German company builds railway line to Sudan on lions’ trail
By Ulrike Koltermann
NAIROBI, August 01, 2004 (dpa) — “Simba, Simba!” yelled the Kenyan labourer as he ran for his life from a lion. The animal had second thoughts and eventually settled for a donkey, which offered more meat.
Another man dived into a water tank and spent hours trying to avoid the lion’s paws which slashed across the opening.
The construction of the first railway line in Kenya was a feast
for “Tsavo’s man-eaters” as the lions were named. The hungry beasts tore about 130 workers to pieces.
Nearly 100 years later, a German company is tackling the reconstruction of the old route which is to be extended to southern Sudan.
Steffen Ralfs, a representative of Thormaehlen, the company building the railway, said: “We won’t have any problems with lions any longer, but it does get wild in places.”
He was implying the undeveloped region in Sudan. At the end of the nearly 20 year civil war between the Sudanese government and the rebels in the non-Arab south, the country is faced with a huge task. There are no roads and no electricity or water supply.
“The planned railway line could become southern Sudan’s lifeline,” said Ralfs.
The Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLM) rebels are keen on the project because it means that oil could be transported to the coast.
The oil resources in southern Sudan were one of the reasons for civil war. At the peace negotiations, both sides had agreed to share equally any future oil revenue. So far, oil pipelines from the south lead only to the north.
The Thormaehlen company from Bad Oldesloe in northern Germany secured the contract because of owner Klaus Thormaehlen’s personal acquaintance with SPLM functionary Costello Garang Ring, who resides in Germany.
He bears the same name as rebel leader and future Sudanese vice- president John Garang and is responsible for the SPLM’s international contacts.
Construction of the railway line will begin as soon as a peace treaty has been signed and southern Sudan’s own government is in power.
The 4,000 kilometre long, single-track route will cost about 3 billion dollars. The company wants to employ many local labourers.
Ralfs said: “We want to retrain former fighters into track layers and give them a new start.”
But the specialists would have to be brought in from Europe as well as the machines and a large part of the construction materials.
The Kenyan part of the route will be the easiest by far.
“The former British, single-track route will be replaced by a standard European one,” Ralfs explained. Material and workers can be transported on the old route during construction.
In southern Sudan, that means real pioneering work. A signed peace treaty does not guarantee safety as the threat to workers from roaming, man-eating lions has been replaced by marauding militias.