President Paul Kagame and his Tanzanian Counterpart, President John Magufuli met a fortnight ago and agreed to construct a 521-kilometer standard gauge railway (SGR)line from Isaka to Kigali.
Both presidents directed ministers of transport from both countries to meet within two weeks to deliberate on how to implement the construction of the railway line.
On Saturday, Infrastructure Minister, James Musoni was in Tanzania where he discussed with Tanzanian Minister of Works, Transport and Communications, Prof. Makame M. Mbarawa on way forward.
In a statement released on Saturday, both ministers reiterated their strong commitment to further strengthen the relationship for the mutual benefits of the two countries and their people and the commitment to realize the implementation of Isaka-Kigali railway project to reduce transportation cost, foster physical integration of transport modes, economic growth and improved social services in the sub-region.
After deliberating on key implementation issues of the project, ministers agreed to adopt the railway feasibility studies which were previously conducted in the two countries.
They adopted the proposed Project Delivery Method of Design and Build similar to that of Dar es Salaam-Morogoro and Morogoro-MakutuporaStandard Gauge Railway project for the purpose of uniformity of standards.
“The parameters used for the design of the ongoing project will be the same for the Isaka-Kigali railway Project,” reads the statement.
Also both ministers agreed to jointly mobilise funds for construction and each country will meet the cost of infrastructure in its own territory.
According to the statement, issues regarding train operations and track access shall be agreed in future separately.
Ministers also agreed on the proposal to adopt the setup of the existing Joint Technical Monitoring Committee for Dar es Salaam-Isaka-Kigali/Keza-Musongati project reduced to Tanzania and Rwanda.
“Ministers adopted the proposed timeline towards implementation of Presidents’ directives so as to lay the foundation stone by October,2018,” the statement reads.
The discussion was attended by different senior Government officials from both sides including Tanzanian Finance and Planning Minister, Foreign Affairs and East Africa Cooperation Minister. On the side of Rwanda was Amb. Eugene Kayihura, the High Commissioner of Rwanda to Tanzania among other officials.
Leave a Reply