East Africa Economic Report

LAPSSET Corridor Eight years ago, this publication predicted that Lamu will become a major city in Kenya. Something of a Qatar of East Africa. This prediction was grounded on several factors to wit: the 32-berth Lamu Port; the then proposed 120,000 BPD refinery; LAPSSET; the proposed power generation plants to generate 1150 MW; a  Crude  Oil Pipeline from Kenya’s oil fields in  Marsabit, and possibly South Sudan. Also See    https://eaers.blogspot.com/2018/06/lamu-gunning-to-be-energy-hub-in-kenya.html We said that these projects will  change Lamu’s  ecosystem. But we never anticipated the Magnitude of the change that came eight years later. We did not imagine, in our wildest dreams, of a US$17 billion  Petrochemical Plant processing 700,000 bpd. Now that Lamu has been chosen to host the plant, the second largest such  plant in Africa, we update our prediction because the changed ecosystem extends beyond Lamu County. Then  new complex c...

The Equator bridge: Looking doable   The East Africa Petrochemicals project is serious. The groundbreaking ceremony is this week, just three months after it was announced. The US$17 billion, project, driven by Africa’s richest Man, Nigeria’s Aliko Dangote, is historic and a record breaker.   Karuma dam: First Act of defiance against the West It is the apex of the continuing narrative of Africa rising, and it has landed with a bang! Few investors elsewhere will match that record, Not the Chinese, not the West. Only African billionaires will  approximate that record.  We are witnessing Africa’s economic emancipation in real time!   And Kenya, will become the nexus  of massive investments, it appears, because money follows money. The location of the Plant, in Lamu County, is also the head of the massive( $25 billion) LAPPSET corridor. LAPSSET, for Lamu Port, South Sudan Ethiopia corridor is a multi modal transport corridor incorporating a Sea Port,  High ...

LAPSSET Corridor: New Impetus KENYA’S Long-term development Blueprint, Vision 2030, launched in 2007, is hurtling toward the end. And Kenyans are discussing a new blueprint- Beyond 2030. Now, it is time to review Vision 2030. Did it deliver? Is it a good foundation to build a new blueprint? Were there weaknesses? What were they? Can they be redeemed?  Vision 2030 “aimed to transform Kenya into a newly industrializing, middle-income nation providing high quality of life for all its citizens by 2030. It was premised on three pillars Viz: Economic, Social, and Political. Anchored on Enablers and Macro foundations.” The target is defined. W e can now review it. Did Vision 2030 deliver?  According to the scorecard published by the Vision 2030 Secretariat, by 2024 significant progress had been made in all the pillars except the Economic Pillar. The Political Pillar, the least technical of the three, was 88.2 percent enforced. The Social pillar, incorporating education, Health, Clean...

  A Passenger  SGR train: Five hours to  Nairobi from Mombasa Finally! Kenya and Uganda have tightened the first bolts on the construction of the “Lunatic Express 2.0.” This marks the end of a six-year hiatus on the project.  The “Lunatic Express 2.0”, otherwise christened the Standard Gauge Railway, which had stalled on Kenya’s town of Naivasha will now extend to Kisumu and Malaba on the Kenya-Uganda border. This is a section of the longer Mombasa-Kampala-Kigali railway, envisaged back in 2009 by the East Africa Community. The crossing into Kampala, Uganda is a major milestone on the project. The two countries are under pressure from other members of the community to complete this section so that they take it up from there. The US$ 5 billion, 500KM section is a game-changer in transport logistics in this region. It cuts travel time from Mombasa Port on the Kenyan coast to Kampala, 1200KM inland, to 24 hours - down from the current four-days to a week. ...

Nairobi Expressway: With the City CBD in the background e  When the American You Tuber, Ishowspeed, visited Africa last Month, live streaming his stunts, Americans were shocked. To them, Ishowspeed had demolished the narrative of an underdeveloped, poverty- stricken Africa.   The African story previously was a story of destitution, of people living in hovels, no water, no electricity, no cities, and no cars... blah blah! “Africa is a shithole continent,” Trump said. The Live streams of expressways, high-rise buildings, modern cars, happy, healthy, and energetic people, shocked Americans, -and destroyed the narrative. I hear the live streams have stirred interest on the continent, and tourism enquiries are rising. I leave that to tourist- arrivals data at the end of the year. My point here is to answer the question: How did we get here?    It’s a combination of factors, to wit: Geopolitics, the digital revolution, the emergence of China as the second-largest power hou...

The Tanzanian standard Gauge Train, which has been running for less than two years, has suffered frequent minor mishaps. Among these are frequent stoppages due to power outages.  However, over the last two months, these mishaps have escalated to include a derailment and service suspension due to a flooded river damaging the infrastructure. This has led to the public lashing out at the management, terming it incompetent. No Sir. The management is not incompetent. The problem lies elsewhere, and no Management, however competent, can deal with it. The mistakes were made at the design stage. The line is a level crossing line with few elevations. That is the problem, and I shall be brutally frank. It will persist for the life of the line. Around October 25 th , 2025, the train derailed at Ruvu station during the morning run from Dar-Es- Salaam to Dodoma. The management described the accident as an “operational hitch.” And On December 31st, 2025. The service was suspended as heavy ...