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Work on 240-km Arusha-Athi River highway begins
2008-03-26 09:15:27
By Adam Ihucha, Arusha
The unnerving congestion that has come to characterise a 240kms narrow Arusha-Athi River highway could be a thing of the past, thanks to Nairobi and Dar es salaam governments for embarking on construction of the road.
Update reports from the East African Community have it that Nairobi has already started undertaking the key activities such as creating diverting routes, while Dar-Salaam is due to start in three weeks time.
``In what could go down in history as one of the most ambitious projects to be executed under the EAC, Dar-es-Salaam and Nairobi governments have embarked in a major reconstruction of a vital 240-km Arusha-Namanga-Athi River highway,`` the EAC secretary General, Ambassador Juma Mwapachu told `The Guardian` recently.
African Development Bank (AfDB) and Japanese Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) will foot up to 90 per cent of the cost of the project whose reconstruction is expected to cost USD175m to completion.
The other 10 per cent is to be financed by Tanzanian and Kenyan governments.
EAC says both governments will be expected to provide counterpart funds in local currency to augment the loans.
``The loans will cover all foreign currency costs and part of the local costs,`` said EAC Senior Public Relations Officer, Richard Owora.
``The governments of Tanzania and that of Kenya will bear part of the economic cost in local currency,`` he said.
According to the breakdown of financing for the project, the government of Kenya will provide funds amounting to USD33m and the loans will cover USD72m while the Government of Tanzania will fund up to USD19.6m with the loans covering USD60m.
On March 9, 2007, the governments of Japan and Tanzania signed loan agreement worth USD6.9bn yen (74.2bn/-).
The Japanese loan will be used to re-construct the road between Arusha and Namanga, said Owora.
``This loan assistance will be extended under the newly established Minimal Interest Rate Initiative (MIRAI), which offers preferential terms of loans to low-income Least Developed Countries (LDCs) with the annual interest rate of 0.01 per cent.
The loan repayment period will be 40 years including a grace period of 10 years.``
Koji Tanami, Deputy Governor and Managing Director of JBIC, and Gray Mgonja signed the loan agreements in Dar es Salaam recently.
The Arusha-Namanga-Athi River Road Project is a multinational programme, which forms part of the Corridor No.5 of the EAC Regional Roads Network Programme that spans from Tunduma in Southern Tanzania to Moyale in Northern Kenya.
The Arusha - Namanga - Athi River trunk road is 104.3kms on the Tanzanian side and 135.7kms on the Kenyan side. The whole road length is currently bituminised, but in a poor state.
Once completed, it is anticipated that Arusha-Namanga-Athi River road will significantly improve transport services across the border town and lower transport costs between Arusha and Nairobi.
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