Luanda set to topple Lagos as Africa boasts more megacities

Sub-Saharan Africa is set to host five megacities by 2050 and Lagos is likely to be overtaken by Angola’s Luanda as the continent’s biggest metropolis.

Predictions in a new World Bank study suggest the population of the Malian capital Bamako will grow by 80% over the next 25 years to 7.6 million, while the number of people in Mogadishu, Somalia, will surge by 64% – moving both of them into the top 15.

The Democratic Republic of Congo’s Kinshasa, Dar es Salaam in Tanzania and Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa, will all house more than 10 million people, the generally accepted definition of a megacity.

Luanda’s population may top 20 million.

The region is going through an unprecedented surge in urbanisation.

The World Bank forecasts that by 2050 the number of people living in cities in sub-Saharan Africa will increase by 320 million to 823 million, rising to 1.7 billion people