(Posted 24th November 2024)
The construction has now officially commences with Turkish Firm Ms Yapi Merkezi as the lead contractor. This follows the parting of Ugandan authorities with Chinese companies, which were initially favoured to undertake – and arrange financing – the project but over several years failed to show any results.
The ground breaking event was graced by non other than President Yoweri Museveni who in his address told Ugandans that the cost of a container from the port of Mombasa to Kampala, presently costing over 3.200 US Dollars, would be halved, bringing huge benefits to the country and the Ugandan economy.
The initial cost was given as about 2.7 billion US Dollars and no cost has been published yet about the two add on lines.
The primary SGR rail line will run from Malaba to Kampala, via the town of Jinja. It is understood that there are plans to construct another line to Northern Ugandan town of Gulu and then on to the border with South Sudan and to later also rebuild in SGR format the rail line to Western Uganda, which has long been dormant.
This SGR project was initially launched some 10 years ago to traverse the Northern Corridor but only the Kenya railway line was constructed, initially to from Mombasa to Nairobi and then on to the Rift Valley town of Naivasha. There the funding ran out and subsequent to the Corona Pandemic did China not come forward with the added funding to complete the line.
Then again in 2019, ahead of the global Corona Pandemic, did Uganda and Kenya agree on the extension but the pandemic stalled those plans at the time.
President Museveni’s visit to #Kenya bears fruits as SGR railway extension agreed
Like Uganda has the Kenyan government now also made different arrangements to complete the SGR line to both Kisumu – Kenya’s lakeside city on Lake Victoria – and also on to the Ugandan border in Malaba.
However, Tanzania’s Southern Corridor (of the East African region) has since matured much further, in part because Tanzania also ditched Chinese contractors and went with a Turkish company which completed contracted work on time and within budget.
Tanzania plans to extend their SGR line to both Kigali and Bujumbura which would, once completed ahead of the Ugandan extension to South Western Uganda and the border with Rwanda, make that section of the railway unnecessary.
ATCNews has extensively reported about the East African SGR railway projects and articles can be sourced via https://atcnews.org/?s=SGR+Railway
