Uganda wants new sea outlet in Port Sudan
By Esther Nakkazi and David Kaiza
NAIROBI, May 3, 2004 (The East African) — Uganda is holding talks with the Sudanese government on the possibilities of developing a route between the country and Port Sudan as an alternative seaport to Mombasa.
Acting Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Julius Onen told a joint meeting of Uganda Manufacturer’s Association and Kenya Ports Authority officials that Port Sudan was one of the issues discussed between Uganda and Sudan at a recent meeting held in Kampala.
Mr Onen said that economic relations were an important agenda discussed during the Uganda-Sudan joint commission on security held in Kampala.
Already, Sudan is the biggest importer of Ugandan coffee and tea on the continent, having overtaken Morocco.
While Mr Onen did not give details of the discussion on Port Sudan, he said that it did not change the importance of Mombasa to Uganda, even as he called for more efficiency in cargo handling at the latter post.
“Sooner rather than later, people will no longer be talking of the Port of Kenya but off the Port of East Africa,” he said.
The week-long meeting in Kampala between Sudan and Uganda was intended to normalise bilateral relations.
A draft agreement was signed at the end of the meeting to pave the way for regular consultations on various issues including security, tariffs and trade.
At the meeting, UMA decried the inefficiency at the port of Mombasa, which they said was costing them a lot of money.
The acting chairman of UMA, Kaddu Kiberu, described Mombasa as a port at which efficiency, security and safety and customer friendliness could not be guaranteed.
“We are want to improve the operations at the port,” Mr Kiberu said. “Why is cargo always delayed?”
Kenyan officials attending the meeting included the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Transport and Communication, Gerishon Ikiara, and the managing director of KPA, Brown Ondego.
The Sudan route is the second alternative Uganda is considering after holding talks with Djibouti to use the latter as a seaport.
Uganda had proposed to use the port for coffee exports to Europe in light of the delays experienced by transporters using the port of Mombasa.
The talks between the two governments, which started in 2001, do not however seem to have yielded much fruit, tying Uganda to Mombasa for most of its sea traffic.
In effect Uganda remains among the biggest users of the port of Mombasa, its traffic accounting for about 20 per cent of the total with 1.8 million tonnes, nearly double the million tonnes that passed through the port in 1999, accounting for 12.3 per cent of the traffic.
The port of Mombasa has come up with ways to simplify cargo clearance procedures with the establishment of a one-stop centre for processing documents at the port, reduction of document photocopies, and the reduction of stamps on the Mombasa Port Release Order (MPRO) to just a single stamp.
Last week, the KPA opened a liaison office in Kampala to provide “on the spot” support to current and potential users of the port of Mombasa by giving correct and accurate information and serving the port clients based in Uganda.
An official at KPA Kampala office said they were in the process of strengthening the capacity of the office to deliver a reliable and efficient port service that responded more effectively to customer inquiries by acting quickly and using more reliable information.
The official said the initiative, which is being implemented under the auspices of the Authority’s fully integrated information technology strategy, will integrate the new office with the software used by KPA for its day-to-day business functions at its headquarters.