The Business community in the region has called on governments to always actively involve them in the planning of projects under Northern Corridor framework.

The call was made during a dinner, on Thursday, in Kampala ahead of the tenth summit for the Northern Corridor Integration Project (NCIP) today.

The summit is expected to be attended by Presidents Paul Kagame, Uhuru Kenyatta (Kenya) and host Yoweri Museveni (Uganda).

The presidents attended the dinner last evening with business leaders from the region ahead of today’s meeting.

The summit is aimed at assessing the implementation status of all the projects under the NCIP framework.

"The private sector should be involved right from the time of conceptualisation of these projects. This is because we are quite knowledgeable on evaluation of risks involved and how to mitigate them,” said Dennis Awori, a board member of the East African Business Council.

In the recent past, most of the services like conducting feasibility studies for huge infrastructure projects under the NCIP such as the standard gauge railway and oil pipeline have gone to foreign companies, a move the region’s private sector say doesn’t promote ownership.

"Our governments should ensure a certain minimum target of not less than 70 per cent of local participation in supply of locally manufactured materials that meet the required international standards, supply of services, supply of skilled technical and managerial expertise,” said Claver Mugabo, the vice chairperson of Private Sector Federation, Rwanda.

Mugabo’s concern was echoed by Sikander Lalani, the managing director of Roofings Ltd, a regional quality steel manufacturer, who said, "If we have an industry that produces quality products in this region, why should there be importation of that very product from China or Europe?”

New era for private sector

The tenth NCIP summit is launching a new relationship today to involve the private sector in the integration projects. This will involve signing of the agreement on total liberalisation of labour and services.

Agatha Juma, the chief executive of Kenya Tourism Federation, said Kenya is willing to work on harmonising health insurance coverage in the Northern Corridor bloc.

"It is not proper for a Rwandan with a local health insurance cover to come to Kenya and then be asked if they have an international health cover for them to get treatment,” she said.

Monique Mukaruliza, Rwanda’s coordinator for NCIP, called on the private sector to make use of advertisements made for tenders for services under the NCIP projects, and don’t leave them to go to foreign companies.

"We want to promote ownership. If one local company can’t handle a certain contract, they should then jointly handle it with a foreign contactor and by doing that we shall be gaining in capacity building for our local business people,” she said. 

Senior officials and experts agreed that by end of the month, roaming charges will be scrapped on shot messaging service like it was done on calls under the One Area Network.