound gesture.
“The bank’s establishment of a regional office in Bridgetown, Barbados, the first and only Afreximbank office outside of the African continent, was a political and spiritual gesture. It signalled to us that in the Caribbean that we are no longer the forgotten family members of this great continent, but we are truly the sixth region of the union.”
The AfriCaribbean Trade and Investment Forum (ACTIF) series, initiated by Afreximbank, has become a premier platform for engagement, mobilising over US$6 billion in opportunities across its editions in Barbados (2022), Guyana (2023), and the Bahamas (2024). With ACTIF 2025 slated for Grenada, Prime Minister Drew announced that St. Kitts and Nevis would proudly host ACTIF 2026.
“But these meetings, these agreements, these events are not the end. They are the beginning of a new era, an era where African and Caribbean businesses co-finance tourism, co-develop climate resilience infrastructure, co-create fintech solutions, and co-author the story of what a truly global Africa looks like.”
Reflecting on a recent high-level delegation visit from St. Kitts and Nevis to Abuja, Dr Drew noted the activation of new project development frameworks and cultural exchange initiatives.
“Earlier this year, I led a high-level delegation from St. Kitts and Nevis to this great city, Abuja. It was a productive, affirming, and deeply meaningful journey. During that visit, we had discussions that spanned renewable energy, biotechnology, agriculture, creative economy, and education. Out of that visit came opportunities that are already being activated, including new project development frameworks and cultural exchange initiatives.”
He underscored a shift in perception of the Atlantic Ocean.
“And just this month, we were honoured to receive an African delegation in St. Kitts and Nevis. That visit represented a physical crossing of a once-tormented corridor, the Atlantic Ocean, that for centuries symbolised our forced separation. But this time, the journey was not one of sorrow, but one of solidarity. The visit breathed new life into our shared commitment to build a new bridge that I call the Atlantic Bridge, one made not of wood and steel, but of people, of partnership, and of purpose. We are now reimagining the Middle Passage, not as a scar, but as a root, not as a memory of bondage, but as a pathway of boldness. The waters that once carried our ancestors away in chains now carry our children’s dreams, our nation’s ambitions, and our shared determination to reunite across the Atlantic in pursuit of sovereignty, prosperity, and dignity.”
Prime Minister Drew affirmed his commitment to interlinking Africa and the Caribbean.
“As Prime Minister, I have made it a core foreign policy priority to see Africa and the Caribbean not as two regions with occasional overlaps, but as one extended family with an economic, diplomatic, and developmental destiny that is interlinked. Under my upcoming chairmanship of CARICOM in January of 2026, I intend to lead missions of regional heads of governments back to the African continent. This will not be a courtesy call. It will be a declaration of intent, a commitment to further embed the Caribbean into the architecture of global Africa.”
