Kenya and Uganda have each announced plans to rehabilitate the railway lines connecting the two nations.

Reuters reports that Kenya intends to modernise its Malaba-Uganda line at a cost of US$210 million. In 2017, the country opened a railway linking Mombasa with Nairobi at a cost of $3.2 billion. This will be linked with a new line to Naivasha in the Rift Valley for US$1.5 billion. The standard gauge rail (SGR) line is set to be opened in August, but it does not yet extend to Uganda.

‘We need to make sure that when we commission the SGR in August, we have connectivity to Uganda from the SGR so we have to rehabilitate that line to make sure it is properly functional,’ according to Kenyan Transport Minister James Macharia. ‘It is much faster to rehabilitate because the [Naivasha-Malaba] SGR would take three to four years.’ Rehabilitation is expected to take one year to complete.

Meanwhile, Uganda is planning a US$205 million upgrade of its existing Kampala to Malaba meter gauge railway, following delays in securing funding for an SGR. As reported by the East African, it is hoped the upgrades will improve monthly freight capacity from the current 20 000 tons to 120 000 tons by 2026.

18 June 2019
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