By Kitts D.Mabonga
KAMALA
Much as the seven East African Community (EAC) member states signed several trade and investment protocols which dictates that there shall be free movement of people, goods and services, it has emerged that there are some small pockets of lack of enforcement of such laws of which incidents has brought unnecessary stalemate yet they are meant to harness trade and investment among the states.
Speaking to East African Gazette during an exclusive interview, at her offices at Kingdom Kampala last week, Rebecca Kadaga, the first deputy Prime Minister and Minister for EAC fairs said free movement of people, goods and services is a big challenge, saying people engaging in business along the EAC common border points are not aware about these protocols delaying the process.
“As we have been moving around to assess and interact with the business communities working along the interstate border points, it emerged that there was a lot of confusion about the entire efforts of implementing the protocols as most of the people including immigration officials manning these points are not fully conversant with these laws of which they are supposed to enforce “Kadaga explained.
She called upon the individual member states to take it upon themselves in ensuring that they build strong national EAC protocols sensitization teams exclusively based around those targeted business communities such that it can be easy to preach to them about these protocols which are key in fostering both integration and boosting the business environment along those key populations.
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Kadaga regretted that in the recent past, there has been very unfortunate conflicts among some member states like D.R Congo, South Sudan, Rwanda, Tanzania and Kenya which collectively and cumulatively had challenges of trade issues along their border points with Uganda as some refused entry into their countries both goods and traders which incident directly caused losses to the trading communities.
“This was unfortunate and should not have happened in the first instance because there are many set channels of resolving trade disputes including challenges with quality standards of the goods from Uganda, adding that Kenya had rejected our eggs and dairy products, while South Sudan pushing out of their territory entire fleets of laden trucks of cereals products as Tanzanians turned away our rice and other products as Rwanda summarily closed off its borders with Uganda” she noted
She appealed to the member states to jointly seek solutions to any challenging trade and investment matters which may from time to time arise and avoid stand off as this act portrays the Community in bad light given that all have agreed to work together for the common good of the 300 million East Africans.
Kadaga who doubles as a woman member of Parliament for Kamuli district noted that the EAC protocols shall gradually be accepted, embraced and implemented by the member states and that Uganda would do all it takes to ensure that the system collectively benefits all the people of EAC without segregation.
She commended all the seven EAC Block heads of states for standing together in solidarity by ensuring that they collaboratively and strategically work closely to politically iron out any unfair bottlenecks that may stand in the way for the future prosperity of the community which has the capacity and capability of becoming the one stop center basket; capable of feeding the entire African continent and beyond once the coordination of programs like agriculture, Science. Technology and innovation, trade. Industrialization and investment are harnessed.
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‘Am very confident and firm that the EAC block has the capacity and potential of becoming the food basket of the entire African continent and beyond however in order to achieve that dream and goal, we must work as a block through unity in diversity to effectively identify our economic strengths and be able to sale our products under one flag of the EAC as well as identify our weaknesses such that we can jointly seek solutions to move forward’ Kadaga.
The minister reminded all stakeholders, that the EAC block has been put under the spotlight by the international community who are closely monitoring whatever the block was planning for its over 300 people, therefore it was incumbent upon all the concerned authorities to take up the path of dialogue in seeking solutions to emerging challenges as opposed to confrontation which only divides the block .She however noted that future of the block is bright, promising and would help foster the economic development agenda of the East Africans.
She said Uganda is ready to work jointly with all stakeholders in the block in ensuring that the people are guided into the right path of development and prosperity by enabling them to overcome the burden of poverty and fend off the negative challenges such as poor health which affects both production and productivity.
Kadaga says the other areas of focus like improved access to clean water and sanitation, education for all, lay strategies of job creation for the majority including persons with disabilities who are vulnerable and face many societal challenges yet all have equal rights as all.