Kenya urges railway firm to finish concession work next week
31/10/2008 17:39
The Kenyan government has ordered the regional railway firm to hasten the
completion of the concession process by next week.
Prime Minister Raila
Odinga said in a statement today that Kenyan team of the Rift Valley Railways
(RVR) should complete its work on concession process by next week and meet their
Ugandan counterparts a week later then close the process.
The statement said
the agreement was reached during a meeting between the PM and RVR team later
yesterday where the government and the railway firm reviewed the progress
report.
"Everything being done for RVR is a matter of emergency. Everything
you have to do must be done faster. Otherwise costs will shoot up and the budget
we are working with in mind will be irrelevant. Let the RVR technical team
finalize this process next week. RVR is struggling and needs to be rescued," the
PM said.
The PM said he discussed the concession process with Ugandan
President Yoweri Museveni early this week when they met in Nairobi. He said
President Museveni agreed to instruct his PM to spearhead the process of
concession from the Ugandan side and link up with the Kenyan team in two
weeks.
During the yesterday meeting, the PM asked RVR to conclude its part,
and then he would get in touch with Ugandan authorities and set up a meeting for
the two teams in the second half of November in Nairobi.
"We must fast track
this process next week and meet the Ugandan team the week after," the PM said.
Odinga said work on reviving RVR must be complete before the Christmas season
sets in.
During the meeting, some of the investors in RVR expressed
reservations that the concession fees for RVR was "too high" and the government
was not providing enough subsidies for the firm.
Some investors also asked
the government to give a firm commitment on how much it is willing to invest in
the railway line's turn around.
The PM however asked the RVR technical team
to finish its work then politicians will do theirs. The meeting was a follow up
to an earlier one held last August to review progress on restructuring of the
railway.
In the August meeting the Kenya government gave a three month
ultimatum to RVR to streamline its operations, and to raise US$40 million new
investment capital to enable it to rehabilitate and improve its services to the
public.
The government gave RVR up to October 31 to ensure service delivery
normalized or the government takes over the railways operations.
The PM said
a clause that gave one of the share holders a 35 per cent majority-share had
been revoked to enable other shareholders the room to inject more funds into the
corporation.
On Tuesday, Kenya and Uganda agreed to expedite the development
of an efficient railway system that will link the port of Mombasa with Kampala,
Southern Sudan, Rwanda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo
(DRC).
President Mwai Kibaki and his Ugandan counterpart, Museveni directed
that a Joint Ministerial Commission be established to work on ways of developing
a new standard-gauge railway line that will reduce transport costs.
The Joint
Ministerial Commission, which will comprise finance and transport ministers and
Attorney-Generals of Kenya and Uganda, will also be charged with the
responsibility of ensuring that the operations of the existing concessioned
railway line meets the aspirations of the Governments and people of the two
countries.
The two leaders stressed that an efficient railway line was the
most viable and affordable means of transporting goods and people within the two
countries and the region as a whole.
Rift Valley Railways (RVR) won a
concession to run the Kenya and Uganda railways jointly for 25 years from
November 2006. It is led by South Africa's Sheltam Trade Close.
The company
plans to make the railway line a major artery for regional trade but has to
contend with a lack of locomotives, wagons and dilapidated tracks.
Years of
mismanagement in Kenya and civil strife in Uganda have meant their respective
governments have struggled to buy spare parts and maintain tracks and
trains.
The 1,900 km line that helped open up the continent was laid a
century ago and was dubbed the "Lunatic Express".
Xinhua
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