Kenya opens $3.2bn Nairobi-Mombasa Madaraka Express railway
Africa is making gigantic infrastructural strides. Gone are those meagre days when key sectors were patched with petty rickety infrastructures. Today we have humongous projects prosecuted in the continent, some of these projects slated to voraciously drink in an ocean of dollars. Among such projects is the groundbreaking new railway in Kenya which is being constructed between the Kenyan capital Nairobi and the port city of Mombasa.
This project unprecedented in an economic and financial scale launches Kenya on new tracks of infrastructural sophistication. According to the Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta in the launching ceremony, that project is expected to wallop $3.2bn taking three years to be birthed. With major funding coming from the Asian giants China.
The sprawling railway would span 290 miles which is an equivalent of 470km! The project comes as an extension of the recently launched China’s Belt and Road initiative of hefty international infrastructure ventures.
From the extensive plans laid bare for the railway, the intimidating network of rail would at the end, link Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, Burundi and Ethiopia all the way down to the Indian Ocean!
This railway project when successfully finished, would without doubts rank as the largest infrastructure project ever to have graced Kenya since the nation gained independence. The project was also seen as a critical part of the grand global Chinese strategy to economically permeate Africa.
The funds needed to the realization of this inspiring project would be procured from concessionary loan benevolently coming from China who will foot the bill for 80% of the total expenditure.
The grace period for the loan spreads into a decade by which it is well anticipated that the railway should have been making reasonable economic returns on the investment. From the background concoctions of the loan, Kenyan would conveniently pay the loan for the railway construction within a time interval of 30-40 years. A large swathe of Chinese brains would be deployed to the early management of the railway while indigenous Kenyan manpower is trained to succeed them.
In course of the Belt and Road Forum for International Corporation which held back in May in China, the President of Kenya, Mr Kenyatta implored China to navigate a business path where both parties are on the winning side as Kenya officially keyed in to the Chinese sponsored Belt and Road initiative.
This project when executed would bring great logistics relief to the Kenyan people introducing pace into transport and cutting costs as well. This railway would pleasurably slash down the time for journey from Mombasa to Nairobi from the previous 12 hours to a convenient 4 hours 39 minutes!
Big development coming from Kenya which we would love other African nations to replicate. Gone are the days when Africa nested in infrastructural despondency. Today we can proudly say we are hot on the heels of global technological development.
Responses