The Coalition of the Willing, which rocked the East African
Community in recent months, was triggered by fear over competition for
economic dominance in the region, The Citizen has learnt.
Reports from Kampala hint that Tanzania’s
aggressive ambition to invest in infrastructure, especially the
construction of a Chinese funded multibillion-dollar port project,
caused panic, particularly in Kenya, which has dominated the region
because of its Mombasa port.
The revelation comes as Kenya yesterday launched
the construction of the Sh22 trillion 1,250-km Mombasa-Malaba railway
line in a ceremony attended by four presidents from the East African
region.
President Uhuru Kenyatta on Thursday hosted
presidents Yoweri Museveni (Uganda), Paul Kagame (Rwanda) and Salva Kiir
(South Sudan) in the ceremony. The line to be built by the China
Communications Construction Company will run from Mombasa to Malaba,
Kampala and then Kigali and later to Juba.
Construction work will be undertaken in three
phases with Phase One starting from Mombasa to Nairobi, followed by
Nairobi-Malaba and Kisumu in Phase Two and Malaba-Kisumu to Kampala in
Phase Three. The projected completion date is 2016.
But as the multitrillion shillings railway
launching took place in Mombasa yesterday, details that caused the
coalition of the willing emerged showing that Kenya was alarmed by
Tanzania’s $11 billion modern port project and plans to revive the
central railway.
According to Uganda’s government owned newspaper,
New Vision, at the heart of the struggle between the ‘coalition of the
willing’ on one hand against Tanzania and Burundi on the other, is the
competition for economic dominance between Kenya and Tanzania to control
the transport artery of movement of goods into the interior.
East Africa’s largest two economies, Tanzania and
Kenya, are in a simultaneous race for infrastructure development with
support from China, to spur their economies. There are ongoing works in
port expansion, setting up economic processing zones, agriculture road
railway networks, building satellite cities, minerals as well as oil and
gas explorations.
Both countries have strategic access to the Indian
Ocean and are gateways for international trade for the landlocked East
African Community neighbours. Kenya controls what is known as the
northern corridor route linking Uganda, Rwanda, Ethiopia, South Sudan
and eastern DR Congo. Tanzania on the other hand, controls the central
development corridor for Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda and additionally,
eastern DR Congo, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Malawi.
But the central corridor has an added advantage
with access to more landlocked countries than the northern corridor.
China and Tanzania signed a framework to construct $11bn port in
Bagamoyo, which is set to become Africa’s largest port with a capacity
to handle 20 million cargo containers a year.
This will undoubtedly overtake Mombasa port of
Kenya, presently considered to be the EAC’s largest port with a capacity
to handle 800,000 containers annually, The New Vision reported.
According to the paper, Kenya alarmed by the
growing Tanzania’s economic muscles, decided to consolidate potential
clients in the region by also embarking on massive
infrastructureprojects.
0 comments:
Post a Comment