Ministers and senior technocrats from Rwanda and Kenya will join their Ugandan counterparts in Kampala to prepare joint progress reports on Northern Corridor projects to be presented to a Heads of State summit slated for Wednesday.

Meetings start tomorrow with technocrats preparing progress reports which they will present to line ministers. The ministers will in turn prepare summaries to be presented to the Heads of State.

"Normally these meetings are to take stock  of what we have jointly achieved since the last summit and for technocrats to brief leaders on challenges encountered and seek guidance or support,” says Monique Mukaruliza, Rwanda’s national coordinator of the Northern Corridor projects.

The last summit was held in Kigali in July and the Kampala one is expected to follow-up on the decisions taken then.

Rwanda, Kenya and Uganda are implementing about 10 projects and according to Mukaruliza, smooth progress has been achieved because of political commitment from all governments involved.

Work in Progress

Development of the Standard Gauge Railway (SGR), arguably one of the most expensive ventures that the partners are undertaking, is reportedly on course.

In June, Uganda and Rwanda are understood to have signed off studies on a preliminary engineering design for the Kampala-Kigali section which officially started in August and expected to be completed in twelve months.

Mukaruliza revealed that the design standards and operations have been agreed upon by the partners and that the Ministry of Infrastructure (MININFRA) and Rwanda Transport Development Agency (RTDA) are assessing the capacities of contractors that expressed interest to work on the project.

RTDA, The Sunday Times has learned, is also currently recruiting railway engineers to be seconded to work on the construction of Mombasa-Nairobi section and build their capacity through practical experience.

About 30,000 locals are expected to work on the construction of the cross-country rail.

Regarding regional interconnectivity and the standardization process of the power transmission lines between Kenya and Rwanda through Uganda. The partners are expected to open bids on October 17 to choose the best consultant to undertake the feasibility study.

Meanwhile, the feasibility study for the Kampala–Kigali section of the refined petroleum products pipeline has been finalised and international bidding firms to undertake the project was unveiled last month.

"Regarding the oil refinery development, two companies out of four that submitted proposals for the role of lead investor for the oil refinery and related downstream infrastructure have been invited to progress to the next stage of the tender process.

"Negotiations are ongoing and the Best and Final Offers ("BFO”) will be announced before next Summit,” Mukaruliza told Sunday Times.

She added that the feasibility study and preliminary engineering design for the development of the crude oil pipeline is at procurement stage and the best bidder has been invited for negotiations.

Other joint projects include the single customs territory, single tourist Visa, use of ID for border crossing and an East African Commodity Exchange facility.

Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda and South Sudan also mutually agreed to adopt a regional telecommunications framework for a "One-Network-Area’ whereby subscribers travelling within member states will be charged as local subscribers in the visited country network, among other benefits.

According to Patrick Nyirishema, Director General of the Rwanda Utilities Regulatory Authority (RURA) Kenya and Rwanda are expected to launch uniform roaming charges for cross border calls between the two countries.

The launch is expected to take place during the presidents’ summit on Wednesday.

Nyirishema also reassured that the harmonization will be spread to other partner countries once they’re ‘technically ready.’

The full rollout of the ‘one-network-area’ will see East Africans exempted from surcharges applied by member states on international incoming calls and there will be no additional charges to subscribers on account of roaming within the region.

Burundi and Tanzania

Like in the previous summits on the Northern corridor projects, Burundi and Tanzania are not expected to attend. According to Mukaruliza, the two are always invited but when they attend, they do so as observers and have made no outstanding commitments to any of the ongoing projects.

"What’s is positive is that when we started implementing the single customs territory on the Northern Corridor, Tanzania pushed to have one also implemented on the central corridor,” said Mukaruliza.

Many observers of the East African integration process, however, believe that the fast progress on the Northern Corridor projects is a good example of what can be achieved when there’s full political will and commitment.

In Kampala, this political will and commitment is expected to be renewed by the three presidents through several pledges to the ongoing projects.

The summit, held on rotational basis, will see the next held in Nairobi in three months’ time and take stock of what will have been achieved between October and December 2014.

"So far, everything is on course and the political will and commitment from our presidents gives us much confidence to succeed; regarding finances to fund these big projects, no one is worried because we are confident of attracting interested private investors who want to be part of the positive future prospects of these investments,” said Mukaruliza.