KENYA – UGANDA SGR RAILWAY MAKES AN IMPORTANT STEP TOWARDS REALITY
(Posted 31st March 2019)
The just concluded visit by Uganda’s President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni to Kenya has yielded instant results, as far as the planned Standard Gauge Railway connection between the two countries was concerned.
After ending his visit to Mombasa – East Africa’s main port city and gateway of goods to and from Uganda – did President Museveni take the train to the capital Nairobi, reaching his destination in just over 4 hours.
This ‘trial run’ by President Museveni coincided with Kenya’s announcement that they secured the finance for the third and final stretch of the new railway, which present connects Mombasa with Nairobi and which has transporter over 1.7 million passengers over the past 12 months.
The second stretch of the new railway, due for completion over the next two or three months, presently extends the new line to Naivasha, where Kenya intends to establish a major manufacturing hub and where President Kenyatta has notably offered Uganda land for a ‘dry port’ – a facility from where containers transported by rail from Mombasa can then be picked up by trucks and transported by road to Uganda – at least until the railway extension has reached the Ugandan border..
The last and final section in Kenya will then connect Naivasha with Kisumu and the Ugandan border in Malaba, linking up at that point with the Ugandan section from Kampala.
The agreement – President Kenyatta also recently visited Kampala to discuss this and other issues – is a major step towards the completion of the railway, which was conceived over a decade ago and which was aiming to also connect South Sudan, Eastern Congo and Rwanda.
Given that Rwanda however is investing in a link to the Tanzanian town of Isaka, from where trains then move all the way to the port of Dar es Salaam, is it anyone’s guess at present if they will invest in a second line to link to the Uganda border – though earlier agreements remain in place for now.
Uganda has already indicated that it wishes to extend the SGR line to the border with South Sudan in Nimule but also to Kasese, from where the Congolese border is relatively close.
This would assure the financial viability of the new railway line, with enough cargo, and passengers, to help pay back the loans taken out for the construction and equipment.
